Before I get on to this fly I want to apologise for the near total lack of posts here on my blog. For some time now angling has slipped down my list of priorities and that meant writing about my fishing suffered the same near terminal decline. Yes, I have been tying flies, but all of that work is destined for another book so the patterns never made it to these pages. Change is coming though and soon enough you will be fed up with me adding yet another post here.
So, what is a Reversed Zulu? It is basically a Blue Zulu where the body and head hackles are swapped over. I tie it for sea trout lough fishing but in all probability it works for brown trout too. Here is the ‘normal’ dressing of the Reversed Zulu:
For the hook I use strong wet fly hooks in sizes 8 down to 12.
Tying silk is black in 8/0
The tail is red, it can be dye swan or floss silk
Make the rib from fine oval silver tinsel
The body is dubbed black seal’s fur or substitute
Body hackle is a cock hackle which has been dyed medium blue and then palmered down the body
Now wind a black hen hackle at the head, using a feather which is slightly longer in fibre than the body hackle.
I also tie a variation of that fly. I swap the black fur out and replace it with dark blue fur and I use blue tying silk which gives a nice head when you use clear varnish.
I have never fished either of these variants on the same leader as an original Blue Zulu, so I can’t say if they are better or worse than the ‘wee blue devil’. For us fly tyers it is just two more patterns to create and fill our boxes with! This idea of reversing materials is quite common. The reversed Kate McLaren is one popular example and over here we often tie a Cock Robin with the red and golden olive halves of the fur body tied the other way around.
Happy tying!
Claretbumbler 