The Montana is a
medium/big size nymph with excellent “stimulating” qualities, useful during our
first attempts to induce an apathetic fish to take our fly. This artificial has
a strong alluring power because appears analogous to various aquatic
invertebrates: it can be confused by the trout for a young stonefly with dark
colours, or for a leech or also for a dragonfly nymph. What I consider of this
fly really irresistible for the fish is the particular combination of colours of
the materials used for building its body, which helps the nymph to be well
visible even in turbid waters and in any light condition, without to be too
flashy and frightening also for the shiest trout.
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INSTRUCTIONS

I
start to build the Montana by inserting the hook into the vice jay and then
winding, in narrow coils, a piece of fine lead wire along its shank

I
secure the black thread to the hook and I use it to cover partially the lead
turns. Next I bind in two or three tips of black hackles on the hook bend:
these hackles represent the fly tails and they have to extend backwards nearly
half the length of the hook shank

Turning
the chenille around the two rear thirds of the hook shank, I realise the
abdomen. The chenille surplus is not cut, but stopped on the upper part of the
hook: in this way it will be used during the next steps to create the elytrums

On the
side of the chenille surplus, I fix two more pieces of chenille, the first
black and the second yellow, and the tip of a small black cock hackle

Wrapping
the yellow chenille around the hook section interposed between the abdomen and
the eye, I create the thorax, along which I wind, in wide turns, the black
hackle

I cut
off the waste end of the hackle, separate the feather fibres at the top and,
with the left hand fingers, I pull them down and back. Then I push the two
lengths of black chenille forwards, placing them to cover the upper part of the
thorax, and I secure them just behind the hook eye

I
realise the fly head with a few turns of the black thread, which is finished
with a whip-finish and a drop of clear glue
MATERIALS LIST
HOOK: long shank size14 to 8
BALLAST (optional): fine lead wire
THREAD: black
TAILS: two or three hackle tips from black cock neck
ABDOMEN AND ELYTRUMS: black chenille
THORAX: yellow chenille
HACKLE: from a black cock neck
BALLAST (optional): fine lead wire
THREAD: black
TAILS: two or three hackle tips from black cock neck
ABDOMEN AND ELYTRUMS: black chenille
THORAX: yellow chenille
HACKLE: from a black cock neck