NWSJ 3-47.indd

Northwoods Sporting Journal
Page 26
The Tyer’s
Corner
July 2015
The Pink Lady Streamer
by Hugh Kelly,
Detroit, ME
This month’s fly happens to
be the last streamer tied by Carrie
Stevens; she tied it to demonstrate
her technique to the man who
bought her fly tying business. The
fly can be seen at the Rangeley
Outdoor Sporting Heritage Museum in Oquossoc, ME along with
other famous flies of the region.
This fly gets confused often with
the Pink Ghost which is a different
fly entirely. You see pink versions
of many streamers out there and in
the fly fishing literature; pink in a
fly has worked for me in the past.
I’ll caution you that there are several versions of this fly and some
folks take exception to substitutions; I’ll suggest a substitution or
two in a few paragraphs.
Recipe for the Pink Lady
Streamer
Hook – Standard streamer hook,
8x long
Thread – Black
Rib – Silver Mylar
Body – Pink floss
Belly—White bucktail
Throat—Pink saddle hackle fibers
Wing – Peacock herls between
grizzly saddle hackle feathers
Shoulder – Mallard flank
Eyes—Jungle cock
I use the old Mustad 94720
hook because I still have some,
you can use the newer version of
the hook. There is no tail, tie in the
Mylar first for the rib to come later.
I use silver but many recipes for
this fly call for a gold rib. The body
is pink floss. On smaller wet flies
I usually start with white thread
when I use a light colored floss
body so the black color doesn’t
show through when it gets wet.
Since I use several layers of floss
on streamers and I don’t get any
bleed through, I feel it doesn’t
seem to be a problem with this fly.
Wrap a floss body and wind a rib
forward, five to seven wraps.
The belly is white bucktail
like many Rangeley style streamers; a small bunch selected from
the tip of the tail will flare a lot
less. Tie in the belly and add a
small bunch of pink hackle fibers
for a throat. The wing is four or
five peacock herls between two
grizzly saddle hackles. I prefer to
tie in the herls first and then each
wing after that. Carrie’s wing
method was to cement the shoulder to the wing and the eye onto
the shoulder. These preassembled
wings were then paired up and put
onto hooks with completed bodies.
There is a great blog about this
technique at http://donbastianwetflies.com/ that I really recommend
reading if you want to tie Rangeley
streamers or wet flies. Use mallard
flank feathers for shoulders and
then add the eyes. The eyes on this
fly are Jungle cock which is more
available than it was years ago.
The Ultimate Fishing Experience
Substitutions. I usually hear
thunder at this point. I often will
tie flies in gold and silver Mylar
because you never know which
color will work better in the water
you’re fishing, likely because of
tannin in the water or position of
the sun. Carrie sometimes would
wind her rib slanted toward the
rear of the hook, I’m not sure that
landlocks can tell the difference.
An orange feather between the two
grizzly saddle hackles in the wing
is an addition that came later and
this particular version has given
me some very hard hitting strikes
and break offs.
Hugh Kelly has fly fished
and tied his own flies for over 40
years. He and his family live in
Detroit where he ties flies, drinks
Moxie and plans fishing trips. He
can be reached at hkellymaine@
gmail.com and he writes a fly tying
blog at puckerbrushflies.com
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