Gettin' Real With Eggs - Tying Otter's Milking Egg 14Mar21

I've now long used and prefer "squirmy worm" material to tie aquatic worms. My favorite is my two-toned Obi-wan variant of the San Juan worm. I randomly read of Otter's Milking Egg pattern, attended by some praise. It uses a similar gummy material for the egg as do squirmy worms. In search I found the exact team/company, in Denver, who innovated the tie, and bought the materials directly from them. I decided to go whole hog and tied the egg with a yolk/seed mimic as well as milking around the egg. Here I describe the tie with pics along with some tips for easing the task. First the finished egg.

 

Here are the ingredients for what I believe will be the more successful eggs in Colorado. 6mm eggs on size 12 scud hooks with Antron yarn for the whites and a tiny red glass bead for the seed. I used olive thread that matched the hook color.

I first pierced the gummy egg with a fine knitting needle at the spot where I'd plucked it from its string. Stay aware of the location of this piercing as you then need to set the red bead on the needle and use it to insert the bead into the egg. This is the fumbliest part of the whole tie ~ I dropped too many beads or they popped right back out. When done set this assembly aside with the egg still on the needle as you need to know that pierce location later.

Build a thread base in the middle of the hook, ending about at the bend. Select a sparse amount of Antron yarn and pull it apart and rebunch it so as to basically align the fibers. Tie the bunch at its mid-point to the back of the wrap and overwrap to make "2 tails" of Antron flowing backwards.

 

Apply a dab of cyanoacrylate to the thread base; then grab the egg assembly noting the piercing location and slide it over the eye all the way back to the Antron. 2/3 of the egg, including the yolk, should be on top of the hook. Move the thread forward to near the hook eye on the underside of the egg and wrap once.

Grab 85% of the Antron fibers (leaving a smidge of milk) and broaden/widen the bunch while you move them over the egg (covering ~180° or half the egg) and secure them with loose wraps. Compress the egg a smidge by pulling on the Antron forward and then tighten and move the Antron back as milking flow and tie tight warps. Whip finish.

Field trials this year will tell but I already sense that these are serious upgrade in realism for salmon eggs. Here I compare my classic egg tie with the new one and show the eggs and squirmy worms in the box. Browns tracking spawning 'bows in the spring and trout following spawning Kokanee in the fall will love these.

UPDATE 31Mar21... This is a field trial update as I've now used this "bug" on multiple outings. I need to make the milking Antron tighter to the egg on the top as it ten bunch into a single multi-threaded strand around the side and really appear just flowing out the back. Else, looks yummy and casts fine.