Midnight Madness: How To Tie A Mouse

This blog installment comes courtesy of fishhound pro Chris "Uber" Raines.

Thanks to Fishhounds for the great response to my first Emergings blog entry titled Of Mice And Midnight. A lot of readers asked about the mouse I use, and here's how I tie it.

This is a low-riding, waking mouse pattern that'll trick even the most finicky brown trout. Wait for cover of night, slap it on the water and hang on.

Step 1: Select a 2/0 Tiemco salmon hook and secure a length of 20-pound mono for a trailer hook. A trailer hook's very important because night-fish love to nip at the tail. Loop the mono through a No. 8 Gamakatsu Octopus hook and diligently tie down the mono to the main hook until it's ultra-secure.

Step 2: Cut a 2" piece of chinchilla fur and secure it as a tail. In front of the chinchilla, tie in three pieces of small, round rubber on both sides of the fly for kicker legs.

Step 3: Palmer a section of crosscut chinchilla fur forward, being sure to wrap so the fur lays back through the process. Palmer the fur forward, leave about a 1/4" of space before hook-eye, then secure.

Step 4: Tie three small, round-rubber legs on both sides of the fly. You can make the front legs longer than the back ones.

Step 5: Take two pieces of foam and make a body by folding one piece of foam around the other. Secure the foam approximately 1/4" behind the hook-eye. I use my fingers to pinch the foam together to get a nice, tight series of securing wraps. Whip finish and trim the foam as needed.

Voilà, you're finished.

Chris "Uber" Raines first felt the mighty pull of Michigan's Pere Marquette River in 1987. A half-century later, he's still there and serves as head guide at the Pere Marquette River Lodge. An Orvis-endorsed fly-fishing guide, Raines is also an accomplished centerpin, bait and backplug fisherman. Send him an email at chris.raines@hotmail.com.

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