Simple yet effective

[smalljaw]

I tied these up 11 days ago for a friend to try out, he showed me a jig that he liked and wanted me to copy. Well the jig was just a rabbit strip with a chenille collar so I added a little more to it and gave it to him to use but not before I took the pics. These are both 3/32oz walleye heads, the top one is black and I tied in brown bucktail and brown Cabelas chenille large size and then I tied in a sculpin brown UV2 rabbit zonker with black bars. After I tied in the rabbit zonker I palmered the chenille up and underneath the rabbit and then over top so that the rabbit zonker looks to be coming out of the chenille body. The bottom jig is white and has white bucktail with silver flash tied to the hook shank. I then tied in white Cabelas chenille large size and palmered it a couple wraps when I tied in a white and chartreuse UV2 rabbit zonker and then finished palmering the chenille the same as I did for the first jig. I didn't post these as I don't think they look too great but I decided to put the pics up as my friend called me today and told me he did really well on those jigs, both caught fish but the black jig with brown bucktail and rabbit was the clear winner and the guy he was fishing with just emailed me and asked if I would make him 2 dozen of each...lol. I think I'm going to make myself a bunch in this pattern.

 

[quivira kid]

Looks a lot like a fly I use to hammer white bass in the spring. Very nice ties!

 

[StumpHunter]

There has to be a first jig of every kind ever tied and it sounds like you have a keeper.

 

[Fatman]

SJ - Nice ties

 

[AtticaFish]

Wasn't gonna post them...... baahhh. Those are very cool looking ties!!! I've never tied zonks in quite like that but i bet it has great action and profile in the water.

I do tie something similar - but opposite - zonker out the back with a bucktail wing.

Throw a hackle or crosscut collar on that and you could have a look-alike for the slumpbuster fly pattern.

Giving me some inspiration.

 

[Hawnjigs]

The dark & light color choices could imitate most baitfish swimming. Nice materials volume for slow fall and swim. Altho I've been KISSing one material(plus flash under) puffball ties think adding a pinned zonker on top like yours might help keep the tie more centered on both sides of the hook.

Would there be any problem with short strikes with the tie extending so far behind the hook?

 

[Fatman]

X2 with Hawn - with the length will that hook back and either tangle on the hook or the short strike???

 

[smalljaw]

The dark & light color choices could imitate most baitfish swimming. Nice materials volume for slow fall and swim. Altho I've been KISSing one material(plus flash under) puffball ties think adding a pinned zonker on top like yours might help keep the tie more centered on both sides of the hook.

Would there be any problem with short strikes with the tie extending so far behind the hook?

Hawnjigs, you and fatman bring up a good point and while it can lead to short strikes it hasn't yet, at least my friend didn't tell me but these jigs, along with most of my jigs, are meant for bass and these are more for cold water when the fish want something smaller and slower. What happens with bass is they tend to eat jigs and worms head first, it is why so many do so well drop shotting a 6" worm nose hooked on a size 1 octopus hook. The jigs I've caught bass with over the summer have been ones with longer tails but I do agree, on my smaller jigs I have to shorten the tails up a bit, but having the bass mentality makes it hard to do.

 

[Fatman]

SJ - thanks that's the kind of info you don't find in the pattern books

 

[AtticaFish]

Dead on - species specific! If you are throwing with the intent to catch bluegill, the tip of the tail needs to be closer to the business end of the hook. Bass and crappie, not so much. Don't have enough experience with trout/salmon to know any better but sure hoping in the next few years i get to put jigs in front of more chrome.

Zonker fouling on the hook is another story. With longer zonker tails, i like them to have some sort of stiff upper wing (b.tail or kip) that will help keep the zonker back where it is spose to be while casting. Just a personal preference. Drives me nutso when the zonker tail is wrapped over the hook and not where it is supposed to be.

 

[smalljaw]

Dead on - species specific! If you are throwing with the intent to catch bluegill, the tip of the tail needs to be closer to the business end of the hook. Bass and crappie, not so much. Don't have enough experience with trout/salmon to know any better but sure hoping in the next few years i get to put jigs in front of more chrome.

Zonker fouling on the hook is another story. With longer zonker tails, i like them to have some sort of stiff upper wing (b.tail or kip) that will help keep the zonker back where it is spose to be while casting. Just a personal preference. Drives me nutso when the zonker tail is wrapped over the hook and not where it is supposed to be.

I hear you AtticaFish!! That is the beauty of this, the goes in the mid point of the zonker sort of like texposing a platice worm or creature bait and better still is the zonker is soft and pliable that when the fish hits it and you set the hook you still have almost the same hook gap, believe me, I really asked a lot of these question to myself when I saw the original jig and the tweaks I made to it were purely cosmetic as the original didn't have the full body chenille or the bucktail and being a bass guy the first thing I look at with these smaller hooks in the amount of gap, and so far, so good!!

 

[Fatman]

This information is really educational for me as I only started using zonker strips this year. I never even used them in fly tying, If I can get by all the trouble areas that flat out saves me money in the long run. Thanks guys!!!!!!!!!!!!1

 

[hookup]

Maybe I missed it, but what was he fish'n for?

The top one looks deadly on bass.

 

[smalljaw]

Maybe I missed it, but what was he fish'n for?

The top one looks deadly on bass.

Hookup, they are indeed intended for bass, especially cold water bass.

 

[Shoemoo]

Dead on - species specific! If you are throwing with the intent to catch bluegill, the tip of the tail needs to be closer to the business end of the hook. Bass and crappie, not so much. Don't have enough experience with trout/salmon to know any better but sure hoping in the next few years i get to put jigs in front of more chrome.

Zonker fouling on the hook is another story. With longer zonker tails, i like them to have some sort of stiff upper wing (b.tail or kip) that will help keep the zonker back where it is spose to be while casting. Just a personal preference. Drives me nutso when the zonker tail is wrapped over the hook and not where it is supposed to be.

Trout and salmon are inhalers like bass and crappie, not nibblers like bluegill. I've seen a 10" hatchery trout swallow a 6" nightcrawler in about two gulps. So short tails aren't as important as long as they're not so long they cause short strikes.

You can use a loop of heavy mono to hold the zonker strip away from the hook point if your pattern isn't conductive to a clump of stiff hair.

 

[Fatman]

Shoe thanks for the tip on the mono loop