Beginner’s Fly Tying Online Sign-Up Deadline

Hope that everyone had a wonderful holiday and that these early winter days have given you an opportunity to relax with a favorite beverage, while you tie some flies for the coming colder months. For our January Beginner’s (virtual) Fly Tying session, I have chosen another streamer pattern, which I and several of our club members use for catching stocked trout, as well as steelhead, during the winter months. The pattern is commonly called an egg-sucking leech.

Closely resembling a standard woolly bugger, the bright colored yarn or bead tied in at the front of the fly seems to enhance the fish’s interest in the fly (see note below, regarding the use of flies with egg heads). Materials and instructions for tying my version of the egg-sucking leech will be provided to all who sign up for the January session.

From my internet search: Egg Sucking Leech a Deeper Look at a Controversial Fly – “Contrary to popular belief, flies with egg heads have been around for close to 200 years. This makes it difficult to validate arguments that we shouldn’t fish egg-suckers because they’re not traditional. Flies like the Dallas, Toppy, and Beauly Snow flies were finished with tufts (technically termed ruffs) of red, orange, yellow and green mohair — essentially turning beautiful classic flies into really expensive, time-consuming egg-suckers. Even leech flies have been tied as early as the 1700s, with The Horse Leech Fly from Brookes’ ‘Art of Angling’ mentioned in 1740. Classic fly tyer, Dave Carne adds that it’s important to note that most of the bright-head flies were primarily used as spring patterns.”