The Slow Rolla

As I mentioned in the blog post on February 10, I had ordered some of the Kiley's Slow Rolla tails to experiment with at the bench.  I tied a few basic streamers with them very similar to what I used on the articulated streamer with the flash ball.  I wanted to see how well these tails moved in slower flows more likely to where and how I will be fishing them in slow-moving creeks/rivers and still waters.  This was my initial set of test flies for the Medium size Slow Rolla tails, dry and wet profiles.

It's the same simple streamer design as before, minus the ball of flash at the head.  A tungsten bead to get it to sink a little, Ice Dub under body, craft fur, lateral scale, Laser Dub, and some eyes.  It looks pretty nice at the vise and as a wet profile, but where you see what this fly will really do is in the test tank.

I also ordered some of the Small sized Slow Rolla's, hoping they would be a good size match to my standard size crappie and creek bass streamers.  I took simplicity to a new level with these versions.  The recipe is as follows:

- Hook: Gamakatsu SP113L3H size 8

- Tail: Slow Rolla small

- Weight: 12 wraps .020 non lead near the front of the shank

- Body: Laser Dub in a loop or brush, picked out and colored via marker

- Head: 4MM Fish Mask

This version also performed gloriously in the test tank.  I have mentioned it before, I'll say it again: when I built my little test tank, I bought a low-flow water pump.  This was for a couple of reasons.  Number one, and admittedly most important, was the price.  Lower flow pumps are stupid cheap.  In a practical sense, it is also a better representation of the water flows I will be fishing and slower retrieval speeds in pond and lake fishing.  Basically, if it moves well in my tank, it's going to perform well where I fish.

 

The Kiley's Slow Rolla's performed a lot better for me than I even expected.  These tails are really easy to tie with, move like crazy, and seem (stretch testing) to be very durable.  I can't wait to have my bass and creek boxes stuffed with some of these streamers to show to the fish this spring.  I have a sneaky suspicion they are going to bring a lot of fish to hand.