A fly fishing friend posted a request for a “Killer Crane Fly” pattern. I did a bit of research and sent him a link to a pattern I had seen on the web. After thinking about it for a while, I decided to play around with a slightly more realistic crane fly. This pattern is a fishing fly with a few touches added to make it appeal to me, as well as the fish. It’s been said that there are no new patterns to be found in fly fishing... I’m sure someone out there might say this looks like the XYZ pattern, etc. If so, apologies in advance. I honestly haven’t seen a peccary body on a crane fly pattern as of yet.

Material List:

Hook: Mustad 3665A Size 16

Thread: Rust

Body: Peccary quill over thread base (bulge at bend)

Legs: Paint Brush, knotted and colored with marker

Thorax: Superfine dubbing with mottled turkey shell back

Wings: Cree hackle tips treated with FlexLock (Grizzly, Dun, etc. to match natural)

Tying Instructions: Prepare and stage all materials in advance:

1. Coat wings with FlexLock and preen toward tip.

2. Pre-knot leg material and color in advance

3. Build the underbody with thread or fine dubbing. Make a bulge at the rear as per the natural's taper.

4. Tie in the peccary at the bend and wind toward the eye.

5. Tie off peccary, color it with marker.

6. Tie in wing case.

7. Set first 2 sets of legs and use superglue after tying in to set positions.

8. Set wings and dub to that point covering legs and wing tie in point.

9. Place last set of legs, super glue after tie in, pull turkey over and tie off.

Cheers,

Bruce C