Grey Cricket Terrestrial Freshwater Hook : #10 Mustad . Thread : Black 6/0 monocord. Body : Grey sleeping mat (fine grained) foam, coloured black. Tail : Black crow breast feather. Rib : Black thread. Legs : Black crow wing slips knotted. Hackle : Black cock shoulder.
Tying Instructions 1) Tie in thread on #10 hook. Tie in tail consisting of 4-5 strand slip of black crow breast feather, extending 7 mm from bend. 2) Cut foam (sleeping mat density) to form oblong and shape for body, 0.5 cm wide, 1.2 cm long, coloured black with waterproof pen. Slit half way through underneath to fit over hook shank. Fix body on hook from bend to 4 mm from eye with a smear of varnish in slit. 3) Take thread from tail and around body imitating body segments, not too tight causing large segments. Clear varnish top of body to give a shiny hard black wing case appearance. 4) Legs are constructed from black crow wing 3-4 cm long 5-7 strands wide, knotted in centre, smear of varnish to hold together. Tied in front of body to sit like the natural. (not easy!) 5) Tie in large hackle in front of hind legs, wind to the eye giving a splayed hackle of 3 cm diam. Trim hackle back to 0.4cm diam. representing thorax/head but leave a few 1 cm diam. to imitate short legs and leave two sections x two stands of long filamentous hackle from the top of the head in a V shape to represent antennae. 6) Tie off without building up a large head and varnish.
Fly Notes
Fishing Notes Sits low in the water like the natural, suggest gentle casting as fly is pretty delicate. Target species includes Brown and Rainbow trout, maybe Australian bass.
Location Notes Untried yet, but late summer / early autumn is cricket season, any part of a river likely to hide a trout, they rarely pass up the opportunity on a live one so the imitation shouldn't be much different.
Prey Notes Imitation of dead black cricket found throughout SE Australia.
Tier Dale Grey

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