The Synthetic Dirty Hippy

For several years, one of my favorite streamers for both warm and cold water species has been Charlie Craven's Dirty Hippy.  It's a fun tie, it casts easily, has a great profile, has a great (slow) sink rate, and the fish love it.  Tinkering with known patterns is something I enjoy doing.  Swapping materials, adding something extra, I like adding my own twist on patterns like these.  Curiosity set in last night, and I decided to see if I could tie a fully synthetic Dirty Hippy with some materials I had in better supply than some of the natural materials used in the pattern.  The recipe I followed was:

Hook - Size 4 3XL streamer hook
Weight - 10 wraps .020 lead and a medium cone head
Body Flash - Large lateral scale
"Gills" - Ice Chenille
Flash - Rainbow Flashabou
1st Belly - Laser Dub
1st Back - Faux Fox
2nd Belly - Laser Dub
2nd Back - Laser Dub
Head - Ice Dub
Eyes - Size 4 Fish Mask and 3D eyes

This recipe deviates from the original with materials tied in behind the cone.  The lateral scale adds some body flash, and the Ice Chenille bleeds through the body and belly materials for a great "gill" effect.  Other materials I have swapped for this rendition are the Faux Fox for marabou, and Laser Dub for the arctic fox.  The original Dirty Hippy also uses Ice Dub for the head, but I used a Fish Mask for this version instead of gluing eyes directly onto the head.

In hand and on the vise, I really like the way this turned out.  This size will be great for small stream bass and should maintain the slow sink rate and easy casting that I knew to be great assets of the original pattern.  Hopefully this fly will get some thorough testing soon.