The Ultimate Go-To Trout and Bass Pattern With Irresistible Natural Movement

Learn to tie the Skulpin Bunny in today's fly tying tutorial video using the NEW Skulpin Bunny Fly Tying Kit.

This versatile fly has proven itself on rivers worldwide as a fish magnet. Designed to be fished on the river bottom, the Skulpin Bunny can be dead-drifted or slowly stripped to imitate a sculpin and swims in the hook-up position to avoid snagging.

The Skulpin Bunny swims hook up to avoid snagging on the bottom, shown here swimming in the NEW Fly Tester.

The Skulpin Bunny Fly Tying Kit contains everything you need to tie 6 Skulpin Bunny flies, including step-by-step tying instructions, to make it easy for you to get your hands on the various needed fly tying materials all in one place.

Fly Recipe

• Fish-Skull® Sculpin Helmet
• Fish-Skull® Living Eyes
• Kona® Trout Streamer 4XL (TS4) hook
• Hareline® Cross-Cut Rabbit Strips
• Hareline® Straight-Cut Rabbit Strips

Nick Groves' Polarceiver Fly Will Smash Smallmouth Bass and More...

Nick Groves' Polarceiver combines two of my favorite materials, Peacock Herl and Polar Chenille, into an easy-to-tie articulated streamer. 

Utilizing a Fish-Skull Fish-Spine for increased swim action and a Fish-Skull Baitfish Head to help the fly get deep and add a realistic head profile, the Polarceiver has quickly made its way to the top of my list for smallmouth bass fishing!

The popularity of fishing for striped bass in freshwater has exploded as more and more fly anglers have experienced the excitement and intense fishing action that comes with it.

In this episode of The Articulate Fly Podcast with Marvin Cash, Henry Cowen shares his experiences growing up and fishing in New York City, his striper learning curve when he moved to the South and how the gear guys have influenced his fly angling.

Henry is best known for helping to popularize chasing freshwater stripers on the fly and is releasing a new book, Fly Fishing for Freshwater Striped Bass: A Complete Guide To Tackle, Tactics, and Finding Fish.

Available through Flymen, if you pre-order one of the first 250 copies of Henry's new book you will receive a SIGNED COPY from the author! This highly anticipated book has an expected release date to you of October 15!

Not only that, 10 of these pre-orders will win a fly personally tied by Henry Cowen with a personally signed card!

Learn more about Henry's new book and reserve your copy.

Taking the Classic Deer Hair Diver to the Next Level

By integrating the new Fish-Skull Chocklett's Articulated Micro-Spine system into a well-established pattern, Braden Sherwood has designed a total winner – in fact, he won the recent Micro-Spine fly tying contest with this fly pattern.

The added movement and taper through the spines in this smaller diver pattern is fantastic.

River Pike: A Somewhat Predictable Creature

River pike are one of my favorite fish species to target on the fly, both fishing for them and guiding clients onto them, pike always give me an extra level of excitement. Rivers, compared to stillwater are more susceptible to changes. Water levels fluctuates faster and make the pike respond in different ways. When you drift down a river it’s a forever changing landscape. Behind each bend could be your new record pike waiting in ambush.

So, what are some helpful tips you can use for targeting river pike?

The Golden Nugget Is a Modern Medium-Size Baitfish Imitation

The Golden Nugget is easy to tie and highly effective on the water! Using the Fish-Skull Baitfish Head to help with swimming action, profile, and depth, this versatile streamer fly pattern can be fished for most freshwater and saltwater applications.

You can find Robin Phillips on Instagram: @robin.phillips.flies

Fly Recipe

The Mohawk Sculpin, Created by Cheech Pierce of Fly Fish Food, Is a Super Fun and Easy Sculpin Pattern To Tie

With its wide profile and short stature, the silhouette of the Mohawk Sculpin is a perfect match to the real thing and is sure to trigger predatory attacks.

The extra-heavy Fish-Skull Sculpin Helmet helps the Mohawk Sculpin drop like a rock to the bottom and this sculpin fly pattern even has a little extra "bling" from the new Hareline Magnum Bling Rabbit Strips.

Learn to tie Cheech's Mohawk Sculpin today!

Fly Recipe

The Micro Feather Game Changer is a snack-size articulated fly pattern that lands softly to avoid spooking fish, but still pushes enough water to get a predator's attention.

Imagine a fly that perfectly imitates a baitfish in your local waters, not only in profile but by swimming like a real fish and provoking the predatory instinct within your target fish... but you can still cast it with a 4wt to 6wt fly rod.

The Micro Feather Game Changer is fly a pattern developed by Blane Chocklett. This version is scaled down to about 3", and is a fantastic pattern for smaller water or picky fish.

The new Fish-Skull Chocklett's Articulated Micro-Spines open up a whole new world of possibilities for tying scaled-down Game Changer style flies.

The Flymen Big Game Needlefish Puts a Next-Generation Spin on a Staple Barracuda Fly

This fly will move Barracuda in Belize, Pike in Canada, and sizing it up or down it will catch musky, smallmouth, and trout in your local fishery as well.

Fish-Skull Body Tubing creates the elongated body of a Needlefish, and a Big Game Articulated Shank adds extra swimming action to attract your target species. Super fun tie!

Paul Brown's Disco Deceiver is a big flashy streamer with TONS of swimming action.

For targeting everything from pike to brown trout in endless color combinations, the Disco Deceiver is a ton of fun to fish and tie. Combining Fish-Skull Articulated Fish-Spines in the middle of the fly's body gives it two extra break points for movement and a Fish-Skull Baitfish Head helps get this fly to the strike zone quickly.

Why do I love tying and fishing big streamers?

The other day I was watching an episode of "The Office" and in it Michael Scott said, "What is better: a medium amount of good pizza or all you can eat of pretty good pizza?"

As weird as it sounds, that got me thinking about fly fishing and the reason why I fish and tie big streamers. With big streamers, you may not always catch fish, but the fish you do catch and the memories will be epic.

Growing up in Southern California I was always fishing for largemouth bass. Before I stated fly fishing, I was throwing big lures, plugs, swimbaits, etc. for bass with my baitcasting rod. Throwing an 8-inch lure was a common thing for me as well as at time throwing a big 12-inch plus rainbow trout plastic swimbait. So when I started tying flies I always thought why not tie big flies like the lures I was used to throwing. To me this made sense, but at that time a lot of people looked at me strangely. 

If you enjoy tying and fishing big streamers, the following are some things I'd recommend you keep in mind.

What makes fly fishing the Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota area special is this is the wild native range of warm water species.

When most people think about fly fishing Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, they think of trout. When you think of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, you think of warm water species.

We have some of the best smallmouth bass and muskie fishing in the world. It's all right here, as well as arguably the best carp fishing when it comes to pursuing them in the Great Lakes. 

The upper Midwest is such a rad area for fly fishing and there's a very small group of outfitters that are providing guided trips at an elite level. We offer single day and multi-day trips, and if you've never done a multi-day guided fly fishing trip, I'd definitely recommend one to the Midwest. It allows you as an angler to get into a groove, especially if you're a busy person that generally doesn't have a lot of time to fish. 

The Faux Bucktail Flatwing updates an old-school pattern with new-school materials. 

Replacing bucktail with Fish-Skull Faux Bucktail, adding a mixture of synthetic flash in different textures and colors, and topping it all off with a Fish-Mask brings the Flatwing into the 21st century.

Learn to tie this next-generation fly pattern today!

Fly Recipe

• Hook: Kona Xtra Strong Stinger (XSS), size 1/0
• Tail: Fish-Skull Faux Bucktail
• Tail: Saddle Hackle
• Body: Flat Braid
• Bottom: Faux Bucktail
• Wing 1: Faux Bucktail
• Wing 2: Ice Wing Fiber
• Wing 3: Ripple Ice Fiber
• Lateral Line: Dry Fly Hackle
• Wing 4: Ice Wing Fiber
• Wing (main): Peacock Herl
• Head: Fish-Skull Fish Mask
• Eyes: Surface Seducer Dragon Eyes