Saltwater Popping Minnow V2

Popping.Minnow version 2

Some time ago, I tied up the 1st version of Popping Minnow using ready made foam head

The 1st version was tie fully with synthetic fibers like Predator fibers or Baitfish Fibers… great action and easy to cast.

But due to the size of the foam popper head that available from our local fly shop, the ideal size of the pattern limit to 2″ – 4″ max in length..

The pattern also used a lot of material, almost half a pack of baitfish fibers just to stack and tie the body and tail…

So I started to shape the head from foam cylinder, to create bigger minnow pattern for bigger species like Sailfish and GTs. The idea is to introduce saddler to minimized the foul on hook, use less material to stack the body, put in additional shank to reduce the hook size and re-position the hook,  ( Big foam popper head will block the hook gap unless you are using very big and wide hook )

You just need some sand paper and lighter to shape the foam…

220lbs hardwire shank shaped from 9cm to about 3-4cm

Foam cylinder

220 lbs hardwire

saltwater saddle

Deer Creek GnG fibers

Baitfish fibers or Predator fibers

flashabou or UV flash

Short shank wide gap saltwater hook

 Red fine Dubbing from Semperfli

Epoxy eye

3 ton 5min A+B epoxy

Deer Creek thin flex UV resin

30lbs mono and markers

 Prepare the shank and hook, tie in a mono loop ( this is to sort of fix the hook so to minimize the hook flip around and to position the hook )

 Tie in some GnG fiber

 Tie in 2 pairs of saltwater saddles

 tie in some flashabou or UV flash

 reverse tie in some GnG

 Fold the fibers over and tie down

( I always tie my saltwater pattern this way, it will secure the fibers better )

 reverse tie in some Baitfish Fibers / predator Fibers

 Fold the fibers over and tie down, now tie in a pair of different color saddles ( your liking )

double up the amount of fiber use and reverse tie in some fibers again

 Fold over and tie down

( these fibers will be trim later, so don’t have to worry it’s too bulky ) )

 Apply the epoxy and insert in the per-shaped foam popper head

 Once the epoxy is dried, tie down the fibers to fill up the gap between the head and the body

 Make sure enough fibers are tie in so it’s compact enough for trimming

 Trim the fibers

 Color the head and fibers, stick the eye with epoxy and coat the head with a thin coat of UV resin

 Cheers…

You can even create a slider version if you shape the foam into a slider head..

Happy tying…