Silver surfer – silver straggle fritz bugger

 

I was ripping the black tailed version of this fly through the chop with some success when my boat partner asked what fly is that 'silver surfer'. I explained to him that it was just a woolly bugger variant tied with a black tail and silver UV straggle fritz. I tried to give it a real name such as 'silver woolly bugger' but unfortunately 'silver surfer' has stuck.

Tied with your choice of woolly bugger tail this fly is very much a pulling fly for dirty water ... and very effective in that role.

You can of course substitute a plain, painted or anodised brass bead for the thread head and the lead wire weight as in the straggle fritz bugger.

Materials

Hook Thread Weight Body Head
Knapek L #6 to #10 Red Hends Gral 207 .015 mm lead wire Veniard UV standard size straggle fritz in silver Thread

Process

A
  1. Wind the thread half way down the hook shank.
  2. Tie in a length of .015 mm lead wire at the half way mark and take 5 wraps of the wire forward of that position.
  3. Worry off the excess wire.
  4. Continue winding the thread in touching turns to the bend of the hook.

B
  1. Tie in a marabou tail about 1.5 times the length of the hook.

C
  1. Tie in a length of straggle fritz at the bend of the hook.
  2. Stroke the straggle fritz fibres backward out of the way so that as you wind the straggle fritz forward you won't tie down any of the fibres.

D
  1. Wind the straggle fritz forward in touching turns to the 95% position taking care at each turn to stroke the straggle fritz fibres backward out of the way so that as you wind the next turn of the straggle fritz forward you don't tie down any of the fibres.
  2. Tie it off behind the bead and trim the excess straggle fritz.
  3. Build up a neat head about the same size as a 3 mm bead head and then whip finish and trim the excess thread.
  4. Apply a couple of coats of head cement to the thread head