Fly Tying Archive:

Soft Hackled Streamers for Salt Water:
A change up is a change up is a change up

When I wrote the book Striper Moon I put some flies in it. Not that many but ones that I thought would cover many different types of bait that are found throughout a year of fishing. They are good flies and many people fish with them and have made personal versions of them over the years, which is as it should be. There is one of these flies that has been copied and re-copied by many tiers and has been sold under many different names. It is the Change Up.

The original dressing calls for the fly to be tied as a flat wing with the option of changing the color of the feathers to match the color of the baitfish present. I thought of it as similar to a baseball pitcher changing up his presentation by mixing in a few curve balls and sliders perhaps a fast ball once in a while, hence the name change up. The fly is a very good fly and has caught countless fish since it was first published in 1994. I have never heard of it referred to under its original name but perhaps you will recognize it from the tying description, which follows taken directly from Striper Moon.

Hook: 254 or 253 Eagle Claw all sizes Tail: Blue saddle tied in flat, over a yellow saddle, flat, over pearl Mylar (flashabou), over white saddle, flat, over small amount of white bucktail Body: White, webby saddle, doubled or folded and palmered down the shank

I tie this fly in many different sizes and with different color tails. If you change the top saddle on several ties you can present the fish with a different look quite simply. You can even tie on three or more droppers in different colors and find out quickly which one the fish prefer".

This fly along with the Big Eelie, which uses marabou, The Banana Squid, also marabou, The Eel Punt, soft bird hackle, and the Bugster all use soft webby hackle or marabou as the finishing step to complete the fly. The Bugster adds a whole marabou plume as a topping over the palmered body. There is also a nice soft hackled flat wing streamer dressing for imitating mullet in Striper Moon called the September Night Fly. This fly is a very good producer even when there are no mullet around. Dressings for these flies are provided in the set of links below.

These time-tested flies have been catching stripers for quite a while. Try them out and please alter them to suit your fancy. Wish you well.
Ken Abrames

Tying the Change Up (you are here)

Tying the Big Eelie

Tying the Banana Squid

Tying the Eel Punt

Tying the Bugster

Tying the September Night Fly

Tying the RLS Nine Three Flatwing: Introduction

Tying the RLS Nine Three Flatwing: Complete step-by-step instructions

Tying the RLS Supervisor Flatwing: Complete step-by-step instructions