Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly – Ready to Swim or Balance!

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Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly Pattern ..

Ahhhh night shifts! 3:30 AM and all kinds of crazy shite is going through my head.

Every now and then a balanced leech flashes by and then is gone … lost in a smorgasbord of bizarreness. I get my sleep deprived mind to latch onto the leech next time round and I shake my head like a rainbow to try and concentrate on what the back of my brain is trying to convey to me. I kind of gather that I should be tying balanced leeches but things are still fuzzy.

First off I never have tied a balanced leech one as the only leeches I use under an indicator are size # 12 or #14 micro leeches and they seem to work just fine as is. Then I think back to an incident from a few years ago. I was flying out of Vancouver early the next morning so I got a room at the airport hotel. I was down at the hotel lounge crushing a few Rumbies and reading a flyfishing magazine to kill time when I looked up to see a guy heading right for me. He stops and asks if he can join me. He had brought a rum for me so it was only polite to wave at the chair across the table. He continued with, “I see you’re reading a fishing magazine. I’m a die hard fisherman.” Long story short he’s from Ontario and is an avid bass and walleye fisher-dude. I had laid the magazine down open to an article on balanced leeches and he asked,” What exactly is a balanced leech?” I proceeded to tell him that you put a bead on a pin and tie it sticking forward from the eye of your jig hook so that when the fly is tied that it balances and hangs horizontal. He looked a little puzzled so I added that it was fished under an indicator. He says.” Ya I do the same thing … a jig under a bobber for Bass. The only difference I see is my jig and pig has a pork tail and that has a marabou one.” I was about to correct him and tell him it wasn’t anything like that but the more I  thought about it they were the same.

Now I’m about as far from a fly fishing purist as you can get but I wonder if that guys comment may have deterred  me from tying balance leeches a little bit. As I’m pondering this a picture of a leech is forming in my head that’s,”Not quite right.” And so with some wildly firing synapses the Bi-Polar Leech was born! One minute this leech is balanced, calm, cool, level headed and just hanging around. But a second later it’s unbalanced skittering, stripping, diving and shooting all over the place. Sounds Bi polar to me.

This step by step is more about the technique of tying than the materials used so please feel free to tie it with your favorite leech materials and colours. Here’s how I tie it …

Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly | Tying Materials:

HOOK:  Togen Wetfly 1X Short #8

BEAD:  Togen Cool Beads

TAIL:  Strung Marabou

BODY:  Hareline Dyed UV Polar Chenille over the Marbou

WIRE:  Ultra Wire Large

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Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly | Tying Instructions:

1) Pinch the barb and slide your  bead on.

2) Secure the wire and wind down to the bend in the hook.

3) Tie in your marabou at the bend and pull out of the way.

4) Wind the wire forward to a point about a third of the way down the hook securing over the marabou on your first wrap.

5) Secure the wire on the top of the hook with lots of wraps of thread not unlike tying for a post on a dry fly.

6) Twist the marabou into a rope and wind forward, around the wire to the bead.

7) Wind your thread back down to the tail and tie in the Polar Chenille.

8) Wind the thread back up to the bead.

9) Wind the chenille forward around the wire to the bead.

10) Secure and trim off the excess & whip finish.

Now at this point it looks pretty messy but a quick run  under a stream of hot water to align the fibers will sleek it out quite nicely! 😉

Just tie this leech on normally if you intend to cast and strip or troll the fly …

Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly – Swimming Mode

… and if you want it balanced simply pull your leader back over the fly and secure with the wire wrapped twice around the hook!

Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly – Balanced Mode

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Here’s a few other colours to consider …

Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly – Colour Options

Bipolar Balanced Leech Fly | The Video …

And if that wasn’t enough, Brandyn took a liking to this neat little creation and recently added a how to tying video 🙂

And that’s the Bipolar Leech folks! You can go from casting and stripping it to a balanced leech presentation without changing your fly!  This fly may not be for everyone but it got me tying balanced leeches and hopefully it gets you to the bench as well!  So tie some up and go have some fun!

Gord FlyGuys Northern Division
Keep Calm Fish On

*** if you’re interested in custom tied, time tested & proven effective BC Interior fly patterns, but would rather buy than tie, please Contact us for details!

*** for more effective BC stillwater fly fishing patterns be sure to check out all of flies on our BCs best fly patterns index page!

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