The Bad Hair Day is a simple, lightweight baitfish fly originally designed by guide and tyer Dave Pinczkowski. Built almost entirely from craft fur, this fly has a great baitfish profile, tons of natural movement, and a unique darting action that makes it a killer streamer for smallmouth bass, trout, and even saltwater species. It’s also incredibly easy to customize with different colors, sizes, and a little flash. 

Best of all, you don’t need a bunch of fancy materials or complicated tying techniques to make one. Just some craft fur, some flash, and laser dub is all you need for a simple, effective, easy-to-tie baitfish pattern.

Bad Hair Day Materials

Bad Hair Day Tying Steps

The Bad Hair Day fly pattern is essentially a simple craft fur baitfish with a laser dub head. If you’re able to reverse tie craft fur (you will be, it’s not that hard!), you’ll be able to tie the Bad Hair Day with no issues.

Add Weight to Back (optional)

Adding a weight near the bend of the hook gives the fly some added weight so it sinks. Additionally, that weight gets the fly to kick side-to-side when retrieved, especially in slack water. You’ll have to ask someone with an expertise in hydrodynamics how that works, but it’s a nice addition to the pattern.

Slide the bead somewhere along the start of the bend and give it a bunch of wraps around the shank. A drop of superglue or UV resin will also help the bead stay in place.

Add Tail + Flash

Reverse Tie Craft Fur

Take another hunk of craft fur and measure it so it goes about halfway to three-quarters down the tail. This will help create that baitfish taper we want.

Flip it over so the tips face forward and tie it in securely to the shank. Using an empty pen, push the fibers backwards and grab a hold of them.

As you pinch those down, build a nice big thread dam in front of the craft fur. Keep building this until the materials lay ~45 degrees downward. It’s tempting to want to just tie the material to the hook shank, but this will inhibit the movement we want. So take your time and build that thread dam!

Reverse Tie Craft Fur + Flash

We’re going to repeat that reverse tied craft fur step 1-2 more times with our base color. Measure it out so it lays down about halfway or three-quarters down the previous craft fur. Then, reverse tie it down and build up that thread dam.

This is also a great time to add more flash. You can certainly do this with every reverse tie, but I personally like to alternate. I don’t want this Bad Hair Day fly to become a clump of flash, but rather it work naturally with the craft fur.

(New Color) Reverse Tie Craft Fur

As we approach the head, we’re gonna change up colors. In this example, I used white as my base color and shifted to a natural brown for the head.

With this new color of your choice, follow those same reverse tying steps. Measure, flip, and build that thread dam.

As you’re tying in the craft fur, make sure you give it the occasional brush or comb. This stuff can tangle pretty easily, so brushing it out consistently will give us a nice, clean, free-moving Bad Hair Day.

Depending on how much shank you have left, you may have room to tie in another clump of the new color. No big deal if not, we’ll get some color change with the next steps as well.

Add Laser Dub Head

Put away the craft fur and grab some laser dub. Take a good chunk of it and slide it evenly across the hook eye. Pinch that in, tie it down, and push it back. This thicker laser dub material will give our Bad Hair Day fly the ability to push water and move how we want to. So don’t be afraid to go with a thick chunk or several small chunks of laser dub here.

After a whip finish and final brush, you’ve got the Bad Hair Day fly pattern. This is a great option for a baitfish imitation with tons of natural, flowing movement as it’s retrieved. Plus, the color combos are endless to you can tie these up in a bunch of ways to match the hatch (or whatever you’re confident in).