There are literally a ton of ways to tie in legs on nymph patterns, especially when it comes to dealing with rubber or silicone material. In past videos I have shown some of the ways that I prefer to tie them in, some better than others. One of easier ways that I have found and adopted over the years is the Loop Lashed method. This style makes it easy to maneuver the excess material out of the way of tying in other steps of a pattern whenever you are trying to minimize material waste, but also for tying in successions of legs to the fly.
Whenever you are using long strands of rubber, silicone or even monofilament, you can tie legs more efficiently by mounting a single length of material and loop and lash it to the hook as you go rather than mounting separate sets of legs. This reduces preparation and the tying process as a whole.
In this style of legging a fly, the two ends of the strand(s) are lashed to the sides of the hook, and their final position is not perpendicular to the shank; they are angled to the eye of the hook. The angle that they are positioned is at the discretion of the tier, and in our video today you will see just how I maintain the angle of the legs as a result of the other body materials way of propping said legs in a manner that keeps them extended outward from the body.
What you may find is helpful in the process of doing multiple successions of loops is the use of a clip, band some other device that will hold the sections of legging material out of the way of the hook shank as you lash the other materials to the hook. The silicone magnet contraptions that I now use work well for this, but a material clip, hair clip or even just a magnet can work just as well.
The decision to lash a pair of rubber legs or a single rubber leg to the shank of the hook is determined by a couple of factors. One being the length of the material that you are using might require you to use more than one strand, and also the number of legs plus or minus antenna required to complete the pattern. Once you have tied a couple of said pattern you will quickly be able to ascertain just how many sections of the legging material you will need to finish the fly and hopefully adjust accordingly.
As I briefly stated in the video, you can go one of two ways when tying Hellgrammite/fishfly patterns. The natural tendency today is for overly complex multi sectional variations that hinge on realism and exact imitation. I will never negate innovation and the push to go further with creativity and realism, but often simple and suggestive is the ticket, and much more feasible from an efficiency perspective. Every tyer has their cut off point in terms of how much time they will invest in a fly pattern, and this one is well within my personal threshold for what it represents. This one is rather easy, and doesn’t take long to tie, give it a shot and see what happens.
Even more important in the video is I demonstrate a slightly different and actually easier way to loop lash the legs that makes things a bit easier. Not only will the legs tie easier, they will lay in the proper alignment every time.