Beginning Fly Tying

A while back, I stopped by the local fly shop and bought myself some materials so that I could experiment with tying my own flies.  It's something that I've been wanting to do for a long time, but haven't gotten around to it.  My father-in-law had a spare vise and some tools that he is letting me use, so I figured it was time to get down to business.  For my first flies, I decided to do a "Wooly Bugger", since I had heard that they were very simple to tie.  I bought some Black Marabou, and some black feathers.  They weren't the nicest feathers for tying this particular fly, but they were much cheaper, and I figured it wouldn't hurt to learn on some cheaper materials.  I also got some hooks and several different colors of chenille.  One thing that I found interesting is how many variations you could tie of the same fly with very small changes in the materials.  With the few materials I got, I was able to tie several of the variations that they had at the fly shop, and also create a few of my own.  Even though my flies didn't look nearly as neat as some of the ones in the store, I think they looked acceptable, especially for a first time.  It was very satisfying to spend some time creating something.  It was nice to be able to have something to show for a little bit of work.  I'm very excited to take some of these flies out to a reservoir or stream, and at least show the trout what I've been up to, and hopefully they're interested in a bite.