Just completed a new fly rod and tied some adams but can not find my recipe
for making dry fly floatant. I really like to make all the items I can, would
appreciate any help, Stanford.

I take the contents of the little capsules of dry dessicant ,and the little packets of silicone crystals
that come in pill bottles and other packaging .
I empty them into a small screw or snap lid container .
put my soaked and fish slimed flys in ,hold the lid closed and shake.
works as well as any that I've ever bought. leaves no powdery residue
and shakes off easily.

It takes quite a few of these to make enough to fill,say a 1 oz container .
a local pharmacy should be able to help you out . they get scads of them in their bulk packaging.
give it a try it should be all free!
mojotrout,
MOJOTROUT ROD CO.
NORTHUMBERLAND , PA

This is a stumper Stanford. Most pastes are a concoction of modern products you would have to buy over the counter anyway, so not particularly personalized. Many are silicon based. Some early pastes included animal fat, so I guess you could get some of this from the butcher. Mucilin is an English product available from Golden Witch with lots of heritage. I might suggest tying with cul-de-canard (duck butt) feathers, as these have natural oils for the personal touch you want.

Here's a quote from a fly fishing BB that I copied down about 3 or 4 years ago. Have not tried it yet so I cannot vouch for this but it does sound reasonable:


"The best and easiest floatant in the world is simply paraffin wax and lighter fluid. Mix approximately 30% paraffin and 70% lighter fluid. Put this mixture in sunlight and the paraffin dissolves in the lighter fluid. You must allow your flies to dry for a few minutes after soaking them, but it is the best floatant I've ever used. Flies float forever! "

Wow, much thanks to all.
After much searching, found a recipe in Flicks book,
Mix a piece of Mucilin about the size of a bean with
an ounce of liquid of Carbon Tetrachloride.

I know the amount of Carbon Tetrachloride is very slight, but do you really want to use soemthing like that?

I am not a bark crunching tree hugger or anything, but it seems that it is pretty nasty stuff even in small quantities.

I know Dave Hughes says the used to use parrifin and gasoline back int he day.

Joe <*}(({{>>{



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/09/2005 12:34PM by Joe Asinger.