Crane Fly Patterns

W

Wmass

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Sep 17, 2006
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Could someone recommend a good crane fly pattern? I have seen alot of these on the water lately and need a good pattern.
 
Wmass:

Mine may not be the best but it sure may qualify as one of the simplest. I warn you; it AIN'T the greatest floater so use Frog Fanny or your favorite stuff:

Hook - your favorite light wire dry fly hook
Body - Thread
Legs/Hackle - about 3 wraps of dry fly hackle that is approximately the length of the shank; tied in at the head SLOPING backward at about a 30 degree angle. Slightly over-wrapping the hackle with a few turns of thread will help to get it to slope at that angle.

Whip finish and that's it. I'll post a picture tomorrow if you are interested but its just a thread bodied fly with no tail and hackle the slopes backwards.

You can tie about 20 in an hour and they DO work!
 
check the fly swap page...I think Chaz had one last year...
 
Here's one that I've had success with not only in PA, but also on the spring creeks of WI and Iowa. It's pretty simple and comes from Ross Mueller, who has written a couple of books on fishing the Midwestern Spring Creeks.

Hook: #18 dry fly hook, your choice. I like the Cabela's Model 4 straight eye hooks.

Body/Abdomen: cream/yellow fur or synthetic dubbing, fine and thin. Start the body well down into the hook bend.

Thorax: a little sulfur orange dubbing. The thorax should take up no more than about 1/6th of the overall length of the body. Pretty short.

Wings: a pair of white/cream hackle tips tied delta-style. Wings should extend about 1/3 of the shank length beyond the bend

Hackle: Cream, oversize. Wrap over front portion of the orange thorax figure-8 around the wings. Use a hackle you might use on a size #8-10 fly. Then clip the bottom flush to the hook.

This is a pretty effective fly. but in my experience, trout focus on craneflies pretty sporadically and there will be lots of times when it isn't worth a hoot. But when they are on them, it's a good fly.
 
Chaz, has a great cranefly pattern. He gave me some once and they worked very well!
 
I like Chaz's crane fly too. You can find it in the 2004 Fly Swap page. I used to tie mine like Bamboozle, because I figured the long swept-back hackle would look more like a crane fly's legs, but he's right that it doesn't float that great. Chaz's floats nicely and is more visible, and it works great. RLeeP's hackling sounds interesting, because it has longer hackle that would look like long legs, but is clipped on the bottom for better floatation. Chaz has a #14 orange one in the Fly Swap, but many of them (like those on Valley Creek now) are more like #16-18. And some crane flys are yellow, brown, or gray. I'm not sure if the wing is necessary, but I've started tying mine with gray Z-lon, just because it's easier to tie in.
 
Another crane fly I use with success is nothing but a size 16-18 Tak's Biot Midge tied with a grey biot wing; yellow thread body and dun hackle. I guess if you wanted to you could add some long hackle fibers for legs but I never bothered.

I don't know if the trout think it's a Crane Fly or not but I do and if they take it ; I can figure I'm smarter than them :-D
 
You may not want to buy your flies, but I like these:
percy flies
 
How do I get to the 2004 fly swap page? Anybody have a link maybe instead?
 
The flyswaps pages are in the top post in this forum. They are a "sticky" post, meaning they are permanently in the top spot. But here is the direct link for you.
http://home.comcast.net/~jmanderino/PAFF2004.htm
 
I will try and post a few pictures of the flies that I tied up to look like craneflies. I just found a pattern in a book and followed it, with a few tweaks here and there. I have yet to fish it though so I don't know how it will work. I will post the pics later tonight.
 
Hey guys,

Can somebody post Chaz's recipe in this thread? We have comcast blocked here at work and I wanted to stop by a fly shop after work to pick up supplies for that pattern. I am a huge pain for this crane fly pattern! Sorry!

BJ
 
Orange Crane Fly
Tied By Chaz
Hook: #18 tiemco dry fly hook
Thread: Rusty Orange
Body: Sulphur Rabbit Fur
Wings: Dun Hackle Tips Tied over the body (not used on pictured fly)
Hackle: Brown Hackle Feathers

Tying Instructions:
Use a rusty orange thread and start by wrapping it back to the bend of the hook.
Dub either sulphur or medium gray fur dubbing and wrap around the hook until
it is 2/3 of the distance up toward the eye. Tie 2 dun hackle tips down over the body
as you would on a Henryville Special. The last step is to tie on a brown hackle and wrap
it around the hook 3 or 4 times and tie all of this off.
 
Jack, did you ask permission? Chaz may wnat to go into Don' Sculpin mode. :lol: :lol:
 
Here's Chaz's pattern:

Hook: #14 Standard Dry
Thread: Orange Unicord
Body: Sulfur Dubbing
Wing: Dun Hackle tied downwing
Hackle: Ginger

Can't you use the link at the top of this forum? It's the first "post" in this Fly Tying forum, titled "PA Fly Swaps 2003-2007". If you can get into it, there's a picture of the fly, which gives you a much better idea of how to tie it.

P.S. I see Jack posted while I was writing my response. He posted Chaz's pattern from the 2003 Swap. I posted his from the 2004 Swap. The picture in the 2004 Swap is better.
 
Wulff-Man:

Thank you for posting the pattern. The first time I asked about the fly swap page I was just dumb and didn't see the sticky. Today my problem is that I am blocked from viewing the Fly Swap pages since I am at work. I really appreciate it.

BJ
 
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