The Orb, by Switters B

I have been following a couple of fly fishing blogs for the past two years. I love "The Trout Underground" by Tom Chandler over on the Upper Sacramento River. He is the best all around and most interesting blog, covering the most niches of fly fishing. He also draws from some other great blogs such as "Moldy Chum" and "Singlebarbed", two that I recommend. I like Singlebarbed because he ties and ties and has a new pattern up on his blog at least four times per week. However, this post is about Switters B, a huge fly tyer and innovator. I have been trying to find the materials to tie his fly, "The Orb".

Evidently, the author at Switters B was swimming subsurface in a lake when he saw a callibaetis hatch emerging. He stated that the emerging nymphs appeared to Glow when near the surface. He then created "The Orb", a size 14 nymph that has a large clear plastic bead, under wrapped with tinsel, at the head of the fly. I have been trying for a year to find the floating plastic beads he uses. Recently, I came across 1000 4-mm plastic beads on ebay and bought them. Unfortunately, they don't fit on a size 14 hook, but a size 10. I also picked up 6/0 clear glass beads and 5-mm plastic pearl beads from Michael's, and am having trouble getting them on the hooks.

I finally used my barb-mashing pliers to bend out a 2x short curved nymph hook, size 14 -- got a 4-mm bead on it, and put gray ostrich herl for the tail, the abdomen, and the thorax. My first attempt ended up with too large a thorax, but thought I'd put it up in this post. I'm looking forward to tying this pattern and giving it a thorough test this summer, as requested to all by Switters B. I'm sure I'll get this pattern figured out, and it gives me a use for the small left over tips from tying the ostrich callibaetis in the previous post.

My apologies for the blurry photographs. I'll edit these posts and get better pictures up asap.

Take care,
Shane