I just used to hook my bobbin onto a screw when I first started tying as a child (actually tying flies in your hands was more popular too…), but nowadays I use the more fancy sort of setup shown here.

Pheasant Tail Nymph - Tied by David Cammiss

Another must have under the surface fly is the Pheasant Tail Nymph (PTN), which, when fished upstream in a fast flowing river for brown trout is often a deadly pattern, as it is retrieved slowly on a figure-of-eight in a small still water.

Below we have a tutorial video which takes you through tying the Pheasant Tail Nymph.

This is another attractor pattern which imitates general aquatic life but doesn’t single out any one species in particular. This is a nymph attractor, as the name suggests.

I like to fish a PTN on the point fly in a three fly combo with a gold head PTN or GRHE on the top dropper and something similar on the middle dropper (usually a more imitative pattern based upon what is in the water – found through kick sampling (another future post there!)) upstream in the faster ripply rapids water of Northern English rivers early in the season (March to May/June) and this fly on point regularly takes brownies and the odd grayling as it whizzes along just off the bottom past good lies.

David Cammiss has produced yet another excellent fly-tying tutorial video, to which I need to add very little, so just watch the below video and ask any questions in the comments section at the bottom here:

The Adams Irresistable (Tied by Davie McPhail)

This is the first, I hope, of many videos we will feature from Davie McPhail: this Scotsman produces really excellent fly-tying videos on YouTube and we are going to be featuring many of them over the coming weeks and months as we look to replenish our stocks of flies before March.

In this video, Davie ties the “Adams Irresistable” which is a slight variation on the classic Adams dry fly that no self-respecting flyfisher would leave home without at least one of in his box.