First things first, I am NOT an expert at fly tying or almost any other thing. I am one of those "farm kid" types of people who has tried a million things, but I'm not particularly great at anything. (Fwiw, that's also a fair assessment of me as a high school football player when I was a teenager or as a high school football coach now.) I am a generalist, but what I am probably best at is teaching, which also means connecting people with other people and the resources and materials necessary. I can do that. Please, though, do NOT call me an "expert" at anything related to fly tying or fly fishing. It's not a false humility. Someday I hope to go fishing with some of you, and I don't want to have to explain why my casting is so bad, or why my flies look so scruffy.
Now on to the topic, which, by the way, was a great idea for this thread,
@uncertainbyprinciple....
@CrabHusker hit on a bunch of great points in his post above, but I want to draw special attention to this part above that I quoted. There are some things that are absolutely, indisputably true about fly tying:
- You absolutely will NOT save any money by taking up fly tying. In theory, it's possible, but in order to do so, you'll have to have already spent more than enough money to know what you can do to save money that you will already have spent more than the cost of a lifetime's worth of discount flies. If you genuinely want to get a lot of decent flies at the best possible price, I'd recommend this site:
- Fly tying can be as expensive as you want it to be. You will generally get what you pay for, but it's possible to tie serviceable flies with very cheap tools and materials. Think of it like DIY work at home though: I can get by doing a lot of stuff in my home with a cheap pliers, screwdrivers, and a Stanley 16 oz. hammer, but, man, if I want to build a house, I'd better have nicer stuff and a lot more of it. So it is with fly tying. Much like using tools or fly rods or many other things, the more skilled you get, the better capable you are at getting by with cheaper, crappier stuff.
- Fly tying is its own reward. If you want the flies, but you're not excited about the whole process of both making them and learning how to make them, don't bother getting started. My wife calls it "crafts for men," and she's not wrong. You'll be much more discerning than even the most persnickety of trout. I have spent hours tying flies that I could have bought for a couple bucks, and the ones I bought would likely have been better quality. It's fun to create useful things, and it helps that there's an aesthetic quality to it. It's meticulous work with your hands, so it definitely helps if you've enjoyed hobbies in the past like woodworking, leatherwork, etc.
- It's both insanely addicting, and it has an insidious but ubiquitous way of changing how you look at the whole world. I can't drive past a Hobby Lobby without wondering what they have in there that would be cheaper than buying it from a fly shop. I have literally spent hours in Walmart, reading the labels for material compositions on yarns, holding them up to the light to check for translucence, etc. I'm a full-fledged hoarder. I can't skin or clean game without saving the hide or feathers. There's very fine copper wire in transformers for computers, printers, etc., so how the heck can you just throw those away? There's a wonderful synthetic material called "tri-lobal fibers," and it was especially popular in use in those old, ugly late 70s through 80s carpets that, until right now, you've been just tossing away without realizing what treasures lie within! You'll find yourself looking at pets, wondering, "I wonder what that dog's hair looks like underwater? Does it float?" Your wife's cat that you secretly used to want to kill will suddenly become a never-ending supply of dubbing as you become Rumplestiltzkin spinning his discarded hair into gold. You'l find yourself going full redneck when you see roadkilled animals on the side of the road, and about 50' afterwards you stop to go back and "harvest" some of that fur or feathers because you don't have that at home. You'll suddenly see the brilliance in having pet peacocks and/or guinea fowl, and you'll want to start putting up artificial wood duck nests for nefarious purposes. Starlings, grackles, pigeons, rabbits, gophers, chipmunks, pine squirrels, gray squirrels, fox squirrels, and woodchucks aren't just backyard pests: they become prey species for adding more material. The old buddy you used to go hunting ducks with will suddenly seem like a very important person with whom you need to get reconnected. I'm not making this up, and I could keep going with another several dozen examples. It's a sickness ... a wonderful, awesome, sometimes self-fulfilling sickness. Your wife will mock you, but that's okay because you'll discover that you can steal her nail polish and cuticle scissors and put them to much better use than she currently does. They actually have 12-step support groups for people who are addicted to a) fly tying, b) fly fishing, c) hoarding stuff for fly tying and fly fishing. I could easily join all three groups, and my wife would send me to meetings with cookies and a little more hope in her heart. If you were to attend one of those meetings, at at least one point during the evening you would notice some article of clothing that somebody is wearing that would be put to infinitely better use as fly tying material.
- Catching a fish on a fly that you tied is one of the more pleasurable things that you can do in life with your clothes on. It doesn't matter if that fish is stupid either. You'll feel like you just mastered a very important part of "life."
- If you have Obsessive-Compulsive tendencies--are you the type of guy who likes the light switches to all be up or down, and you'll notice when your wife (or somebody else) turns your hanger the opposite way?--you're going to be obsesses with it at first in ways that truly aren't healthy. You'll be encouraged enough by what you can do to believe that you can do more than you're capable, but your hands and your eyes and your brain won't be coordinated enough to do it quickly enough, and you'll want to pick up everything periodically and throw it in the neighbor's backyard,... but then you'll also slip away at night to go to the bathroom and suddenly find that you're tying a half-dozen flies at 3am for no reason that would make sense to anybody who's not insane. You will find that you can spend months tying every possible fly that you can imagine using on a trip, yet you'll still end up fishing just one or two, and those are likely to be ones that a guide or your buddy or somebody at a fly shop recommended. I can properly identify the materials, tying methods, and even the creators of multiple complex Atlantic salmon spey flies, but I've not only never fished for Atlantic salmon, I don't know that I ever will. I have books that explain the history of flies, and I read them for fun. In the fall of 2014 I somehow got in the habbit of reading some fly tying and fly fishing books while riding the bus with my football players, but I had to quit: my mind wasn't on the game when we arrived.
- You also need to be properly warned of a few more related things. I should also point out that it's highly unlikely that any of your current friends will "get it," so you're about to enter a whole new realm of "odd" in their mind. You're about to find yet another bottomless pit for your disposable income, which will cease to exist as a concept by August. Finally, no woman alive has ever said, "You know what really made me more attracted to my husband was how much he knew about dry hackle and marabou."
Now that I've properly warned you of all of these dangers, the rest is fairly straight-forward. Crab's giving some solid advice, except unlike him I got started finishing flies with a whip finisher, and now I hate doing it by hand. To each his own, though. We can still be friends, I guess. I do not recommend buying any starter kits as they tend to be too general for your specific needs and too specific for your general needs. Your most important purchase will be your fly tying vise. If you have a fly shop nearby, they usually have demo models available, and it's a good idea to start out by borrowing a vise from someone else before spending an afternoon in a fly shop testing them out by tying flies on them, if they'll let you do that. If they let you do that, buy it from them. It'll be slightly more expensive, but, man, reward them for making that service available for you. Most fly shops also have fly tying classes, but I'd recommend tying a few flies before you start because it'll help a lot.
One place where I disagree with Crab is probably because of what has changed since he started tying: I don't recommend buying any books to help you get started tying flies. There are too many wonderful resources available online, especially fly tying channels on YouTube. It is infinitely easier and better to watch a fly being tied on video than to read about it and look at pictures of it in a book or magazine. I still have shelves full of books on flies, but those were far more useful AFTER I had already learned how to tie flies. I posted some channels in the FFFFFF thread, so I'll repost those here later.
As for bare bones tools that you absolutely have to have to tie flies and not end up frustrated, here's my list:
- Fly tying vise
- Bobbins = these are the things that hold a spool of thread and help to place the thread more precisely; get at least one that is either glass-lined or has a ceramic insert as the all-metal ones are notorious for cutting through the thread as you're tying, but the cheap all-metal ones are fine for heavier thread for big flies, bass bugs, etc.
- Fine-point scissors = your wife's fingernail scissors will work at first, but get some Dr. Slick scissors in the near future; the knockoffs are not as good; related: do NOT let your wife borrow your fly-tying scissors for any purpose up to and including impromptu emergency surgery on small children.
- Whip finisher = at first it seems like a mystical, magical tool, but with about 20 minutes of practice, you'll be proficient with it; I'd recommend a mid-sized Matarelli style whip finisher; there are great videos that show how to use them
- Bodkin = this is just Shakespearean language for "sharp, pointy thing;" lots of guys make their own by inserting a needle into a wooden dowel handle and cementing it in place. You can also buy one for a couple bucks on Ebay or elsewhere. Don't spend a lot on this because if you get a nice one you'll lose it or break it, but if you get a cheap and ugly one, it'll last forever
- You can get some bobbin threaders cheap on Ebay, but no matter how many I have, they seem to all run off with the odd socks that disappear in the dryer, never to be seen again.
There is no limit to what you can convince yourself you "need," but that's sufficient to get started on most basic flies. Once you have those all figured out, you'll be able to figure out what else you should get next. If you need reading glasses, it's a good idea to go ahead and invest in a decent magnifying lamp right away. I never knew how handy they were until I was given one by a widow whose husband had used it.
As for materials, it depends on the flies that you want to tie. If you tell us what kind of fish you'll most often be trying to catch right away, we can narrow down the flies to tie, which will narrow down the materials list. As a general rule, you don't want to start with tiny flies unless you want to risk endlessly retyping "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" before dying from the cold in the middle of a maze while trying to kill your own son. It helps the endorphins a lot if you see success early on, so I also don't recommend starting out by tying flies for chasing after muskies, steelhead, Atlantic salmon, permit, sawfish, or coelacanth. Bass and trout are good, but bluegills, sunfish, and rock bass are better.
There are several very effective flies that are really nothing more than just thread and/or yarn (which is what chenille is) on a hook. If you fish for trout or panfish, there are several very simple patterns that are great starters. For bass, trout, or panfish, it's very tough to beat a small Woolly Bugger. If you like fishing Woolly Buggers, it's probably one of the most effective easy patterns to use when you first get started in fly tying AND fly fishing. I'll put a video below that talks at length about tying them, and it's geared towards a tier who is just starting out.
Hooks and thread are two of the most important decisions that you'll make that seem mundane at first, but you'll regret it if you go cheap. You don't want to get poor quality thread, or you'll find yourself swearing in multiple languages when it keeps breaking on you, always in the most inopportune moments. Ditto for the hooks, except those will break off in the mouth of the largest fish you've ever caught in your life. As a general rule of thumb, buy hooks that are made in Japan, and you'll rarely regret it. Gamakatsu are about as good as there is, but they cost about as much as gold teeth. Tiemco and Daiichi are a slight grade below in quality, but they're a significant step down in price. Thread breaks down as it ages, so avoid buying used thread or thread from places that aren't constantly turning over their inventory. The greater diameter, the less it's an issue. The size and style of thread also needs to match the flies that you're tying.
For my kids to learn how to tie flies, I had them all tie Woolly Buggers, starting in sizes 6, 8, and 10. A poorly tied Woolly Bugger will get just as many bites as a perfectly tied $5 Orvis one. Black, brown, olive, and white are all great, but you'll never go wrong with black.
If you or anyone else wants me to do, I can put together a care package of pretty much everything that I listed here and mail it off to you. I have enough materials to outfit the Chinese Red Army. I also have quite a few cheap vises. My wife would be ecstatic to see some stuff leaving the house, so we could work out the details later. Maybe a trade for something.
