Among tube flies, there is no doubt that the Sunray Shadow is one of the most popular and effective ones. My first contact with it was in the Kau tapen Lodge in Tierra del Fuego. They had begun their operation not long ago and the head guide was Roland Holmberg, a well known Swedish angler who guide View more...Among tube flies, there is no doubt that the Sunray Shadow is one of the most popular and effective ones. My first contact with it was in the Kau tapen Lodge in Tierra del Fuego. They had begun their operation not long ago and the head guide was Roland Holmberg, a well known Swedish angler who guided for Atlantic Salmon in the famed Gaula River in Norway. Roland used a two-handed rod and tube flies, a real novelty for us who used single-handed rods in those times.
More than 35 years ago, watching an angler fish a Sunray Shadow at great speed, with a floating line and a spey rod was quite a show. Only European anglers used two-handed rods regularly in those days, we had none in Argentina and in the US they were not very popular, although anglers like Mike Maxwell were already known as Spey Casting names.
Roland gave me some Sunray Shadows, very simple ones: a deer and goat wing tied on a transparent tube, with many tooth marks by several sea trout. I rapidly tied some copies and kept the originals, and since those days I have used tube flies, together with my normal streamers, always with great results.
There are models of streamers that are very difficult to turn into tubes, and today articulated streamers are fighting hard, but a good tube is still unreplaceable to fish on the swing, for example; with the advantage that we can use a great variety of hooks to adapt the tube to different waters and fish sizes.
The original Sunray Shadow was designed and tied for the first time in the 60s by a pro tier called Mr. Raymond Brooks, who rented the Laerdal River in Norway between the 60s and 90s. it was tied with black hair from a Colobo monkey (Colobus sp) taken from a rug a friend had given him. Commercially, Ray Brooks must have gotten that hair from a fur salesman of those times. Today, monkey hair is forbidden and it is replaced by sheep, goat or Collie dog hair.
We can see these original Shadows in a picture attached here, it’s a tube model clearly derived from the Sunray Shadow Roland gave me. I have added details over the years to fish for browns from other rivers, different to the Río Grande in Tierra del Fuego.
In the Grande, brown trout come from the sea, where they eat other sea fish like anchovies and other similar ones. These long, thin, translucent fish are well imitated with an original Sunray Shadow. It still does a killing in the Grande, but I needed a bulkier one for the inland browns that eat their congeners. Taking the idea from tubes from the Dee River in Scotland, like the Dee Monkey, I added materials and colors that were very effective in traditional streamers.
The grizzly Matukas dyed in yellow have never failed. This Puelche takes the colors of the wing and body, although the black floss with its silk glow cant hide its resemblance to other of my favorite streamers, the Black Ghost. The underwing of the Puelche is a mix of yellow and red bucktail. Many will remember the colors of the Mickey Finn. The yellow and black wings of the Puelche are made of materials like sheep or goat hair, that moves very well in the water. Then come some details like glow, peacock that always must be present in streamers (because this tube is still a streamer), jungle cock in the cheeks for better contrast, yellow and black hackle in this case, that has the important function of creating a turmoil on the back making the wing to move in an undulating way.
The Puelche is perfect to swing with floating lines or slow sinking ones, casting across the current to then make a long mend upstream or downstream, according to our need of slowing down or accelerating the fly to have a more attractive speed.
It is very effective as well when we fish it in the deep with fast sinking lines, but we must make it cross the current in an appealing speed for the fish.
This fly needs certain velocity so the front hackle makes turbulence and the wing moves undulating like a swimming fish.
With short mends and simultaneous moves with the tip of the rod we’ll make the swimming erratic and with some stops, imitating a small fish in trouble.
Many times, big trout follow these flies for a while and suddenly attack them in a spectacular way, sometimes it happens at the end of the swing so we need to stay calm and patient.
Roland, when the water temperature was good, fished the Sunray Shadow casting across the current to then bring it in long fast strips with his line hand. Sometimes he even made it jump on the surface because of the high speed but the browns were faster and caught it easily. The attack on a fly that goes fast is not delicate and it leaves no doubts at all.
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List of materials
TUBE: aluminum or plastic, 2 inches.
Thread: 8/0, black.
Body: silk Floss, black.
Ribbing: medium oval tinsel, gold.
Wing 1: yellow and red Bucktail, equal amounts and mixed.
Wing 2: sheep or Icelandic hair, yellow.
Wing 3: sheep or Icelandic hair, black.
Wing 4: goatee or goat hair, black.
Flash: holographic Flashabou, green.
Back: peacock, 2 fibers of a good eye, if posible in bronze color.
Hackle: pheasant body feather, dyed yellow.
Cheeks: Jungle Cock.
View more...TUBE: aluminum or plastic, 2 inches.
Thread: 8/0, black.
Body: silk Floss, black.
Ribbing: medium oval tinsel, gold.
Wing 1: yellow and red Bucktail, equal amounts and mixed.
Wing 2: sheep or Icelandic hair, yellow.
Wing 3: sheep or Icelandic hair, black.
Wing 4: goatee or goat hair, black.
Flash: holographic Flashabou, green.
Back: peacock, 2 fibers of a good eye, if posible in bronze color.
Hackle: pheasant body feather, dyed yellow.
Cheeks: Jungle Cock.
Steps
Step 1
Tie some oval tinsel leaving a space at the back. That’s where the flexible connector, to lock the hook, will go later on.
Step 2
With silk floss make the body. Go forward with the thread, tie the floss leaving space for the wing, the neck and head. With the floss, now go back and forward again, then tie and cut.
Step 3
Wrap the tinsel making a tag with 3 turns together, then spiral the tinsel on the body with 5 separated turns.
Step 4
Mix the yellow bucktail with the red one evenly, then use the stacker, and make the first wing. You can use a bit of cyanoacrilate on the base of the hair so they don’t loosen after using the fly repeatedly.
Step 5
Prepare a bundle of sheep or icelandic hair, yellow, and tie so that it is a bit longer than the previous wing.
Step 6
In the same way, tie a bundle of sheep wool or icelandic hair, black color.
Step 7
Tie 6 flashabou strands over the wings.
Step 8
Now tie the goatee or goat wing, it has to be shiny and longer than the other wings.
Step 9
Look for 2 good peacock fibers from the eye part, tie them on top and one at each side.
Step 10
With a silver pheasant feather make the neck or hackle, tie it by the tip, and comb towards the back before wrapping it.
Step 11
Add the Jungle Cock cheeks.
Step 12
Use UV resin to finish the head, small and conical.
Step 13
The original Sunray Shadow from the old days.
