Headstand Leech Proto Carp Fly Using Cohen's Carp Dub

Leeches are an important food element for many species of fish, including carp.  I have several friends that catch a good majority of their carp every year on leech flies.

Up to now I have always gone with a black Zimmerman's Backstabber when I wanted a leech.

The Backstabber is a superb fly and super easy to tie, but I much prefer to catch fish on flies I have designed myself.  As a result, I have been trying to come up with a leech of my own for over a year now.  I have tied up at least 15 different ideas, and I hated them all the second they came off the vice.  Unoriginal.  Ugly.  Too hard to tie.  Doesn't behave right in the water. You name it, I have screwed it.  What I needed was inspiration and that inspiration recently arrived when Pat Cohen from rusuperfly.com sent me a bunch of his new Carp Dub from Hareline.

Pat is one of my favorite on-line tiers because everything he ties has a high level of aesthetic artistry that is just beyond me.  Don't get me wrong, I think my flies are pretty spiffy and they catch the snot out of carp, but there is just no way they are as artistic as Pat's for the simple reason I am not as artistic as Pat.  So, when he sent me all that dubbing in the obvious hope that I would make something cool and carpy with it, I was a little overwhelmed and intimidated.  On demand  is NOT how the creative process works for me.  It works in it's own good time, and for no apparent reason.  If at all.  I also felt a little pressure to make something worthy of Pat freaking Cohen.  As a result I avoided my tying desk and the pile of carp dub on it for several days.

Finally yesterday I was walking by my desk when I happened to notice the "Northern Lights Black" looking at me funny.  You know, kinda out of the corner of it's eye and I just had to stop and actually take a closer look.  Pull a pinch out of the bag and feel it.  Put it under a light and check out the color variation.  "Micro-flash".  "Niiiiiiiice".  "squigglies".  "Ummmm Hmmm".  "Coarse but not TOO coarse.  "Ohhhhhh yeah".  Not really ideal for dubbing a tight body, but good for a buggy dub and PERFECT for a dubbing loop!  Twenty minutes later this was sitting there on the table in front of me.  Like magic.  A leech I don't hate.  A leech I like quite a bit.  And I feel it.

So this was version 1.0 of a Headstand articulated leach with a Cohen's Carp Dub dubbing-loop-body trimmed for a lateral - almost spoon-like profile.  Very sexy, but like I said above, pretty is not really my forte. What the fly does in the water is my thing and even as I was loving this fly I knew deep down that it would not do a head-stand as intended.  I used the shank from a size 12 dry-fly hook and there is just not enough natural buoyancy in this dubbing to lift that.

Fortunately my subconscious was on the job as I slept.  When I awoke this morning I knew exactly what I needed to do and hopped in the car for a quick run to the fly shop to get some tube tying stuff.  You know.  Stuff.  Whatever the heck stuff you need to tie tube flies.  After some consultation with David (one of my favorite shop guys because he is a born-again carper) and a quick buoyancy test in Anglers All's goldfish tank I bought this stuff:

Forty minutes later version 2.0 was off the vice and in the sink.  It now had a tail built on a 3/8" long piece of small tube fly tubing attached to the hook with big fly thread.  A quick dunk in the sink confirmed that version 1.0  (top fly below) flopped right over on it's side while version 2.0 (bottom fly below) did a decent (although not perfect) headstand.

Now I had a problem though.  I was REALLY feeling this fly.  Feeling it enough that I was going to be agitated until I got the chance to try it out.  Fortunately today was a really nice day and by 2:00 I had a little time to run to the river for some quick on-the-water winter testing.

I had some good shots in the next two hours and learned some things.

First of all I am on the right track.  I had at least 6 carp turn on the fly.  For winter carpin it was a very very positive response.

Second of all I think the fly might need to be a smidge smaller for winter carpin on the South Platte.  In other seasons and on other bodies of water I think it would be fine, but four of those carp lost interest in the fly after their initial positive reaction. In my experience, on the DSP that typically means that the fly is too big, being fished with too much movement or is too flashy.  In this case I am going for just an eensy weensy bit too big.

And finally I learned that although I THINK I am on the right track, I KNOW that the fly will actually already work as-is because two of the 6 carp were more than happy to eat the dang thing! The first was a little guy but I don't care.  The only feeling better than a winter carp is getting the stink off of a new pattern!

The second was a whole different story.  Big.  Real big.  As a matter of fact if the second fish was just half a pound heavier I could have closed out 2013 the same way I closed out 2012.  With a super-rare-for-me twenty!

Not a bad start for the Headstand Leech.  Not a bad start at all, but as you may know a fly doesn't earn a quirky name, recipe and place on the favorite flies page around here until it proves itself worthy. Two carp does not worthy prove!

RIO Carp Line Review

A couple of months ago RIO and CarpPro asked me to review the RIO Carp Line.  RIO's Carp Line is one of the few carp specific products currently on the market and for Fly-Carpin to not voice an opinion on it would be ridiculous.  Besides, as I posted before, this was a chance at redemption.

When looking at buying carp specific fly fishing gear I think you should probably ask yourself several key questions.  

Is the product actually going to give you a technical advantage?  AKA is this going to help me catch carp?

This is of course an impossible question to answer definitively.  I can offer my opinion though and that is...it depends.  Some help I am eh?  Seriously though I think it depends on the situation.  In my opinion they shaded this line towards overhand casting at mid to long range for flats style carpin.  This line has a definite finesse feel to it with good precision and delicacy that will certainly help in this scenario.  Since flats style carpin is what gives most people sugar plums dancing in their heads I think it was a great move.

When you shade a products performance towards one area you typically give up performance in another area.  The good news is that RIO didn't totally unbalance the performance of their carp line worshipping at the alter of the "Rocky Mountain Bonefish" nickname.  For the most part the RIO Carp Line performs acceptably for other presentations and scenarios.

That is good because although I too harbor irrational dreams of being a tanned and muscular bro-ha poling a boat around a sunny flat, much of my carpin is less....less....glorious.  I often utilize a mish-mash of non-traditional presentations in the short to mid-range that goes well beyond the traditional over-head cast.  Flippin, skippin, floppin, lobbin, draggin and droppin baby.  For most of these the RIO Carp performs fine.

I had the most difficulty in the areas of roll-casting, single handed spey casting and line control during various drifting presentations.  At first I had extreme difficulty with turn-over and timing on these kinds of presentations and they can be hyper critical on a river.

The good news is that I got used to it.  The other lines I am used to (RIO Gold and SA Expert Distance) require less rod-speed and different timing for these kinds of presentations and it simply took some time to adjust.  The roll and spey casts need a little sharper and energetic stroke with the RIO Carp Line and line control takes different timing.  In other words, a little annoying but something I can work around just fine.

Now, for some circumstantial evidence.  I first spooled the Carp Line in late October and have done pretty well since.  As a matter of fact I have been on fire with six outings in November and December without getting skunked, a couple of 3 fish days and my personal best DSP carp at 22lbs.  That is far from shabby this time of year, and may be one of my most impressive periods of carpin on the DSP.  Can I say the RIO Carp Line is responsible for this hot-streak?  Of course not.  I can say for a fact that it has not hurt though.

Concerning some of the details -

• The line comes with a "cold water" formulation that has been perfect for my late fall escapades.  I noticed no issues with the coating in air temps ranging from the low 80's (crazy this time of year) to mid 40's.
• This line comes with RIO's welded loops.  This will save you roughly 20 minutes making your own loop or some frustration with a nail-knot and is pretty cool.
• The muted color is one of the advertised design features.  I scoff at that a little because although a drab color is important I fail to see how it differentiates this line from at least half the non-carp lines available. 

Is the product going to bring you a confidence advantage?

Personally, flies have a profound effect on my confidence.  I enjoy fancy gear (aka rods, reels, lines) as much as the next guy but it does not affect my confidence even a smidge.  Something about growing up fishing cool old hand-me-down bamboo rods and automatic reels held together with tape and bubblegum I suspect.

That is not the case for everybody though and honestly I can understand.  So yeah, I suspect that if you are starting out fly fishing for carp the RIO Carp Line might be a very good move.  If you have to honestly concede that having that specialized bit of gear makes you more confident I would say go for it on that basis alone.  Simply stated being confident when you are fly fishing for carp is INVALUABLE.

Is the simple fact that the product is labeled "carp" going to bring you pleasure?

I mean, cmon, you are dealing with a dude that would wear a fly fishing for carp t-shirt to a wedding if he could pull it off.  For me, the simple answer is YES.  I like fishing a product with the word carp plastered on the side of it allot.  I cannot deny that I find a small element of materialistic pleasure involved with fly fishing and this line feeds the need for me.