This idea started off with the intent to make a weightless version of my favorite streamer, The Brave. While that was a simple task, it got me thinking. I removed the cone head from this pattern to give it less of a jigging motion and hopefully give it more side to side motion when fished on sink tip line. I also really like a streamer called "Matt Bennett's Lunch Money" but again, I wanted a version of that fly that was not weighted. What I ended up with was a little bit of both.
What I created was part zonker (like The Brave), part Lunch Money, and part Roamer. I gave the fly a combination tail with one part marabou and the other part rabbit strip. From there, I gave the fly a rabbit strip body and used the same rabbit strip from the tail as the back of the fly. I added some silicon legs to give it a little more flutter and to break up the overall silhouette. Finally, I used four total clumps of laser dub to make the head. I used two clumps that matched the rabbit strip (gray in this case) that I had used for the back and two clumps that matched the rabbit strip (white) that I had used for the body.
I have really high hopes for this fly. I hope that it has a nice hover and maybe a side to side motion like a jerk bait when stripped aggressively. I thought about keel weighting these flies but want to do some field testing first in order to see if a keel weight is necessary. I tied these flies on a 1/0 Gamakatsu B10S which I think is a perfect fit for the materials that I am using. The fly is 3 and 1/2 inches long and has a great taper to it. The materials go from more bulk at the head to thinner in the tail which is similar to the idea that most of the mass of a fish can usually be found in the front half of its body. Field testing is in order now and I will post about the results as soon as possible.
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