My buddy Luke Langton is a heck of a fly tyer! In fact, he kind of wrote the book on fly fishing and fly tying for temperate bass. That's not a joke folks! Click here to check his book out!
I was looking through his book the other day and ran across a pattern called the Watkins Special that I REALLY liked and decided to tinker with it. On a side note, I feel like tinkering with fly patterns is what tyers like to do. We see a pattern and think, "What if I changed this, or swapped this material for that material?" While I have no doubt that Luke's patter is the optimal design, I just couldn't help myself!
In Luke's pattern, he uses a chartreuse and white tail. He also colors the top of the white chenille with a chartreuse marker. I didn't have any chartreuse fibers on hand and wanted to go with a different countershading as well. I like to mix darker and lighter colors because I believe that looks a little more natural and will work in both stained and clear water. I went with a light olive instead and a gold sharpie ended up looking a little olive when I colored the white chenille. I also decided to wrap past the eyes as well to give it a chunkier shape. It seems like most of the mass of a minnow/shad will be wards the head and I wanted to mimic that appearance.
I'm excited to get this in the fly tester and throw it this fall. All credit goes to Luke for this fly. He's a good follow on Instagram and his book is high quality in terms of pictures and instructions for tying flies. If you are in need of something to put on your holiday wish list, this would not be a bad gift to receive!
Link to Luke's book: https://www.amazon.com/Temperate-Bass-Flies-Patterns-Hybrids/dp/B0918BXGP7/ref=sr_1_1
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