The Right Stuff?

The Right Stuff?

Martyn White | Thursday, 20 April 2023

There's still not much happening here, everything seems to be spawning. But it'll soon be warm enough for some early morning bass popping in the float tube, so it won't be long till I'm reporting on my latest puncture.

In the meantime I've been tying Sawyer's killer bugs for myself and a few friends. I've been talking about killer bugs to some other people too, it's funny how many opinions people have about such a simple fly. But you know what they say about opinions..

There's only about one thing that everyone seems to agree on, it's deadly. It has been since it was invented and it will be as long as there are trout and grayling swimming about and eating things. The reason Lee Wulff gave it the name he did for reason. There's definitely an air of mystique about the fly and (one of) the materials- the infamous Chadwick's 477. I once had a card of it, given to me by the wife of an old friend among his tying kit after he died. I'd have bee about 15 at the time, I used it up and haven't had any since. I used subs before and continued to use subs after I ran out. I didn't notice any difference in effectiveness, regardless of which yarn I used as long as it was roughly the right tone. Both the Veniard and Semperfli subs are fine to my eye, maybe a little less pinky but I'm OK with that. The Shetland Spindrift oyster yarn that many people like is a bit bright and coralish to my eye, but seems effective enough for many. In fact any wool shop will have plenty of suitable stuff.

I know some people are willing to spend hundreds of pounds on a card of 477. That's up to them, but I find it baffling for 2 reasons; the first being that Sawyer himself used subs after Chadwicks went out the game in the mid 60s. The second being to my mind more of an indication that it's somewhat deranged, and that's tying the flies with modern, bright, fly shop copper wire. That bright underbody really changes the colour of the fly when wet compared to the reddish stuff you get out of old transistors and kids toys with electric motors. Making the use of the original yarn pointless as you don't get the orignal colour of finished fly.

If you don't want to smash up a child's toys-you could befriend an armature winder to see if you can get it for free, otherwise you can easily buy armature wire ( 0.2-0.3mm is aboutgh right for a killer bug) in the right colour and spool it on an old thread spool. If you use it with a sub you'll probably be closer in colour than 477 over bright wire. But do what you like really whatever killer bug you tie, and do tie them, it'll catch fish.