How to Tie the Red Fox Squirrel Nymph Fly Pattern

Learn how to tie the Red Fox Squirrel Nymph fly pattern, including step-by-step instructions, a video tutorial, pictures, and much more. Improve your fly-tying skills here.

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Dave Whitlock developed this fly back in the late 1960s and considers it one of his best nymph patterns. It's a big-bodied nymph and Dave uses a blend of Red Fox Squirrel fur and a synthetic sparkle material for the dubbing giving it a unique reddish-brown appearance. The fly is typically tied in sizes 10-18.

Material List

• Hook: TMC 5262 in size 12
• Thread: Danville 6/0 in Orange
• Tail: Hareline Red Fox Squirrel Tail
• Abdomen: Whilock's Red Fox Squirrel Abdomen Dubbing
• Thorax: Whitlock's Red Fox Squirrel Thorax Dubbing
• Rib: UNI French Oval in Small Gold
• Collar: Hareline Partridge Skin Feather
• Weight: .015 Lead Wire

Video Transcript

Hello, I'm Carl at Trident Fly Fishing. Today we're going to tie the Red Fox Squirrel Nymph. Dave Whitlock developed this fly back in the late 1960s and considers it one of his best nymph patterns. It's a big-bodied nymph and Dave uses a blend of red fox fur and synthetic sparkle material for the dubbing, giving it a unique reddish-brown appearance. This fly is typically tied in sizes 10-18.

The hook we're going to use today is a TMC 5262. It's their 2X heavy, 2X long nymph and streamer hook, in a size 12. We'll start with some lead to add a little weight to this fly - take about a dozen turns or so into the center of the hook shank. Our thread today is going to be Danville's Fly Master 6/0 in Orange. We'll start by forming a thread dam in front of and behind this lead wire to keep it from moving around. Jump our thread, build a dam in the back, cover this up a bit, and lash it in there.

The first material we're going to tie in is going to be some fox squirrel tail from a red fox squirrel. We'll cut a small clump off from near the base - we're looking for the nice long guard hairs here. I want this tail to be just a little bit shorter than the shank of the hook. I'm going to tie this in right on top above the hook point. That looks right. Cut off the excess.

This fly also has a rib. We're going to use some UNI French Oval Tinsel in small, and we'll run this down and keep it on the near side of the hook. The body for this fly is some red fox squirrel abdomen dubbing - Dave Whitlock made this up, so it's really convenient for us to use. But you can make up your own if you've got some light-colored materials. We'll dub this on and run it about two-thirds of the way up the hook shank. That looks right. Now the rib - make open spiral turns up to the tie-in point, like so.

For the thorax of the fly, he again has a red fox squirrel dubbing that he calls thorax. It's a darker brown, so we'll make a dubbing noodle.

Next we're going to make the collar for the fly, and that is going to be from a Hungarian partridge skin. I'm going to pick one of the darker colored feathers from the back. We'll prepare that by pulling away all of the fuzzy material. We're going to tie it in by the tip, so we'll pull the fibers back and leave about a millimeter and a half or so to give us something to tie in. We're only going to make about a turn and a half with this, and we want the legs - I chose this size - we want the legs to go back to about the bend of the hook. These feathers are really delicate, so you can't horse them very hard or they'll break. Take our hackle pliers and bring the feathers back. We're probably going to get about a turn and a half, maybe two at the most out of this, and that's all we want.

This fly has a pretty prominent orange head, so we're going to run our thread back up over some of that hackle - that'll help lay it down. Once that head's built up the way you like it, get our whip finish tool out and make a four or five turn whip finish. Seat the knot, cut our thread. Got one stray fiber right there - there we go. Now some head cement, and our fly is complete.

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