How To Tie the Low Fat Minnow Streamer

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The Low Fat Minnow is a small baitfish pattern that can be tied in various colors and sizes to imitate various bait. Using synthetic and natural ingredients, the Low Fat Minnow has a slender profile and is lightweight to cast. From bass to snook, this fly effectively catches many predatory species and deserves a permanent spot in any angler's streamer box.

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Material list:

• Hook: Kona BGH Big Game Hunter Hooks (size: 2)
• Thread: Danville 6/0 (70 Denier) Flymaster Thread (color: white)
• Tail: Hareline Strung Marabou Blood Quills (color: white, olive)
• Under Body: Hareline Cactus Chenille (color: pearl) Chocklett's Finesse Body Chenille (color: orange, size: medium)
• Body: Senyo's Laser Dub (color: olive, white)
• Eyes: Fish-Skull Living Eyes (color: fire, size: 5mm)
• Adhesive: Loctite Ultra Gel Control Super Glue
• Head: Loon UV Clear Fly Finish (thick, thin, flow)
• Accents: Copic Sketch Marker (color: black)

Video Transcript

Hello, I'm Carl at Trident Fly Fishing. Today we're going to tie Cheech's Low Fat Minnow in colors to match a bluegill. It presents a great baitfish pattern and it's translucent when wet. This fly will fool even the most finicky of fish.

The hook we're going to use today is a Kona BGH, it's a size 2, it's got a nice wide gap and a wicked point. Our thread is some Danville's 6/0 in white. I'll start our thread a little bit behind the hook eye and wrap back to the bend of the hook.

Here we're going to tie in our first material, and that's going to be some Hareline strung marabou blood quill in white. Don't need a lot, just tear some away from the stem. Wet it a little bit with your fingers so that it's more manageable. It's going to be just a tad longer than the hook. Wet the material a little bit - it cooperates much better.

The next color is some strung blood quill marabou in the color olive. We're going to tie that on top of the white and we want about twice as much as we had for the white. To make it manageable, I'm probably going to have to tie that in two clumps. Marabou gets everywhere. And I think we'll tie in just a little bit more.

This is Hareline cactus chenille, the color is pearl and the size is medium - you could also use small. We'll prepare it by just pulling a little bit of the material away from the core to give us a tie-in point. Just a few wraps, maybe three. One, two, three, tie that off.

This minnow has a little bit of orange in it, and we're going to tie in some Chocklett's chenille in orange, size medium. Strip a little material away from the core to create a tie-in point. This is a fairly heavy chenille, so it's not going to take a lot of wraps - one and a half or two is plenty. We'll pull that material back and wrap over it some to help it lay down back behind the hook.

Now we're going to tie in one more small clump of olive colored marabou. We want that to lay back about even with the end of the tail.

Our next material is going to be some Senyo's Laser Dub in the color olive. We're going to tie that in on top of the fly. It's a long, stringy kind of dubbing and we want to get the ends kind of married up. We're going to tie this in on top of the hook, right behind the hook eye. Next is going to be some Senyo's Laser Dub in white for the belly of the fly. We'll do the same thing, about the same amount of material. Do your best to keep the colors separate.

Now take the olive and fold that back. Two wraps to help it lay down, and then the white. See if we can't brush some of that back and get it behind the hook. You can manipulate the material just a little bit to eliminate any bald spots before you finally tie it down. Now a whip finish, cut our thread, and we're ready for the eyes.

These are Fish-Skull Living Eyes, they're 5mm - I think they're a fire orange color. I like to stick these on the back of my hand so they don't escape me. I like to initially hold them in place with just a dab of super glue gel. Luckily that gel gives you some working time.

Now to help hold everything in place, we're going to use some Loon UV Resin. This is the thin. Get this to soak down in well behind the eyes. You can also use it to help shape the body of your fly. If you pull the material back before you hit it with the light, it will help shape the head of the fly.

Now some thick finish, a little over the eyes. Having a rotary vise simplifies this - it tends to even out all of that resin. Once you're happy with the shape, you can hit it with the light. That resin tends to be kind of sticky, so Loon makes a product called Flow. The thick is still very hard, it just seems sticky to the touch. This Flow, placed over the top of that, is very thin and it will eliminate that stickiness.

Now a little bit of color for the fly. I've got a Copic marker in black. Bluegills have a dot right behind their eyes - like so - and maybe a few stripes down the back. And there we have it, our fly's finished.

It really looks a lot different when it's wet in the water. I have a fly here that we dipped in a glass of water a little while ago to give you an idea of what it looks like when it's wet. You can see that it's much slimmer, much more of a baitfish shape to it, and it's very translucent.

Thanks for watching. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button to keep current with all of the new content here at Trident Fly Fishing. I hope to see you again next time.