A few more flies for freshwater comp

Tied a few more flies
Some yellow black versions of Peter's Orange Black Toga fly
Again simple fly, quick to tie and very very effective in  amongst the lilies

Also some size 6 semper style flies for tiny tarpon (not at all like Northern Hemisphere Tarpon

The tarpon in the billabongs are numerous, but only averaging 20cm, but the occasional 40-50cm plus are about at times. One year two 63cm versions were caught in open water - quite big for freshwater locations
But as fish are fish when nothing else about and they are still lots of points, and points are points when the sun is high and nothing else about

Last time Peter and I were at Corroboree we had a ball catching in total 6 meters plus, each of cumulative measurement of the tiny tarpon we caught in a hot afternoon session (temperature and numbers).
It was a very hard weekend of fishing and the bountiful tiny tarpon empowered our weekend when other species, Saratoga and Barramundi, were not cooperating.

But we only caught them on tiny anorexic flies that Peter had just a couple of
one hook broke after many fish, lost another fly to a worn leader- so we were desperate not to lose the last ones we had currently tied on our tippets!

So this time I made a few quite small semper style baitfish flies, on size 6 hooks.

Not easy but not difficult to tie, but still with practice you start to get the shape right

Lay down a tight bed of thread along the hook shank
Next, tie in a clump of craft hair extending from tail
Then next clump is tied midway along hook shank with fibre tips forward facing
Once ties in, fold the tips rearward and place a few judicious  wraps of tying thread in front of the bend point
Given size of fly only fit one more clump of craft fur in, tied behind the hook eye
A few more wraps in front of tie in point of third clump then tie off thread

I add a few drops of 'Tulip' fabric paint, usually white in colour that dries clear. I use a fabric paint with glitter in it. This is smoothed out over the head area of the fly with a toothpick rolled not stroked over the craft fur

Once fabric paint is partially dried (about an hour) I added some red 3.5mm 3D eyes by putting a single drop of fabric paint on the sticky side of eye. The eye is then placed on the head area and a toothpick is used to smooth out any lumpy bits

The fabric paint takes 48-72 hours to dry according to the packet, but I have fished this type of fly 12 hours after using the paint.

Anyway - tying is fun no matter if the fish like the fly or not
However, hopefully they like the little fly like I do