St Paul Fly Tiers Event - Andy Selvig

Photo Courtesy of St Paul Fly Tiers

 Last Thursday I attended my first St Paul Fly Tiers meeting/event and it was REALLY good.  The group welcomed Andy Selvig to demonstrate how he ties stacked and/or spun deer hair bugs. The bug shown above is one of "his."  The deer hair is packed so tight you can actually sand it with sandpaper!

Andy took on the Wilderdilch pattern for the event, a swimming pattern created by fellow St Paul Fly Tier -Tony Stifter.  Andy's finished Wilderdilch 2.0 was very impressive, but I must say....Tony's original is an excellent fly in its own right (seen below).

A few years back I saw a picture of Tony's Wilderdilch and decided to try my version.

Tony's Original Wilderdilch

Smallmouth Fly Box Rendition

Anyway...Andy's deer hair creations are not meant to sit in a glass box (they are that beautiful), they are meant to be fished.  Without question the heads will survive Mack Truck style hits.  The density of the heads are formed using Pat Cohen's "Fugly" Hair Packer.  Here is a YouTube video of the tool, so you can see the scale of the beast. If you are serious about packing deer hair you should invest in one.

Here are some more pics of Andy's work from the St Paul Fly Tiers website.  The pictures really show the quality of Andy's work.  Thanks again to Andy and the St Paul Fly Tiers crew for pulling the event together and showing us Andy's unbelievable work.