Dostal's Mulberry

Pattern, instructions, and photographs by Larry Dostal

This is the next installment in my series of K.I.S.S. carp flies that flat out catch fish.  Mulberries are a small fruit that grows on trees across the country.  All manners of animals (and people) love to munch on ripe mulberries.  Mulberries are usually reaching peak ripeness in late June.  Extremely ripe mulberries, the ones that aren't eaten directly off the tree, usually fall to the ground becoming food for bugs or transform into purple shoe polish.  If a mulberry tree happens to lean over a body of water full of carp.... you'd better believe the "plop" of a mulberry hitting the water will get the attention of every nearby fish.  It is basically the sound of the ice cream man (we call them "the ding ding man" around here) dinging the bell and calling everyone in the neighborhood to the street on a muggy summer evening.  

When the mulberries are "dropping", hooking up to a carp on a fly plopped underneath a mulberry tree is some of the most fun an angler can have. 

This fly will plop loudly and slowly sink, my preferred presentation, and exactly how a natural mulberry acts.  If you add floatant or use a lighter hook you can illicit some amazing surface eats.  This fly also works great as a dropper below a buoyant foam or deer-hair mulberry fly pattern.  Tie a bunch of them and keep your secret mulberry tree a secret!!!!!

Materials:
Hook: Size 4-8 Saltwater Live Bait style hook or Glo-Bug style hook (Tiemco 105)
Thread: White (or purple) 140 Denier UTC
Stem: A Single Chartreuse Silicone Leg
Berry Body: Thick Purple Chenille - Patons Bohemian Yarn - Peaceful Plum Color is my favorite
 **Special Equipment** Purple Sharpie to color your thread (if you're to cheap to buy purple)

Materials

Fill the hook shank with thread, finishing behind the hook eye

Lash down a single chartreuse sili-leg starting at the hook eye

Tie back to hook bend and bring thread back to the hook eye - snip the stem (sili-leg) to less than 1/2 an inch

Prep one end of your Bohemian Yarn by stripping some material off.....

.....and exposing the core cording of the chenille.

Lash down the yarn by the core - behind the hook eye

Fold the core back and lash down the the yarn to the hook bend

Advance your thread back to the hook eye  *This creates an extremely durable fly*

Palmer (wrap) the yarn forward toward the hook eye

Fill the entire hook shank, but leave yourself enough room to finish the fly

Snip off the excess yarn

Whip finish the fly a few times and color your thread with a purple marker if you're cheap like me

Plop your fly under a mulberry tree and HANG ON!!