Cork or Foam?

[Adam Grace]

Well guys I added balsa wood poppers to the mix with Eugene's help. I did not add spun deer hair because it is not quite the same to me like the other harder materials.

[Hairstacker]

Tell me, what has the world come to when a popper poll doesn't offer deerhair poppers as a choice? Are synthetics displacing time-honored, traditional, natural materials? Does not cork and balsa have more in common with deerhair than FOAM? Is nothing sacred anymore? Should I be threading plastic worms onto my Orvis bass hooks?!? Whew, there, sorry, just had to get that off my chest.

[Darian]

YEAH HAIRSTACKER What he said

[Adam Grace]

Hair, nothing is sacred anymore.

People are now fly fishing with flies made entirely out of plastic, the "Gummy Minnow" for example. There is basically no tying involved with the construction of that fly. You simply fold the sili skin over the hook in different ways and trim to shape. People are using hot glue sticks to make egg patterns, I know, I've tried it. Fly tying has branched out in all different ways.

My lazy butt will stick with simple pre-shaped foam and cork popper boddies. I've spun enough deer already.

I'm glad to hear that you are still a practitioner of the old ways. Keep spinning deer hair alive for the others.

[Hairstacker]

Practitioner of the old ways? Whilst it's true I am somewhat of a traditionalist, I also feel deerhair poppers are every bit as effective, if not more so, than other designs.

No less an authority than Dave Whitlock said, "A bass bug made of clipped deer hair will nearly always be held in a bass's mouth two or three times longer than a hard plastic or wooden fly or lure of the same size and shape. In fact bass can inhale and exhale a hard fly or lure so fast it's easy to think they actually missed it. I've often observed this faster-than-a-blink reaction when testing new fly designs on bass I keep in large aquariums and ponds."

William Tapply posits that "commercial hard-bodied bugs are designed to make a single kind of noise. They pop, push water, or slide. Low-riding porous deerhair bugs, on the other hand, can be manipulated to give you whatever you want: that delicious bass-attracting glug and gurgle, a quiet, bubbly slither, or an attention-getting ker-PLOOP. If you want a POP that will wake up a distant bass, a hard tug on a big flat-nosed deerhair bug will create a noise almost as loud as a cup-faced cork popper." He also notes, "The heavier and denser the material, the harder it will hit the water and the more likely it will spook rather than attract a bass. . . It's hard not to make them [deerhair bugs] fall onto the water with an enticing splat or plop."

Nick Lyons has written, "The soft fly can be manipulated with so much more subtlety than a hard lure -- it can be stopped dead, flirted, fluttered, eased and swum in any direction. . . ."

Not to mention, it can be made to alternately dive and resurface or swum underwater with a wiggle not unlike a tadpole. Personally, I see no advantage of the cork or balsa popper over a deerhair one and foam poppers are probably on par, if we set aside tradition and aesthetics. Hopefully no one will conclude deerhair poppers are old fashioned and thusly surmise they're a second choice these days with all the other options available.

[David Lee]

O.K. , O.K. ..... everybody just simmer down . Opinions are just that -opinions . To each his (or her) own . No use in getting all worked-up over these little things , there's room for ALL types of Bass bugs .

EXCEPT gummy-minnows and hard eggs - THEY AIN'T FLIES

Anyone that uses those two "things" would be the kind of person that has NO appreciation for the PROPER use of Rancid Bear Grease - Now , give each other big hugs and go back to your corners ......

David (peaceful) Lee

[Hairstacker]

Ah David, I ain't worked up at all. Just presenting my opinion that deerhair bugs have as much rightful place today in the bass bugger's arsenal as anything else. Just didn't want any new buggers looking here for information to dismiss them as obsolete is all.

I agree wholeheartedly, to each his own. Personally, I like 'em all, and I have deerhair, cork, balsa, AND foam poppers, each with and without rubber legs, laying around here, although my heart lies with deerhair. I especially like those green and yellow foam frogs Adam ties with the 3 colors of rubber legs -- VERY good looking fly and has to be just a KILLER for largemouth bass. I plan to study his pattern and tie some of them up for myself. And, as I've already mentioned, I was extremely impressed with that crease fly you demonstrated for me that was tied with sandwiched foam. In fact, any time I get a package in the mail, I study the packing material very carefully to see if it might be useful to craft bass bugs. Here's a picture of just such a packing material foam fly I tied not all that long ago, along with a couple of more traditional deerhair bugs (although the gurgler does have a couple strands of krystal flash in the tail ):

[Adam Grace]

I was not trying to argue or start something either. I like the different opinions on this board. If everybody had the same opinion this board would become boring. I agree with Hair that all the different materials are great. We all have our favorites.

Hair, I like you rubber legged gurgler thing. That should excite almout any bass.