Martyn White | Thursday, 16 October 2025
This week's fly isn't the one I was going to do, but I was inspired by a conversation about boobies, the bans they often face and if there were any workarounds.
I've mentioned before that I love a booby, the best thing you can do to a pulling fly for trout is put foam eyes on it. But boobies aren't always allowed. Something that should be a nonsense, but unfortunately many people can't be trusted to fish them responsibly and end up deep hooking fish. No problem if you're killing one for the table, but unacceptable when releasing. So they get banned. I'd say though, it's the method used rather than the fly that's the problem, there are plenty of other buoyant flies that aren't technically boobies that can be fished static or near static without the angler properly keeping in touch with them, which regularly results in the trout swallowing the fly. I’m confident that if fished responsibly, boobies, or any other buoyant patterns, aren’t any more dangerous to still water trout than any other type of fly.
So, this week I’ve chosen the deer hair bomb. The reason being, the complete lack of foam makes it definitely not a booby. FABs, razzlers and Mr. softies aren’t foamless and may fall foul of the rules in some places. The bomb on the other hand is little more than a muddler on steroids. It’s a simple enough tie and you can have a very handy fly with just 2 materials, you might fancy adding a bit extra but there’s not much scope for adding a lot. Here’s a pattern for the most extravagant of bombs;
Hook: FM comp heavyweight size 8-10
Thread: 6/0 uni or GSP if you need it for the hair
Tail: Marabou and flash of your choice
Butt: cactus chenille
Body: spun and clipped deer hair.
The cactus and the flash are entirely optional, and as already mentioned if you don’t include them, you’ll still have a versatile and effective fly. You’ll see in the POD I’ve gone for a gold arsed cat theme, but they’ll work in any colour scheme that you’d tie a booby in. You’ll not go wrong with black, black and green, orange, olive or sunburst and natural. Treat them with watershed or jacket waterproofer and they’ll stay floaty for ages, if you also give them a rub with mucilin paste before fishing they’ll most likely be destroyed by fish before they start to sink.
Some might think it’s unethical to try to circumvent a ban, but I think if fished in a way that isn’t conducive to deep hooking, there’s no reason not to use an alternative. As long as you keep them moving, even slowly and maintain contact you’ll not gut hook the fish. Similarly, with a washing line presentation higher in the column deep hooking just doesn’t happen in my experience. You might not agree with my position, but I’d have no qualms about rolling three of these back with a sharpish figure of 8 retrieve or sticking one of these on the point with a couple of diawl bachs for droppers and fishing it on a midge tip and maintaining contact, you’ll be much more directly connected than on a faster sinking line (although the “in touch” type lines now help with this too), so again there’s no need to worry about deep hooking.