Blending synthetics for realistic baitfish patterns

I've started to tie up a range of more realistic baitfish patterns for next years season and will probably eventually stock these in Baltic pike flies shop although they will be a little more expensive than normal baitfish patterns due to the amount of work that has to go into them. This years has really made me sit up and take note of what the pike are feeding on here around the island. Every single pike I've taken home for the table have had stomaches full of smaller baitfish rather than one big fish which got me thinking that maybe I should be changing my line of attack......especially through the warmer months of July & August where it seems the pike tend to feed up more on the smaller fish. This has had me blending up a batch of different colours mainly out of Black, Misty black, Natural belly, Steelhead silver, Olive so as to be able to imitate smaller Herring, Perch , Ide, Whitefish

To be honest its one hell of a time consuming job but worth it in the long run. With this batch here I took equal clumped amounts of Mirror image "Natural belly" then mixed in Olive mirror image to each clump adding slightly more olive to each batch of the natural belly. Take the clumps between thumb and forefinger and comb through twisting it as you go along which will eventually evenly mix them together.

This one I started with Natural belly then worked in darker shades of Olive and Steelhead mixes as I moved along the hook shaft. The Lateral line is just a single thin clump of Misty black mirror image. This is very reminiscent of a young Ide or Bream found here around Replot.

Here is another Ide or small bream except with this one I mixed blends Natural belly and Olive with some Deadly dazzle steelhead silver. Looking at them though, they would actually make deadly saltwater flies!

Click images for larger view!

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