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The CDC Loop Spider
By Goran Grubic
A
few year’s ago I started to use very basic flies with CDC as a
hackle. They were not unlike the original CDC flies from French Jura
– The Moustique. However I preferred herl bodies to the original
floss, and pheasant’s tail was perfect for the purpose. That is how
the Pheasant’s Tail CDC Spider was born. It is very possible that
some other tier already had the same idea and that the fly was
invented before, so I don’t claim any originality for it. Ted Leeson
and Jim Schollmeyer in their fine book Tying Emergers (2004) have a
fly called CDC Spider (its author is Charles Rangeley Wilson) and a
fly called CDC Soft Hackle, which are quite similar. Anyway, I was
quite happy with Pheasant’s Tail CDC Spider and it caught a lot of
trout for me. It was especially good as an emerger when trout were
taking insects in the water surface. The interesting thing was that
fish accepted the fly in many occasions when hatching flies had
completely different color. And the best thing was that it was quite
successful when I was not able to detect which insect was taken by
trout. It became my “problem solving fly”.
Pheasant’s Tail CDC
Spider
The next step in the
development of the fly came when I started to tie its body with
dubbing loop technique, using loose CDC fibers as dubbing. That fly,
The Loop Body CDC Spider, was equally successful to the previous
one, but it had several advantages. It was better floater and more
durable than the old version.
CDC dubbing loop
The Loop Body CDC
Spider
Last year a non fishing
friend collected some CDC for me. He was not completely sure which
feathers I wanted and thoroughly plucked backs of his ducks. I
obtained some regular dun colored CDC, but also a lot of feathers
that cover the area around the preen gland. To my amazement I
discovered that the downy part of those feathers also had true CDC
properties. The feather was not useful as hackle, but it was perfect
for dubbing loop technique. Hans Weillenman
did a great thing when he defined four types of CDC, and which type
is suitable for which flies. He sorted the chaos that previously
existed about those feathers. However, the feathers I got were not
mentioned. Maybe they can be called “Type 5” CDC, because they are
still quite useful for tying.
Duck back feather
After obtaining a lot of
that new CDC stuff I got an idea to tie the fly using a single
dubbing loop. The first portion of the CDC fibers is dubbed on the
thread, while the second is inserted straight to act as a hackle.
All in one CDC loop
The loop is wrapped in the
usual fashion and the whole CDC Loop Spider is tied in a single go.
It takes a bit of time to get an idea about the right amounts of
fibers, but even a complete novice can learn to tie it in a few
minutes.
The CDC Loop Spider
During the 2007 season I
tried this fly whenever there was a need for emerger pattern, even
in situations when I knew that some other fly would be successful.
To my amazement it worked almost every time. The simple CDC fly
became my favourite “hatch matcher” and caught a number of picky
trout. So far I used the fly tied in the original dun color only.
Next season I’ll try it in a few variations: white, yellow and
olive, but somehow I don’t think that color is its most important
feature.
© Goran Grubic 2007
www.flyandtrout.com
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