Tying Instructions

This is a complicated pattern to begin but simple when finished. Basically it is your standard Matuka with a wool head.

 

1. Start thread, wrap wire for weight down the bottom 2/3rds of the hook. Wrap over wire and tie down your rib. Start your egg yarn, move the thread to the 1/3rd mark and then follow by palmering the yarn. Tie off the yarn.

 

2. Now select 4 hen saddle feathers and tie them in tips first, with two each cupped together and facing away from the other two, so the tail splays out. Carefully wet your finger and push the hackle barbs in the "mohawk" forward. Now wrap in the rib, locking down the feather quill. You will need to fold small, 1/4" sections of mohawk back each time until you have finished tying down the feather. Now tie off your wire and clip. Tie in two feathers, one on either side with the concave faces forward, to make the pectoral fins.

 

3. Select and cut a pencil-thick bunch of wool. Tie it in by the middle of the bundle to the top of the hook. Carefully work your thread forward and make a couple locking wraps, then repeat on the bottom. Now move forward one pencil width and do this again. Repeat until you have filled up the gap in the materials with wool. Finally, trim wool to shape. Try to flatten the bottom of the head to avoid closing up the gape of the hook.

 

 

How to Fish

Fish the Woolly Skulkin across and down or directly across, as deep as you can. These sculpin hold to the bottom of the river but otherwise orient much like trout. They are active at night and sculpins can definitely produce in the nightime hours, but I usually break this out as a last resort. Sometimes all that is needed to fill in a goose-egg day is a whiff of the woolly skulkin.