Branham’s Epoxy Mini Puff
Note:
In the late 1980’s when I was trying to design my first fly, the Epoxy Charlie, the Mini Puff was another fly that I was tying a lot of and had the possibility of becoming a very good epoxy adaptation.
The Epoxy Mini Puff was developed almost side by side with the Epoxy Charlie. I used flash a bou initially for the head and then progressed to crystal flash and finally the Kreinik’s Fly tyers Ribbon. I used these materials and coated them with clear epoxy.
As I became more involved in epoxy flies, I was shown how to dye epoxy, using Rit dye and 70% isopropyl alcohol and to tint the epoxy using enamel paint. This led to just tying on the bead chain eyes and applying either a tinted or dyed epoxy to give a solid head of epoxy that was either semi-transparent or opaque. NOTE: See article on “Working with Epoxies” for exactly how to do this.
I never really promoted this fly but it was carried by Kaufmann’s Streamborn while I was tying for them. I never sent a sample to Umpqua so they did not put it under contract.
Generally bead chain eyes are used but you can use bar bell eyes but the fly will sink like a rock.
Numerous colors can be used. I generally tied this fly with a pink head (either the Fly Tyer’s Ribbon over coated with clear epoxy) or a tinted pink epoxy. The pink had either a pink or tan wing. The brown was either a gold head coated with clear epoxy or a tinted brown solid epoxy head. The white had a silver head or a colored white head. The tan had either a pearly head or a dyed tan solid epoxy head.
Other colors may be used to include a chartreuse head with either a chartreuse or white wing, orange head with either a brown or tan wing, brown head with an orange wing and an all yellow.
All of these colors can be tied with either a Kreinik’s Fly Tyer’s Ribbon head coated with clear epoxy or a head of solid epoxy tinted or colored. Either way, these are very effective flies.
If you really want to get fancy, add some very fine pearl flask to either the dyed or colored epoxy.