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DECORUM CRAB  Here is a great crab pattern that I've been working on, the Decorum Crab. I started out using that furry foam product but was not happy with the results. I know that they are productive pattterns but I felt that cutting out a crab shape from a piece of fabric and tying it onto a hook was sort of cheating. I had the mono eyes, dumbell weights, rubber legs, and ultra-chenille claws sitting on my bench.. All I needed was a body! I ran across a nice pattern that Jack Gartside ties called a Blue crab. I liked the looks of his body, but I ultimately wanted to use a material that I had on hand. I really didn't want to shell out any more money for material that I would likely only use on one pattern. I have drawers full of stuff like that! Then I ran into a pattern that solved my problems, the ragin' craven tied by Charlie Craven. The pattern uses a simple dubbing loop to create the body, and best of all it used craft fur for the dubbing loop. I have tons of that stuff kicking around. So I started experimenting with this dubbing loop body technique and adapted it to produce the decorum crab you see above. The claws are made out of 2 strands of tan ultra chenille tied together to form the joint. The claws are then created by melting the tips, and finally coloring with Panatone marker to match the color scheme of the fly. For the body I like to use different color craft furs when making the dubbing loop, alternating the lighter tan color with a dark brown or olive, this gives the fly a more natural barred look. As I mentioned Charlie Craven's web site made all the difference in the world in coming up with a body remedy. If you would like to learn the dubbing loop technique hop on over to charliesflybox.com here is the link for the ragin' craven. While your there you might as well buy something from Charlie in the way of thanks! |
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