[Sandy Nelson]

Having become a bit of a convert to the DHE i have some wee questions for those who swear by them.

I have been using costal deer hair for the size 12 and 14's i've been tying and it is perfect, well in my eyes anyway, but i notice Bob reccomends using snowshoe on smaller sizes and i have historically preferred using Snowshoe on all my DHE style emergers (i have not been keen on tying with Deer hair as i thought it was too spiky  What a spaz ), but i have problems with it floating which is why i've never been a fan of the fly
So having discovered that a DHE tied with Deer hair actually floats and catches fish i want to try tying the 16's and 18's with some Deer hair instead of snowshoe.
Lakeland have deer hair patches designed for Compara duns that is supposed to suit smaller sizes, has anyone tried it? would it be better than the coastal deer i've been using or just the same? i reckon i could tie the 16's with the coastal if need be, but you know what like

Sandy

[Ben Dixon]

Comparadun hair is good stuff.  Orvis sell it, ask Kev about it 


Cheers

Ben

[Noel Kelly]

[Eddie Sinclair]

Sandy,
I have been using the comparadun hair from Orvis this season on DHE from size 16 to 20 and it works just fine and floats extremely well. I have put some gink on the hair although I do not know if I need to.

Eddie.

[Allan Liddle]

Yup you can do it with good quality deer hair Sandy, but the bulk kinda kills the desired profile.
Switch to the Dirty Duster 

[Andy Finlay]

I've seen there's a DHE & a DHE 2.0 step by step video by Hans Weilenmann on you tube. Is there any benefit of one vs the other?

[Sandy Nelson]

Yup you can do it with good quality deer hair Sandy, but the bulk kinda kills the desired profile.
Switch to the Dirty Duster 

Cheers Alan

I've the DD tied down to 24's in various shades already I was just thinking a size 18 DHE would be rather good and getting the profile was my concern, while maintaining the floatability, hence the question. Having found the snowshoe to be less than ideal, for me anyway , and being impressed with the deer hair option on the larger hooks i figured a finer hair would do the job nicely, i just didn't know which hair would be finer than the coastal deer i've got.

Will get some comparadun hair to see what it is like, i see i can get it dyed a nice dun colour too, hmmmm.......size 18 BWO's..........   It has to be tried

Thanks for all the tips though guys

Sandy

[Peter McCallum]

Interesting your comment re snowshoe. I've never had a problem with it sinking Sandy, putting gink on it should float it and its really fine.

[Sandy Nelson]

Peter

I've tried snowshoe loads of times as i have had an aversion to Deer hair for most of my tying life , I have a deep seated belief (that is slowly dissapating ) that fish spit out spiky flies, so have always gone for a nice soft material where i can. Hence the spiders and CDC fetishes
I have a few Shoes in different colours and really like tying with it, but i can never get the bloody stuff to float for very long, even with Gink,aquel, watershed or dry shake, Dry Shake works best but makes the body float too .
I often end up using it with CDC on top, that works but adds to the tying time and trickiness and i'm getting lazy in my old age . Plus the profile of the DHE doesn't lend itself to the use of cdc.

Having persuaded myself into trying Deer Hair again, due to the comments on the forum, i'm impressed with the way it works so wanted a smaller size solution.

My only thought would be, when i tie with Snowshoe hair i remove all the soft underfibers to make the tying slimmer, could this be the floatation problem? perhaps its the underfibers that help it float or retain floatant, i know from looking at them the longer fibres tend to be more glossy Any ideas?

Sandy

[Iain Goolager]

Yup, it’s a natural progression to emulate the success of the 12’s and 14’s in smaller sizes but I too have had concerns when tying 16’s and a severe doubt about using deer hair for anything smaller.
I tied a few 16’s a couple of weeks ago with ‘coastal’ hair (I use this word cautiously as I remember Peter Smith raging about the indiscriminate use of this term for any type of fine deer hair)
I thought that the attraction of deer hair is the fact that it is hollow, which holds air, therefore the longer the hair section the more air that is trapped. For all intents and purposes each strand is a long cone and if tying small flies and subsequently only using the finer tips of the hair then wouldn’t that negate the primary properties of the material? I’m assuming that at some point the tip of the cone becomes solid.
Ok so the hair bundle could be ginked and act like a shuttlecock but does the potential hassle merit its’ use over CDC?
Don’t you think CDC is a suitable alternative Sandy?
I had this snowshoe discussion with Peter & Kev not too long ago with one (I’m not going to say which in-case I misquote anyone) advocating the use of the underfur & the other saying to junk it.
Perhaps they might help me out and give correct details.
Both these guys are top dressers and can obviously make either or work, as for me I think it is sh8t…………..if I keep the underfur (or some of ) I get a bulky ‘tie in’ & if I remove the underfur I get a long uneven whispy thin mess of rubbish that won’t float.  I have been enlightened many times in the past and am hoping that an upcoming trip north will allow me to see how it’s done in reality.
I bought 5 or so colours of ‘shoe’ thinking that I was about to embark on a game changer when I had lost all faith in CDC (this was the dark ‘pre gel’ era) but it turned out to be a major disappointment.
Iain

[Sandy Nelson]

Don’t you think CDC is a suitable alternative Sandy?

Not for a DHE the way i've been tying them , It is perfect for shuttlecock style flies and i use it all the time. I also spin the cdc for small F-Fly type emergers and it is lovely, but My DHE's have been working best with a comparadun style wing, i've been tying it so it fans out to form half a halo, a lot like clipping the bottom of a full hackle (this is the obvious option, as Alan said earlier) I'll post a picture of what i've been doing when i get home later It may just be the way i've interpreted the pattern, but i thought i had the concept in my head when i tied them, they certainley work better than anything i've done before on these lines, so don't intend to change anything.
 CDC would collapse if it was tied in a similar way and although it would float, it wouldn't give the impression of struggling legs that the deer hair gives or the outriggers to cock the fly in the right way, i've a feeling thats what happens with the snowshoe too as it is possibly,also too soft to fan out properly, so floats for a few casts until the fan collapses and then starts to sink .

I've ordered some Comparadun hair, so we shall see if i can do what i'm thinking, or whether going to an 18 DHE is a practical step too far, But Eddie is getting it to work so i am encouraged

Your comment about the cone and the tips, i'd agree with completely , which is why i asked if there was something that existed that suited the situation ,as i reckon if i used the Coastal hair the tips might not float like they do on the bigger flies.

All good stuff, thanks again

Sandy

[Iain Goolager]

Ok,
Comparadun, 180 degree or 135 degree? Leg profile visible above water to the trout or actually touching the surface?

I tie in a decent amount of hair and this can be fanned out but I tend to be agricultural and let it sit ‘willy nilly’. I have thought about a sparse CDC fibre spun collar, which I think is a good addition to many a pattern to sort of break up the boring  outline of the DHE.

Iain

[Sandy Nelson]

Comparadun, 180 degree or 135 degree?

  I'll get my protractor out when i get home, But I probably go about 137.67' on a 14 and vary it by the square root of the decrease/increase in hook size. This of course is entirely dependant on the curve of the shank and the available gape for the specific pattern of hook, otherwise the the abdomen will not sit at the prescribed angle in the water which is a closely guarded secret

As for CDC collars, all i can say is Hairy Thorax

Sandy

[Allan Liddle]

135 degree for DHE's 

[Iain Goolager]

TWATZ