Fly Fishing - St. Thomas Fly Fishing

BuddyP · Location: Houston, TX

I just started tying my own flies using a Dynaking Kingfisher vise. I love the vice, but the materials that came with the package are budget. I'd like some advice on the best thread, hooks, hackle, etc--for saltwater patterns and freshwater too--so when I go into the shop I have some idea of the best bang for my buck. Anything's appreciated.

TroutBone · Location: Bavaria, Germany

Aaah welcome to the realm of fly tying, as with it, for me it is usually a trial and error, learn from your mistakes and find out what best suits your needs in finding the best threads for the hairs or best hairs for a specific threads can be tricky, as well as patterns and different hollow hairs, deer, elk , antelope or moose hairs will slightly be touchy on certain threads you are using, for me I do alot of tying with deer hairs and I usually use a GSP (Gel Spun Polyester) thread, i was only able to get this in white thread for the longest time, but now you can get them in different colors, but if you only have white thread it's easy to just paint them with a marker, also you can use kevlar material threads on thicker hair like moose or elk, but theres alot of other brands out there that has the same material don't know how your budget is but usually a spool will cost you some few dollars
And for hooks I prefer Gamakatsu, but theres alot of other brands out there that are probably better, but Gama is what I started with so why change, I use Metz Grade 2 neck hackles as I prefer to tie streamers, and dry flies, but I'm still learning as I go, and usually the best flies I tied are the ones that I can never catch anything on, go figure, well it's not alot of info to help you with, just what I prefer, but like I said it's trial and error, your local sporting good shop could probably assist you alot more then I could on here, wish you good shopping in finding what you need.