Littoral Zone #17 | History and Tying Techniques of Balanced Flies with Jerry McBride

Phil (2s): Welcome to the Littoral Zone podcast. I’m your host, Phil Rowley. The littoral zone, or shoal area of the lake is a place where the majority of the action takes place. My podcast is intended to do the same, put you where the action is to help you improve your Stillwater fly fishing On each broadcast. I, along with guests from all over the world, will be providing you with information, tips, and tricks, flies, presentation techniques, along with different lakes or regions to explore. I hope you enjoy today’s podcast. Please feel free to email me with your still water related fly fishing questions and comments. I do my best to answer as many as we can prior to each episode just before the main content. Phil (48s): Thanks for listening. I hope you enjoy today’s show. For close to 20 years, I’ve been the fly time columnist for BC Outdoors Magazine. Early in my tenure, BC Fly Fisher, Trevor Spile introduced me to a novel fly called a Balanced Leach. Little did I realize how this initial introduction would shape my approach to Stillwater flies and how I fished them. In my recently released book, tying Flies with Phil Rian. Friends, you can find Trevor’s balanced Leach. I’ll make sure to include a link to my book in the show notes. A balanced lech has become one of my go-to flies. If I had to choose one Stillwater fly pattern to fish with, it would probably be a balanced leach. Phil (1m 30s): My favorite color combination features a body of black and blue dubbing or bruised, as I call it, in combination with a gold tungsten chartreuse, tungsten fluorescent pink tungsten, or hot orange tungsten bead. Balanced flies have performed well wherever I’ve had the good fortune to fish in Eastern and Western Canada, across the United States and into South America. Argentina’s Lago Strobel, also known as Jurassic Lake, has rainbows that adore balance leaches. Come to think of it, the giant cutthroat of Nevada’s, pyramid Lake love balance, leaches too. Since that initial introduction, I’ve been fortunate enough to meet Jerry McBride, one of the patterns originators. Phil (2m 13s): Jerry resides in Spokane, Washington and is an active member of the Inland Empire Fly Fishing Club. Over the years, Jerry and I have developed a great friendship. I recall Jerry joining my group I hosted to a trip to Manitoba. Jerry provided a memorable tying demonstration featuring some of his favorite balance flies for me and the other group members. I felt it was essential to talk to Jerry to learn how the balance concept came to be and how he ties his balance flies. In a future episode, Jerry will provide us with his presentation techniques, equipment choices, and favorite leader setups. If you’ll wanna learn more about balanced flies, these episodes will get you on the right path. Phil (2m 57s): So, hi Jerry. Thanks for taking the time to join us today. For those of us who don’t know who Jerry McBride is, I know I do. I know you do. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself? Where do you live, how long you’ve been fly fishing, how you got into fishing, all of that kind of stuff. Jerry (3m 12s): Okay. Well, I was born and raised in Spokane, Washington. I went to grade school and high school here. After high school, I went to Down to Pullman, Washington, Washington State University and got a degree in mechanical engineering. I met my wife there at Washington State University and right outta school we got married and I went to work for my first engineering job in Beloit, Wisconsin. So we moved back there. We were there for like five years. Then moved back to Central Washington. I worked for engineering jobs several places in central Washington. Jerry (3m 54s): Eventually managed to get my back to Spokane in 1975. Went to work for a company called Re Pearson Company as a managing the engineering department. Eventually became the plant manager there. Retired in 2000. My wife and I have two sons. They each have two sons, so we have four grandsons. I guess that’s probably kind of about it as far as, and I currently live in Spokane. I was very fortunate to be able to move back to Spokane, ’cause Spokane didn’t have a lot of offer, a lot of engineering jobs when I graduated. Jerry (4m 38s): But I was very fortunate and managed to spend quite a few years there fishing with my dad. He and I were pretty much a hundred percent fishing partners, both streams and lakes. As far as, how long have I been fly fishing, I’m guessing approximately 70 years. I was very fortunate that my dad was a very avid hunter and fisherman and he was very willing to share his knowledge and so on with me. So I went fishing and hunting with him. Plus the other benefit was that I, he had a whole bunch of gear, old gear in the basement so I could drag some of that out. Jerry (5m 26s): And that’s what I did to get started. I had a, a bamboo, real floppy, heavy old bamboo rod with a automatic reel and started throwing that around. And my folks had a place up at Deer Lake that my dad built. So every weekend, pretty much we were at Deer Lake. And during the summer, my stepmother and I would stay all summer and my dad would drive back and forth to work. And I, I guess I didn’t realize how lucky I was. I thought every kid did that. But, so I went swimming and fishing and rode the boat around and did all kinds of stuff. Jerry (6m 12s): I found a, a, some fly tying equipment in the basement, a vice real rudimentary vice and bobbing and so on, just, and, and a little bit of, you know, materials. And so I dug that out and basically taught myself how to tie flies, you know, how to start the thread and so on. I don’t know whether there was a whip finisher there or not. I, I don’t recall now, but I don’t know if I could have taught myself how to use it. Anyway, as far as more recent times I won the Let Your Lambeth Award you dug years out. Jerry (6m 53s): So here’s mine. Phil (6m 54s): Yeah, we’re both, we’re both for blessed to be winners of that. ’cause there’s some, there’s some pretty good names on that plaque, isn’t it? Jerry (7m 0s): There’s, oh, you got yours there too. Yeah, I, I Phil (7m 3s): Got mine too. It doesn’t have other award winners, but it’s got me and you, so that’s good, isn’t it? Well, I was, I think Brian Chan is on there, I think. Oh yeah, I think Harry lame. Yes. And I’m sure I’m missing some other well recognized northwest fly fishers. Jerry (7m 19s): Yeah, I was extremely honored that I was in that kinda company that, that I would win an honor like that. Five of us from the Inland Empire Fly Fishing Club have won that award over the years. One guy for his paintings, the other three for Rod Building, Phil (7m 40s): Do you know their names? Do you remember their names? Jerry (7m 42s): Well, let’s see. Gene Lawrence and did the paintings. I don’t remember ’em right at the, right now. Phil (7m 51s): Well, if they pop up, we can give ’em credit, but that’s great. Now, you’re also a member of the Inland Empire Fishing Club. You’re a member then, and that’s, yes. That club’s got a lot of history to it, doesn’t it? Jerry (8m 1s): Yes. They started in 1956, and I’ve been a member since 1975, so I’ve been a member 50 years. When I showed up in Spokane in 1975, I thought it was a pretty s scum fly fisherman, or part of that was a, I was a young, relatively young man, you know, young man kind of think pretty highly of themselves. Anyway, in short order, I realized I had a lot to learn and, and which I did learn from members that had fished all over the world and were, you know, just really expert fly fishermen. Jerry (8m 44s): I, I, I encourage people to join the fly club. You’re, you’re instantly, I mean, like our club probably, it’s got thousands of years of experience, people that are there and, and people are willing to share their, their knowledge and so on. And anyway, I, I’m a, a big proponent of joining fly clubs. Phil (9m 8s): That’s how I got started. I was with the Osprey fly fishers, like you had mentioned. I was young and thought I knew everything. Turns out I knew little or nothing, but just to be surrounded with those years of experience and it’s just a great learning environment, isn’t it? You’re, that’s all we’re talking about is fly fishing, fly tying and telling stories. It’s a great atmosphere to learn. And you, Jerry (9m 28s): You know, you learn, I mean, if you do any reading about retiring, one of the things they tell you is to have something that’s a passion that you can pursue that gets you out socializing with other people and gives you something to think about that you kind of ponder. My wife is a, a genealogist and she’s, that’s her passion. So in fact, she was on Zoom earlier today with her genealogy club. They were talking, you know, I keep telling her, all you guys talk about is dead people. Phil (10m 6s): Yeah. We’re not there yet, are we? Jerry (10m 10s): Anyway, she kind of, it rolls her eyes At times when we spend, I spent a half hour talking with somebody about a Carmed pattern or something. She, so that’s my comeback is, that’s all you guys talk about is dead people. Phil (10m 29s): Now the Inland Empire Club is also, you guys have put a book together that was big. You know, I I I had early in my development and that was the flies to the Northwest, right? Correct, yeah. And how many editions you said that had in it? Jerry (10m 43s): Six editions. The first edition was like a mimeograph, just a bunch of mimeograph sheets that were circulated among the club members. Fenton Ross Kelly, who is a well-known outdoors editor and, and was the outdoors editor for the local paper here. The spokesman review kind of lent kind of a professional approach to it. And anyway, I’ve, I don’t think I have the first edition, but I have like second through the sixth and, And it was a real, at one time it was a real money maker for the club. Jerry (11m 26s): I’ve gone to, you know, outdoor shows, fly fishing shows, and met people actually from all over the world that had additions of that, of that book. We talked in more recent times about doing another edition, but as books are not very Phil (11m 51s): Well, they still work, Jerry (11m 52s): They still work fallen by the wayside. Unfortunately, they Phil (11m 56s): Have stood the test of time. I know I’ve got two, at least two editions of that book. And when I was, you know, starting out tying, that was one of the books to have if you lived in the Pacific Northwest. And me growing up in British Columbia had to have that. But it’s no longer in print anymore, is it? So you’d have to find it off Amazon? No. If you could find it. No. So I’ll see in the show notes, I’ll see if I can dig it out, look on Amazon, see if I can find it. And if I can, we’ll be sure to put a link in there so if somebody’s interested in picking that book up, which of course you and I would highly recommend they can do that. Yes, Jerry (12m 25s): Yes, of course. Your book, I think I’ve probably sold quite a few of ’em a year. Your patterns for Still Waters. Phil (12m 33s): Yeah, that one’s outta print now too. That one lasted 20 years, I think. And then, like you say, everything has a lifespan, so I guess you’d have to look for that on Amazon too. I, I get asked, but I I’m, I have no copy. I have one copy that’s mine. That’s it. Jerry (12m 48s): Yeah. I tell people if you want to, you know, if you want to know what kind of flies to fish in this part of the world, both the Pacific Northwest and bc, that’s the book to have. Phil (13m 2s): No, it’s, and those flies of work, just like flies of northwest, you’ll find fish don’t seem trout especially don’t seem to know any geographic borders or things like that. So if it looks like food, they’ll eat it. So now you we’re gonna talk about lake fishing today and bounce flies, but one question I gotta ask you is of course lakes, and I know you fish rivers, do you have a preference between the two or they each their own, they have their own thing? Jerry (13m 25s): I don’t know that I have a preference, it’s just that I do because it’s more available and so on. I fish lakes more than I do, but I fish over in Idaho. We’ve got two streams there that we fish on a regular basis for cutthroat. And I really enjoy it. That’s probably the most of the time that I get a chance to fish dry flies. Yep. My, my friend that I fish with Lee Funkhouser is he’s gotten to be quite a nymph fisherman. And typically he’ll catch twice as many fish as I do. Jerry (14m 5s): I’ll run through with a dry fly and he’ll come back through the nymph and catch way more fish. But, and I’m not against nymph fishing, but I I, if I get the opportunity, I’d fish a dry fly. Phil (14m 18s): Well, especially for cutthroat. So, but Jerry, we, we, we got you here today ’cause of what you contributed with the development of balanced flies. And that personally for me, that fly has proven to be a revelation and has really changed my approach on how I fish a variety of subsurface patterns, both under indicators or not. So why don’t we walk through how you came up with balance flies and then of course I think our listeners or my listeners are gonna want to know how you fish them because everybody fishes them a little differently. And I’d be interested to know your thoughts on how you like to fish ’em, your rods, your lines leader setups, presentation tactics, et cetera. But let’s circle back around and let’s talk about, you know, how did you come up with this concept? Phil (14m 60s): What staring at an indicator and just thinking that’s how some of mine come about? Jerry (15m 5s): Well, we, we start out fishing wooly buggers and stuff under, you know, we, well, we started out with Chrons and bionic worms and we had the idea to fish woolly buggers that would That work? And it did. There’s a, a local lake here, a friend of mine and I, he, he’s a real counter kind of guy. Well he is passed away now, unfortunately. But he was, he and I were in different boats with, you know, other people. But one day there a fly that we were, which I sent you a peacock glimmer and one day there he caught 70 fish and I think I pretty well matched him. Jerry (15m 52s): I mean, we just got fish all day long on that fly. So they don’t necessarily have to be balanced. However, I was kind of made me feel good that you said that you and Brian Chan actually did a test early on. Yep, Phil (16m 10s): I remember Jerry (16m 10s): That. And I mean, I don’t know that that would science stand up to scientific scrutiny. Phil (16m 18s): Probably not, but it worked for us. Jerry (16m 20s): But, well, I, I liked the result 2 (16m 26s): Since 19 72, 4 wheel campers has been building rugged, lightweight campers designed to fit almost any truck and every kind of adventure. Whether you’re keeping it simple like me with the Project M or gearing up for full-time off the grid travel, there’s a four wheel camper built to match your lifestyle. You can head over to four wheel campers.com right now to use the builder tool to find your perfect topper. Slide in or flatbed camper for your next journey. Located in Boulder, Colorado, Intrepid Camp Gear is dedicated to designing and manufacturing the best and most highly engineered automotive camp gear on the market. Intrepid Camp Gear specializes in rooftop tents and aluminum cargo cases designed for skis, rods, hunting gear, and any other gear you may be hauling. 2 (17m 9s): Elevate your adventure with intrepid camp gear right now. Head over to wetly swing.com/intrepid right now. That’s intrepid I-N-T-R-E-P-I-D Intrepid camp gear. Phil (17m 23s): Yeah, and for those who don’t know, Brian and I, were doing some, when we do our schools together, we like to try and a fish together and B, spend a little bit of time on the water before students arrive so we have some measure of what’s going on and, and that was, I was just starting to experiment with your balance fly concept and, and we were both fishing the same pattern under an indicator. One balance and one knot and the balance version on that day. Certainly out fished the regular version. Now you know, I know when I go down to Argentina and you’re fishing in four and five foot swells, I’m not so sure a balance fly may make that difference ’cause that poor fly is just being jerked and all over the place, up and down and side to side. But I firmly believe in it. Phil (18m 4s): So, but you did mention, it’s funny ’cause you mentioned one fly there, the bionic worm. And I think it’s appropriate to tell this story ’cause I remember you, I can’t remember what show you and I met up at. You were tying bionic worms and you gave one to me. And I gotta admit I gave you a rather skeptical look because Jerry’s bionic worm marbut tail, it was tied on a gold hook at the time. I think one of those, yeah, with Beit hooks with vri and a hot, it was a hot pink tail and a hot orange bead. Now that’s an atypical carotid larva color. And I freely admit, I kinda look went okay, that’s not terribly natural looking. But rest assured that fly is a killer, especially in when the waters are a little deeper and darker, those fluorescent colors really stand out and that it’s a must have pattern in the CID section of my fly box when they’re focused on CID larvae that even when they’re, they’ll just eat one ’cause they see one. Phil (18m 60s): It’s a great fly. So in additions to your bounce flies, Jerry, thanks for the bionic worm. And I’ll put a link to the bionic worm in the show notes as well so everyone out there can follow it. But let’s get back to bounce flies. I just wanted to give you the credit for the bionic worm. Freely admit, I was a little skeptical. Jerry (19m 18s): The one thing I need to say is my friend Ron Panzer is the guy that came up with that. He and I knew each other from high school. He passed away last October, but, Phil (19m 28s): Oh, sorry to Jerry (19m 29s): Hear because I get around a lot more than him and showed people the pattern and so on. And people thought I was the one that came up with it. But I wasn’t. It was my friend Ron. And I still remember the first time we fished it, we were at Chappa or no, we were at ESE Lake. It was my dad and I and my friend Ron and another guy by the name of Bob. And anyway, Ron, we weren’t doing much of anything, so Ron said, Hey, I tied something new and he, he had four of ’em. We gave each one of us one and it was like magic. I, it was just unbelievable how good it worked. And I mean, we had fish jumping and carrying on And it was, and fortunately he and I both brought our tying stuff. Jerry (20m 14s): We tied up some more the that night and went back out. And anyway, over the years, I don’t fish it as much as I used to. I, and I think it’s, I don’t know, I feel kinda guilty about that actually. But anyway, it was like magic how well it worked. It Phil (20m 33s): Still is today Jerry, so I recommend you pull it out again and fish with it. Jerry (20m 38s): Yeah, we, we, we got, I got quite a kick outta it ’cause my dad and I were at Chika and Fenton, Ross Kelly I mentioned earlier was there and he wrote up a little article about my dad and I and he, and put it in the paper. He didn’t name us or anything, but it said this father and son pair were the only ones catching any fish on a fly that doesn’t resemble anything in nature, you know, Phil (21m 6s): But that’s a good thing sometimes I Jerry (21m 8s): Think. And Fenton was also the guy before that, he was poo-pooing using an indicator. He thought that was a travesty. So anyway, dad and I show up at L Lake and there’s Ross Kelly, he’s, he’s an indicator and he’s got a bionic work. Phil (21m 30s): Your work was done. Anyway, alright, so let’s circle back to the balanced fly. What, okay. How did that come about? Jerry (21m 38s): Okay. Our fly club group has had a, a lunch group, mostly retired people get together every Tuesday. In fact, I’ll go tomorrow and we’ve gone to variety of restaurants over the years, but they call them Sell the Liars Club. And in fact, I think maybe we’ve had you there. Phil (22m 1s): I have been there Jerry (22m 2s): Still Liars club. I don’t know whether we allowed you to tell any stories or not, but, Phil (22m 8s): Well, you know, they would’ve been lies that would’ve fit right in Jerry (22m 12s): Anyway. There was a guy by a dentist by the name of Al Cunningham and he, he had been trying to come up with a balanced fly. He, I think a lot of people had the idea that if, if the fly was more like what a, the bug was in the water, that it made sense. Yep. And anyway, he gave me a bunch of little nickel plated jig hooks that like were made for panfish and said, you’re an engineer, figure it out. Jerry (22m 52s): Okay. So anyway, that got me thinking about it. So the first thing I did is I tried flotation. I thought, well, I’ll put a little bit of flotation on the bend of the hook. But I very quickly came to the conclusion that you would literally have to tune each and every fly that you tied Yeah. To get it to set right. So then of course the other end and, and having, being an engineer and taking physics and so on and went well, okay, go out beyond the, the eye on the other end and balance it that way And it will balance whether it’s in the water or in the air or whatever. And so I got my wife, some of my wife’s sewing pins and I just had brass beads, but I took and tucked some lead inside the counter board on the, and got it to balance. Jerry (23m 47s): And, and so then I tied some on those little jig hooks. Well they worked very well, but you know, about a 14 inch trout would just straighten them right out. Yep. And the other thing that I very quickly ran into was you’d go to casts and you’d go, that doesn’t seem right, you bring it in. Well, the pin and the bead were gone because the, and what I concluded was that the thread got wet and lost tension and so then the, the bead, the pin would just come out. So that’s when I started. So anyway, I went, I went to that must add 39. Jerry (24m 29s): I already had some must add 39.06, which is a really good hook And it’s three extra strong but down eye type hook. And I started tying them on those and got tungsten beads and started super glue in the thread wraps. And the first patterns I tied were mostly traditional patterns like the pheasant tail nymph and the hairs, ear six pack, some of those type patterns. And of course, very quickly you realize that since they run upside down, that putting like a wing pad on on the inside of the hook doesn’t make any sense. Jerry (25m 14s): But what I found was that they were, all of those patterns found patterns in books and stuff that were tied in what Joe Brooks called the in the round. Yep. And so it, that’s how I tied them. It’d be kinda like a soft tackle Yeah. Type pattern. And of all those, that six pack worked the best and I think it was because of the color that’s used, you know, pheasant tails treated with ric acid. Yep. And it gives it kind of a unique color that the problem with pric acid is that if you leave it sit around and it gets into a crystal in form, it’s very sensitive to any kind of movement or anything. Jerry (26m 3s): And it’ll explode and burn, burn your house down. Phil (26m 7s): Well that’s good to know. So hopefully none of our listeners are going out right now on Amazon and buying pick rick acid by the truckload. Jerry (26m 14s): But, but anyway, now there are, I don’t know how they do it, but they’ve come up with dyes that more or less replicate that, that color. Phil (26m 23s): It’s kind of a yellowish color, isn’t Jerry (26m 25s): It? Yeah, it’s kind of a olive yellow yellow, Phil (26m 27s): It’s perfect looking color. And that, for those that don’t know the six pack, it’s tired entirely with pheasant tail and pheasant rump, isn’t it the whole, yes. I think I was taught, it was called a self bodied carry I think was, Jerry (26m 38s): Yeah, it’s a takeoff from a carry special. And anyway, of all the, all the patterns I, I would say that was the most successful in the first go around. And then I started tying more or less wooly bugger type patterns. And then I did that peacock glimmers, a il that’s a mix of, of peacock green and black. And that’s one of my go-to flies today. Yeah. In fact I sent you a picture of that. Yeah, Phil (27m 15s): No, we’ll, and we’ll be sure to include that picture in the show notes as well. So you started with the down eye hook and I did the same thing when I was first introduced to this fly. And the one problem with that is that if you’re not careful, you can bury that hook eye. I always joke, you have a wonderful balanced fly, you just can’t tie it on. So those are the ones you give to your friends who say, you never give me any of your fly patterns. Jerry (27m 39s): Yeah, well my friend, my friend Lee gave him one of those and so he stuck the tipt through and tied a, a fixed loop knot and, and cast. Well what he didn’t realize, he just went through the, the chane, he didn’t actually get it through the eye. The wooded cast the fly just kept running off the door Phil (28m 0s): Going. So you went to jig hooks as well, right? That was the pardon? You went to a jig hook as well back to the jig hook. Jerry (28m 11s): Yeah, well I think that was one a year. I guess something in my mind, a couple of things that, that you contributed to this one was the, the jig hook and the other one was because of your commercial tying background, you brought some kind of measurements, kind of common sense measurements to how to tie the fly. Yeah. Which I thought made a lot of sense and, and certainly contributed. I guess that’s one of the things that I would say that just about anything that we do is kind of built off of what has been done in the past. Jerry (28m 50s): In this case, my friend Al Cunningham got me thinking about this. And then you made reference here to this Fly Tires bench side reference. Phil (29m 3s): Now you’d mentioned that to me in a previous conversation Jerry (29m 6s): By Ted, Ted Leason and Jim Scho Meyer, two big names in Fly Tank. Phil (29m 11s): And that’s a great book, isn’t it? It’s, there’s a lot of information in that book Jerry (29m 15s): Anyway in that book. And I think maybe it was a glass bead or something, I don’t remember. But anyway, he was lashing a bead to a hook to the shank of a hook. So that’s where I got the idea that to do that. So again, like I say, these things kind of one thing builds after the, the other. And I do would mention that your first choice on the, on the jig hook was, well let’s put it this way, the, the daiichi are a lot better. Phil (29m 45s): Yeah, they were, I I started with another brand of hook because like there wasn’t a lot of small jig hooks out there to find in a, I think the smallest I could find was a size 10. And they were designed primarily for panfish croppy sunfish pretty soft mouth fish. But a trout would, they could straighten them out, you know, pretty quick. Especially if you’re using heavier tipt. So when, you know, jig hooks became more and more popular in fly fishing, I think probably due to Euro nymphing now we have a whole host of long shank short shank, big small jig hooks at our disposal. And, and the reason I went to the J hook, like you mentioned is, is is for no other reason than when you finish the fly, that hook eye is above the body of the fly and I can see it to tie it on. Phil (30m 28s): So I don’t do what Lee did and think I had it tied on and threw it across the lake when it wasn’t. I’m not sure. Jerry do you get asked, you know, people often ask me a 60 degree or a 90 degree. I always tell ’em it really doesn’t matter. It’s just that that eye when you finish the fly is sticking up nice and visible so you can see it. So you can tie it on with the loop knots we both like to use. Jerry (30m 49s): Yeah, I think the, I think the 60 degree is more available than the nineties. There seemed like the nineties are kind of limited in size and so on, so, but yeah, I don’t think it makes any difference and I, I was quite impressed that, you know, you were talking about using that same hook on fish at Jurassic Lake. My god. Phil (31m 15s): Yeah, those, I’ve used the, the Daiichi 46 forties, which are a bronze finish. They make a 46 47 that is a black nickel. And now they’ve got a 46 99, which is a black hook barbless and it’s got a nice round bend. The other two have kind of a limerick bend. Right. Which holds very well. But they stood up, you know those down there, you know the fish size is disgustingly big, you know, I’d say 12 to 15 pounds and you’re fishing 16 pound tipt and with a big fish like that and that kind of tipt, the weak spot becomes the hook and it’ll straighten. You can probably tell me better as a mechanical engineer why I just, two big things, you know, the tip, it’s not giving and the fish isn’t giving. Phil (31m 56s): So the hook has to take the brunt of that And it ends up bending out as well. So that’s sort of why I become a, a big fan. But there’s other good hooks out there though, but I, I highly recommend those hooks. The other benefit to these flies too is they ride upside down, don’t they? So they’re, they’re really weedless. Jerry (32m 10s): I I think that definitely cuts down on the, the time you virtually never hook a fish in the gills and you know, typically you hook ’em in the kind of the roof of their mouth or, or even just in their lips. So it’s Phil (32m 26s): Very fish friendly Jerry (32m 27s): And the, and of course it, it’s somewhat weedless, it’ll pull through the weeds. You know, typically I try to fish above the weeds, but sometimes you encounter a weed, it’ll, it’ll slide over it rather than hang up on it. Phil (32m 41s): Well I’ve also, I know you design these flies to fish under indicators, but more and more I also just cast and stripped them on sinking lines and a variety of lines. ’cause they’re basically a little jig. So they’re riding hook point up, they got that seductive pitching motion. I’ve used them on bass over a wheaty rocky bottom without, you know, an indicator and they land on their nose right on the bead and hop up and they look like a regular bass fisherman’s jig or a ned rig and work very well in that regard too. So they’re just not an indicator fly. But you also had all the work you did and I think it’s important to let everybody know you actually had an article published in Fly Tire Magazine and I remember reading it and unfortunately that magazine, every issue is new stuff and you, you know, not everything sadly registers all the time. Phil (33m 29s): But that was a great article. I know you sent me a copy of it and I’ll see if we can, you took copies of it and I’ll see if we can get that in the show notes as a, something for people to read because there’s some great information in there on, on, on the history and how you came up with that fly. Jerry (33m 43s): Yeah, it was actually, I more or less developed this fly in 2003 and I thought, well maybe I could write a, this is the only magazine article I ever wrote in my life. I did consult with Fenton Ross Kelly, who was, you know, a professional writer and he helped me anyway. I’ve submitted it to Fly Tire Magazine in 2004, but it didn’t show up till summer of 2006. So I don’t know exactly. Anyway, I, I did go back to the editor and I said, well hey, Phil (34m 23s): Remember me, Jerry (34m 24s): Do I get anything? I mean I wasn’t expected to get paid. Yeah, but he sent me a hat. Yeah. So I have a fly tire hat. Phil (34m 33s): That’s ironic ’cause my first article I ever wrote, I had made submissions to some Canadian magazines and they didn’t seem interested. And then I approached Fly Tire Magazine the same way ’cause it was Fly Tire and American Angler, they were the same publisher. I believe they were the FI think it was Fly Tar. No, it was American Angler. But anyway, they, that was the first publication that ever took a a risk on me as a writer. So we shared alumni there. Jerry (34m 60s): Yeah. There is a even more extensive who is Fly of the Month for what was Federation of Fly Fishers. And I don’t recall now the the date on that, but there’s an even more extensive writeup that the guy that was doing Fly of the Month for was Bob Bates here who was a member of our long, longtime member of our fly club. He was doing that for anyway. So I kind of had an in there to get it into that. Phil (35m 36s): Are 2 (35m 36s): You an avid angler looking for the perfect fly selection or perhaps you’ve just started out fly tying? Smitty’s Fly Box offers a monthly subscription service that delivers a range of flies. Fly time, materials and fishing accessories. They tailor their selections based on your fishing location, ensuring you get exactly what you need. And Smitty’s isn’t just any fly supplier. They’ve been in business for over three decades delivering quality and expertise. I can personally vouch for their quality having picked up some dry flies and they were perfect. It’s a perfect time to stock up on flies for your next adventure. Check out their offerings at smitty’s fly box.com, buy subscribing. You’re not only getting top-notch flies, but you’re also supporting a small business that has had a significant contribution to the fishing community. 2 (36m 21s): Remember that’s smitty’s fly box.com and let ’em know you heard about them through this podcast. Phil (36m 29s): So let’s go back. We talked about the bead choices, brass versus tungsten and I, I think most people know that, but tungsten’s twice the mass of brass. Right, right. So it’s just a less of a, an extension needed and and readily available. You started on using a common sewing pin. Is that of all, are you still using that today or are you Jerry (36m 47s): Well I, I kind of went with the, I went with the sequin pins for a while. You kind of got me going on that. But what I found was that I don’t think they’re long enough and at least I had some problems with them getting bent and tearing out the, the, the thread wraps. So I’ve gone back to a regular sewing pin, which has a bigger head. So if you, what you’ll encounter with some like eighth inch beads is those sequin pins they’ll pull right through. That’s Phil (37m 25s): True. You don’t get a lot. Jerry (37m 27s): So anyway, I’ve gone back to the bigger pin and cut it to length and I don’t really have any problem. I mean I maybe once or twice a year or something I’ll cut my thread but that really isn’t a problem. You know, where, where you cut the bead and it’s much stronger pin and I I I make a point of lashing at the, right at the, the 90 or 60 degree bend. I make a bunch of wraps there and then right on the, almost on the end where the, where it’s caught. ’cause those are the two leverage points and then go real heavy or well then put some super glue on it. Jerry (38m 7s): Yeah. And, and I also do a thread dam behind the bead to hold it in position and put some super glue there also. Phil (38m 16s): Yeah, I, I used to do that and then I started, and I guess it’s just a commercial, as you mentioned, the commercial tire in me was, it was just eliminating steps. So the cutting of the pin was a step and putting the bead with the thread behind was the a step too because we’re putting the beads on. I think it’s important to tell people we’re putting the beads on so that the wide open tapered end pushes up against that bead head and kind of envelops the pinhead itself. So I was just using the body materials. Right. You know, the tying process to push that up because I used to do that. I used to actually cut the pins, put the beads on, build up a thread dam behind the bead to lock it in place and I’d kind of build them in production style. I cut all the pins, then I would put all the beads on and put the thread dams on and then I would lash that assembly to the hook and then I call that whole thing a chassis and glue it and set it aside and then come back when that’s all dried and then start tying the fly. Phil (39m 8s): So Yeah. Yeah. Jerry (39m 9s): Well I I, I do the whole thing on the hook, you know, I lash the bead to the hook and, and then just run up in front there and, and yep. The thread dam One, one thing that I wanted to mention about beads is your painted beads like pink and orange and chartreuse and so on, they’re all painted and what’ll happen very quickly is the fish their teeth chip those Yep. Chip the paint Phil (39m 38s): On or my bad casting. Jerry (39m 41s): So what I, what I have come up with, which works really well is I put some super glue on there, on the coat coat the, the bead was super glue and what what I do now is I build chassis just like you’re talking about and I’ll super glue ’em and set ’em aside and I kind of set ’em in in order. So then I take the one that I did first Yep. And put it back in the vice and super glue the, or not super glue UV did I say super glue? Phil (40m 12s): Super glue, but UV resm Jerry (40m 14s): UV resin on them and I found that the bead paint stands up much better. Phil (40m 21s): That’s a great tip. Do you have any bead sizes you like to use Jerry? I tend to use like the one eighth on Jerry (40m 27s): The side pretty much. One eighth Phil (40m 29s): Is, yeah. ’cause it gets heavy. They’re, they’re heavy to chuck after a while when you, I I know I’ve seen, I’ve been, I had some of your members out to when I used to do my trips to Manitoba and I know you joined me out there one time and, and were gracious enough to actually tie a balance fly for everyone on a less than great weather day. And I have a picture of that that I use in my presentations of you sitting at the table at Arrow Lakes Lodge tying those flies. So, but I know they were using some, were using five sixteenths and those are just not a fun thing to throw. Jerry (40m 59s): Oh yeah, I think five, yeah. Five 30 seconds. Yeah, Phil (41m 4s): Five 30 seconds. Yeah. They’re not fun to throw. And they also will slide over the pin heads sometimes as well. Jerry (41m 9s): Yeah, of course. If you use the bigger pin that’s, well in fact I even have some heavier duty pins. Yeah. One of the things that I do haven’t done so much lately, I do what I call a Google eye type balance fly where I take needle, nose blos and, and bend the pin at about a 45 or so and then slide the bead on it and so then I put two on there. Phil (41m 35s): Oh I see. Yep. Jerry (41m 36s): I think you’ve probably had some people tell you about Rufuss woods. Yep. On the Columbia River and a lot of times they’re fishing right next to the commercial net pens and there’s a certain amount of feed that gets through. So there’s a bunch of fish on the outside of the pens hanging around and we fish there with under indicators about 10 foot under an indicator. And what you wanted is to fly to, to sink real fast ’cause you get a fairly limited drift. Anyway, so I tied up some of those with 2 5 30 second beads and anyway, on the back cast it had one hit me in the face that a, a weld on my face for about two weeks afterwards and kind of went, you know, I think maybe I’m gonna quit doing that. Phil (42m 27s): People must have thought Maybe you’ve made one too many dead person comments to your Jerry (42m 31s): Wife, but, but it’s, it’s like we’re in like 50 feet of water there. Yeah. And these people that show up there to fish, you know, with bait and so on. They go, you guys aren’t gonna catch anything. But we catch a lots of fish doing that. I could tell you. Yeah. Phil (42m 47s): I’ve also used Brads or Escu pins, they’re called small nails basically. Jerry (42m 53s): Right. Phil (42m 54s): They’re short though. That was the only drawback to them. They’re, they’re not always easy to tie in but the few times I’ve used larger beads, it was just simply finding something with a bigger head on it that the bead didn’t slide over the end of the pinhead or the head of the nail in this case. Jerry (43m 9s): Yeah. Your friend Tim Flagler, he flag, he just came out with a new pattern. It’s tied, it’s kind of tied with squirmy wormy type, I dunno whether you’ve seen that one or not. Hmm. It’s a balanced fly he uses, you mentioned monofilament, he, he melts the end and lashes and slips it in the bead and, but he’s Phil (43m 30s): Got this Yeah, I’ve seen, I’ve seen some people do that with like thick. I, I haven’t played with it much but they basically take like a thick mono, I don’t know like weed wacker cord almost this just thin enough to go through the bead and then heat the end of it and turn it into a flat head and probably epoxy or crazy glue the whole thing together. And I might try that but Tim did feature the balance fly on on his, on his YouTube channel so I’ll make sure to link that as well. ’cause he, he got introduced to bounce flies when he was filming with the new Fly Fisher television back east. I think they were fishing for small mouth bass and we were using like, oh like Bruised Leach and he sort of the producer of the show, Colin McEwen, he introduced Tim to those balanced flies ’cause Colin had come out and spent time with me out west when we filmed as well. Phil (44m 19s): So he flies getting more and more notoriety And it and just, and rightfully so. So Jerry (44m 25s): Yeah, well it’s, I don’t know, I guess I was just kind of pleased ’cause that you did that test with Brian. Yeah because literally I had never, I mean it, it’s logical but I never actually had anybody that said they actually compared him side by side. Phil (44m 43s): Yeah. We did it just for fun. Fish were in the mood to play. So that’s usually a good time to do those kind of experiments and yeah, it was just something to try. ’cause I always get asked, well what’s the big deal? What’s the difference? Why do I need to do this? Does it make a difference? And I guess ultimately you can do whatever you want. But to me it, it makes a difference. And you know, I have a lot of confidence in balance flies and particularly balanced leches, not only out in the northwest but basically everywhere I go people I dunno about you, but you often get asked, you know, what fly do you start with? And mine is usually a bounce leach of some sort. ’cause I haven’t met a, a fish yet while I bass. I’ve even caught pike on them. Definitely trouts, you know, anything that swims likes it. Phil (45m 24s): I was even out fishing for false albacore off North Carolina a number of years ago and I wish I had some with me because those, the Albacore are usually pretty aggressive chasing bait balls. It’s kind of, you know, pretty exciting and pretty chaotic. But they have a phenomenon, they, the locals there called sipping Alies where they come up and they’re almost like, it’s like a trout taking a spinner on the surface. It’s a very delicate rise. And, and of course I’m out there with klauser minnows and things like that and the guy said, boy, it’d be handy just, just hang something about like a little minnow pattern, you know, six inches to a foot underneath the surface. And I’m like, why didn’t you tell me that before I came? ’cause I, I have a perfect answer for that answer. Phil (46m 4s): So maybe the next time some of, if some of my listeners get out there in Chase Falls, albacore, they can give that a a try and report back to us. So do, yeah. Do you still test balance Jerry or do you, are you like me? I tied so many of them. Jerry (46m 17s): I do, I’ll usually do, you know, I’ll do one, you know, I just lightly lash the pin to the, I do do the thread dam behind the bead, but then lightly lash the pin to the hook and take it out and put it on, you know, piece of thread or or a wire or something to, and I try to get it to tip the, the, the bin to be tipped up a bit. Yeah. And I just do one and then I set that one aside and then I’ll go ahead and do my, my, the rest of them. And I, I just bring that one up to gauge that I have the pin out where I want it and I finish those and then when I get all done I take the first one and finish it off. Phil (47m 3s): Yeah. You mentioned some, I think it was in your article, a teeter-totter effect. What Maybe you can explain it’s probably, you know, just better explain that to the listeners. They probably can figure it out by now. Well Jerry (47m 13s): I was just, I guess it was just trying to explain to people, you know, how you’re balanced. You got, you know, Maybe you got a, a little kid on one end and a big fat guy on the other end. Well he’s gonna have to be obviously much closer Yeah. To the pivot point. But I ju just because a lot of people, you know, they, they never took physics in high school or anything and they don’t think about stuff. In fact, I kind of chuckled because I’ll be out fishing with people. I’ve even people that were with me and they pull the fly outta the water and they go, well that’s not balanced. Phil (47m 52s): Yeah. That’s important because there is a difference between what I call air balancing and then balancing in water because it, it, you know, a fly can be in the air sitting not in a, you know, a true horizontal position and yet you put it in the water, it goes perfectly horizontal. Jerry (48m 8s): Yeah, well yeah. Be because the, the weight of the water on the Yep. On the materials. So anyway, they go, well that’s not balanced. They say, well put it in the water. Yeah, okay. ’cause it’s in a neutral Yeah. Medium. The same as it is in the air. And that’s exactly why I quit messing with foam. We have a guy in our club who is a tremendous tire and fisherman, but he, he seems to seek out the most near impossible Phil (48m 38s): Solutions. Jerry (48m 40s): The, you know, it’s like coming up with a cure to the common code cold or something. That’s kinda stuff he likes to challenge. So he ties these flies with foam and, and each one is like, you know, a masterpiece. Phil (48m 55s): Yeah. The thing too, I think some tires I get struggle. They’re always trying for this perfectly horizontal profile in the water and sometimes it’s, you know, I say to ’em, if it’s not totally perfect, don’t worry about it. ’cause under the indicator exactly Jerry (49m 11s): The Phil (49m 12s): Surface chop is gonna bounce the indicator up and down that’s gonna transmit down to the fly and make it sort of dance and move. But the seductive action these balance flies have under an indicator is I find fish just can’t help themselves. It can be a very slow day that fly just almost tantalizes and taunts them and eventually they sort of break down and go, what the heck? And eat it. Right. Jerry (49m 33s): Well I enjoy your, like your, a lot of your videos you actually show a fly just hanging. Yeah. You know, a conventional fly. Phil (49m 43s): Yeah. It looks like an old western off the hanging tree at the end of town Jerry (49m 47s): And then you show one that’s balanced and I’ve got a, a miniature of that. I took a a little plastic jar and drill a hole in it and then I tie a fly on a loop and put some water in there And it put a little handle. So people, and you know, a lot of times when I’m tying I’ll have that set in there and they kind of go, well what’s this? Well then they pick it up and they, they start kind of playing. They can see how it wiggles. Yeah. Wiggles in the water. Phil (50m 16s): So what are you balancing like I do leeches now you mentioned nymphs, like the, the pheasant tails and I do cous nymphs. I even balance my blobs. I know you’ve done that as well. Right. Even though that some might argue, well that’s a round fly, but the reason I do it is ’cause sometimes trout can take those flies ’cause the materials are kind of buoyant and they like the mouth and play with them and then I’ll end up sucking them down. And I found that by fishing them balance that stopped. I had a more, but the tungsten bead a tighter connection on my leader. I didn’t miss any any ’cause a lot of guys will fish like blobs without weight under an indicator. And that fly is, it’s not really tight to any leader or dropper. Phil (50m 59s): And I think those trout can just mouth it and suck it down their throat. I found once I started doing that, I didn’t have any fish taking blobs deep anymore. They were always, as you mentioned, around the lips or in the upper part of the snout and didn’t harm them. Jerry (51m 14s): Yeah. I was, one day I was fishing with some blobs the friend gave me and, and out of like 10 fish, seven of them swallowed the thing. Yeah. And I went the heck with it. I’m not gonna fish with ’em anymore. It just, ’cause I don’t know whether, you know, people say the stomach acid dissolves the hook, but I don’t know whether that’s true or Phil (51m 34s): Not. Yeah. Some of them I was like, I don’t know how that’s gonna, you know, but you just cut it and hope for the best. Right. But you feel horrible. Jerry (51m 41s): Yeah. You don’t have any, you, you look down their throat there and you can’t even see the fly. It’s in their stomach. Yeah. We had you on the phone, we discussed that or a blo zoom deal and you mentioned ha going to a a ts and bead and I thought that was a good suggestion that that would help. But I have probably, I don’t know how many fish I’ve caught on a balanced blob. Probably, I don’t know, maybe 75 or something like that. I’ve actually had a couple of ’em swallow ’em even. Yeah. I I, in that Phil (52m 14s): Instance I have, I, my trick for those is again, I, and I fish ’em off a dropper a lot and because the blob is round the fly itself, I’m not so sure the, to me the balance part may not be, you know, it’s, it kind of looks the same somewhat as it hangs there. But I use a short dropper, I use a very stiff dropper and I often tie a clinch knot to it just so it’s tight and I really watch the indicator. ’cause I find with blobs sometimes you’ll see the indicator, like it’s almost like a small fish is playing with it and mouthing it. And as soon as it starts to go, I strike on those. Whereas years ago I used to wait, they’d play with it and I’d say, okay, wait. And then boom down it goes, okay, now set the hook. Well the boom is he swallowed it, now he’s swimming away and can’t get, get it unstuck. Phil (52m 58s): So yeah, you, there are something, there’s a bit of a technique involved with there. Yeah. Jerry, this has been great just talking about the, you know, the design around here. We’ve been close to an hour now. What I’d like to do is sort of finish up here today and then let’s have you back and talk about how you like to fish them because I know you’ve got quite a, a way you like to fish ’em. So if you’re okay with that, what we’d like to do is we’ll sort sort of end it here. We’ve talked about balanced flies, how you came up with them, the be you the pin assemblies, how you like to tie them and sort of the history behind it. And then have you back on another episode and we’ll talk about fishing them. Phil (53m 39s): How’s that? Jerry (53m 40s): Okay. That sounds like a great idea. Phil (53m 43s): Okay. Is there anything else you’d like to add just to close up the fly tying is anything you wanna mention or talk about? Jerry (53m 49s): Yeah, you, you asked a question about head turner beads. Phil (53m 55s): Oh yeah. The inverting tungsten beads. Yeah. They’ve become quite popular. Jerry (53m 58s): Certainly streamlines the process of tying the fly and I think just tying a, a clinch knot there to more or less have the fly at right angles to the tip. It presents the fly in a horizontal fashion and certainly works. And the only, only thing I observed was that when you catch a fish then you gotta straighten that back up. Phil (54m 22s): Yeah. You do have to check because even if you’re an aggressive caster, your cast can knock it out of position. Jerry (54m 28s): Yeah. So I’ve continued to just go with the balance flies. ’cause I guess maybe I’m a little prejudiced maybe. Phil (54m 35s): Yeah. You you have a little dog in the fight as they like to say. Well, that’s great. Jerry, I really wanna thank you for joining me. I, you know, I, since I started this podcast, having you on here has been one of my, my bucket list items for this podcast because of, you know, the important contribution your ingenuity made to creating balanced flies and, and, and the impact it’s had on my tying and my fly fishing. And, and I believe on others too because I, I believe a balanced fly is a common component of any Stillwater fly box today. And I also know a lot of guy, I, I use them, you know, you mentioned Lee liking to nymph on your cutthroat streams. I use them when a Euro nymph. They work great under a dry dropper. They work great cast and retrieve. Phil (55m 17s): So they’re not just an indicator of still water fly. They have a wide range of applications on lakes and rivers as well. So Jerry, thanks so much for your diligence and for thinking out a problem so the rest of us can benefit. I really appreciate it. So thanks for joining me today. Jerry (55m 31s): You’re welcome. Phil (55m 33s): I want to thank Jerry for taking the time to sit down and discuss with me the origins of balanced Flies and how he ties them. We now know how balanced flies came to be, who introduced them, and perhaps most importantly, how to tie them properly. Be sure to check out the show notes for images and recipes of a few of the flies. Jerry and I discussed. I look forward to continuing my conversation with Jerry in part two as we step away from the tying bench and Get onto the water to learn how Jerry fishes his balance flies. Be sure to join us.