Tied up- Pheasant Tail Nymph

If you choose the right materials, you don’t need very many to tie up fly that catches tons of fish. Let’s tie up one of those patterns, the Pheasant Tail Nymph.

Mise en place

For this nymph, we will use:

A size 14 or 18 hook. Tie ‘em bigger if you wanna’. Tie ‘em smaller if you dare.
A size 2.5mm bead for a #14 or a 2mm bead for a #18 works for me. Move up or down as you like.
As an alternate, use a medium or small glass bead if you aren’t using the nymph as an anchor.
A couple strands of peacock herl. For the smaller sizes, you can use only one.
Some small wire in any color that matches or compliments the bead.
Some pheasant tail (it’s in the name for chrissakes)

Construction

Front to back to front. We’re going to start with the bead. We will build a thread layer to the back and then tie in some wire for a rib. We use some pheasant tail barbs as, believe it or not, a tail. Those same barbs become the abdomen then we wrap in the peacock as the the thorax. Let’s get it on.

Bead

Put the bead on (little hole forward) and build up enough thread to keep that bead from slipping. Don’t go overboard, we will wrap a bunch of material in to keep it in place.

Rib

Take thread wraps back to one wrap past where the hook starts to bend down. Tie in your wire. Wrap the thread to the front and then come on back to the same point where the hook turns down.

Pheasant tail- tail

Get three or four pheasant tail fibers (but never ever five), make their tips even as best you can and tie them in with three wraps of thread. For larger nymphs make sure you are using fibers long enough to wrap most of the way up the hook. Make those wraps one right on top of the other. The tail should be about as long as the gap in the hook. If it is too long you can gently pull the fibers forward. If it is too short, either accept the flaw or retie.

Pheasant tail- abdomen

Gently lift up the fibers over the hook and run the thread to the front. Stop one bead length behind the bead.

One of two things has happened. Either you chose fibers that were too short and you are cursing my name or you have a delightfully naturally segmented abdomen. Full disclosure- I used fibers that were too short and had to restart.

PXL_20260808_202228898.MP.jpg

Rib

Wrap the wire up to the point you stopped with the pheasant. Either over the top away from you or underneath and towards you (counter wrap) probably doesn’t make a difference. Whichever way you swing, be careful not to capture the tail fibers under the wire. You can push them up to keep them out of the way, they are in there pretty good now.

Helicopter the wire off, and use your tying scissors to clip the Pheasant.

Peacock- thorax

Tie in a couple of peacock herls where you stopped with the pheasant tail and wire. Wrap the thread to the bead. Peacock can be a little slippery so I leave trimming it until the end.

Now wrap the peacock herl forward. Don’t over pack it, but don’t skimp. Gotta’ love specific directions. You can check the next photo as an example. Also consider the ratio you have right now. Next fly, do you want to make the thorax a little bigger? That adjustment is easy now that you understand the construction.

Finish

Clip the excess with tying scissors and do a three turn whip finish being careful to lay the wraps next to the bead and not over the beautiful buggy thorax you created.

The next one of these I tie, I am going to be more careful making the first wrap of the pheasant tail for the abdomen. I have kind of a thread butt going on with this guy. The fish this catches can discuss that with me if they take offense.

Tie these in a bunch of sizes, change up the bead type, color and/or size and the ribbing material and/or color. Even though you have two natural materials in their natural colors you can produce very different looking flies using those alternates.

References and Notes

Everyone ties these, including people who know what they’re doing.