Fly-Tying Tools

Using basic fly-tying tools is fairly straightforward. Each one helps you maneuver your materials more efficiently and facilitate the process of working with thread or very thin wire:

• Vise: The vise is your main tool. You fit the hook into the jaws of the vise, securing the hook so you can add your fly materials.
• Bobbin: The bobbin holds your spool of thread or wire. Fix the spool between the two heads, and then run the thread through the tube. Some bobbins come with a tension adjustment feature. If yours doesn’t, you’ll apply tension with your hand as you tie.
• Bodkin: A long needle on a handle, the bodkin works by gripping the handle and maneuvering the needle to poke and prod fur or hairs into place or to add head cement.
• Hair Stacker: This simple and important cylindrical tool aligns your fibers, hair clumps, or fur, giving them nice, even ends to add to your fly. Load the fibers into the barrel, tip ends first. Then load the barrel into the hair stacker frame. Knock it a few times against your workstation to organize the material. Then remove the barrel, pulling out the neatly stacked fibers.
• Whip Finishing Tool: A whip finishing tool creates a slip knot to secure the thread to the hook so you don’t have to do it with your fingers. First, pull your bobbin to expose about three inches of thread. Then hold the whip finishing tool between your thumb and forefinger at the base. Put the tool’s hook end around your thread at the hook shank. Lay the tool’s notched end flat against the thread. Lift the bobbin upward as you slide your fingers to the handle of the whip finisher. The resulting shape of the thread should resemble a figure 4. Hold this figure 4 shape as you make four or five rotations of the tool, which winds the thread neatly around the hook shank. Leave the thread in the whip finisher’s hook but remove it from the notch, and then pull the bobbin, closing the thread around the hook shank.