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Orange Heron Spey Tutorial
Syd Glasso pattern
tied by Bruce E. Harang
Note: The following tutorial follows the manner in which Syd Glasso actually tied the floss rear bodied flies of his Heron series. The method was disclosed to me by Russ Osenbach who learned it from Steve Gobin. Steve Gobin in turn was taught directly by Syd Glasso.
Materials:
Hook:
Return loop up eye salmon, size and weight to suit (here a Partridge Bartleet
Traditional code CS10/1
-- a currently available hook
close in style to the Sealey hook
used by Syd Glasso is the Alec Jackson Low
Water Dee hook)
Thread: Hot orange floss used as the working thread
Hackle: Whiting
Spey hackle dyed Heron gray
Rib:
Medium flat sliver tinsel overlaid (followed) by silver oval tinsel size
medium or small
Body: Rear
slightly less than half - hot orange floss; front slightly more than half - hot orange seal or substitute
(here SLF Hot Orange dubbing)
Throat: Teal flank finely penciled and stripped on one side (an
excellent substitute especially when longer fibers
are needed is Gadwall flank)
Wing: Hot
orange hackle tips
Head: Red
(here Gudebröd 6/0,
BCS 85 Red)
Tying Instructions:
1. Mount an up eye return loop salmon hook in your vise.
2. Attach the floss just behind the hook return wire with a jam knot as you would regular tying thread.
3. Using the floss as the working thread mount the flat medium silver tinsel with a tapered end on top of the hook shank.
4. Again using the floss as the working thread mount the medium or small oval tinsel on the bottom of the hook shank.
5. Wrap the flat tinsel in touching turns rearward on the hook shank to a point above the hook point and let it hang using a hackle pliers or material clamp to hold it in place. Leave the floss and oval tinsel at the front of the fly.
5. (Rotary alternate technique) If you choose to use a rotary vise to wrap the floss in the next step you can't use a hackle pliers to hold the flat tinsel in place as the flat tinsel will wrap around the hook while you wrap the floss body. To prevent this use a small clamp (here made from a small piece of popper foam to hold the tinsel tight to the hook shank and remove the hackle pliers leaving the long tag end of the flat tinsel free to rotate. Also note inserting a short length of plastic tube through the eye of the hook used as a thread stop so a half hitch is not needed allows the unwrapping of unnecessary tie in wraps.
6. Wrap the floss rearward to a point one flat tinsel width short of the hook point tying down the oval tinsel on the bottom of the hook shank at the same time.
7. Then wrap the floss forward a short distance so that the Spey hackle will be tied in where the oval tinsel will cross over the Spey hackle stem as it is wrapped forward behind the flat tinsel. This prevents the Spey hackle stem from being cut by the edge of the flat tinsel.
8. Tie in the Spey hackle on near side top of the hook shank with the floss. This tie in position may seem odd but in fact when the floss is wrapped over the butt it does not effect the overall look or proportions of the body. And it allows the tinsels to start around the hook and become set in proper position to make wrapping the hackle tight against the rear of the oval tinsel easier.
9. Continue wrapping the floss forward to short of the mid-point of the hook shank.
10. Split the strand of floss using your bodkin, wax the split halves of the floss strand, and add dubbing by first spinning a small amount of dubbing on just one side of the split floss, then put the rest of the sparse amount of dubbing in the dubbing loop and twist to tighten the dubbing loop. Make sure to taper the front and rear ends of the dubbing loop create a smooth transition from floss body to dubbed body and from dubbed body to wing mounting point.
11. Wrap the dubbed floss forward to the front of the body which is usually up onto the hook return a bit. Tie in your red thread just in front of the dubbing and then tie off the floss.
12. Take the flat silver tinsel one tight turn forward over itself.
13. Continue to wrap the flat silver tinsel forward over the body in five open turns and tie off on the bottom of the hook shank immediately in front of the body.
14. Wrap the oval tinsel tight against the rear edge of the flat tinsel making sure that it goes over the Spey hackle stem and tie off on the bottom of the hook shank over the flat tinsel tie in point.
15. Wrap the Spey hackle forward immediately behind and tight against the oval tinsel to the front of the body, take a wrap of thread over the Spey hackle stem crossing on the bottom of the hook shank, then finish with 1 or 2 wraps of Spey hackle right in front of the body and tie off on the bottom of the hook shank. This single wrap of thread at the end spiral hackle wraps prevents the hackle from sliding back away from the back edge of the oval tinsel.
16. Strip one side of the teal flank feather and tie in on the bottom of the hook shank. Take 1.5 turns of teal flank feather and tie off on the top of the hook shank. Tying off on top actually helps in mounting the wings as the butt provides a bit of support to hold the wings in place and helps prevent them from rotating after they are tied in.
17. Pull the Spey hackle fibers and the teal flank fibers down toward the bottom of the hook so that there is virtually no hackle on the top of the hook. This helps in mounting the wing to sit low in the style and form of the traditional Spey fly bronze mallard wings.
18. The wings are basically, two pair of matched full hackle feathers, each pair being tied in as a unit in the manner of tying in a bronze mallard wing on a traditional Spey fly . One pair is a right and one pair is a left. That is one pair will naturally arc downward when placed on the near side of the hook and the other pair will naturally arc downward when placed on the far side of the hook. . The far side pair of wing feathers being tied in first such that they are mounted on the side and tent over to the center top of the fly. The near side pair of wing feathers are then tied in similarly on the near side of the hook. This produces a wing that sits low along the body of the fly and still has a keel-like edge profile along the top edge of the wing exactly like the traditionally mounted bronze mallard wing on a traditional Spey fly. This winging method may also be found in Bob Veverka’s book SPEY FLIES, HOW TO TIE THEM.
Here the far side paired wing is mounted like a bronze mallard winge.
The same far side wing as seen in a 3/4 far side view.
In this photograph we see the far side wing feathers from the near side of the fly in a 3/4 view. The tenting around the fly upper body and top of the fly can be clearly seen.
Now the near side pair of feathers are mounted as a unit on the near side of the fly tented to meet the far side feathers along the common upper edge and tent down over the near side of the body at the tie in point.
A near side 3/4 view showing the complete mounted wing.
A near side view with the wing butts have been cut off and a small proportionate head has been completed and whip finished.
A far side view with the wing butts have been cut off and a small proportionate head has been completed and whip finished.
A top view of the completed fly showing an almost perfect tented wing. The wings are mounted and look just like bronze mallard wings when properly mounted.
The only thing left is to apply several coats of Sally Hansen Hard as Nails clear polish to create a glass like head on the fly and it will be ready to fish.
I wish to thank Russ Osenbach for his help and kindness in providing me with the information about the tying methods used by Syd Glasso and for his willingness to share and help preserve a valuable part of our fly tying heritage.
This is the Hoh Spey tied by Bob Veverka in 1989 which would have been in the time frame of when he visited Syd Glasso to take lessons in tying the Glasso style of Spey fly. I apologize for the low quality of the image but it is sealed in a glass dome and I did not want to accidently damage the fly trying to remove the dome. Notice how the wing sits along the top edge of the fly body and the type of spear-like feathers used to help create the low wing profile much like a traditional bronze mallard winged Spey pattern. Also note how sparse the fly is tied to prevent it from swimming on its side from too much material on the bottom of the fly.
© 2008 - 2009 Bruce E Harang