Tying Instructions

   Before you start to tie up a Petey; Remember, he doesn’t have to be pretty or perfect. After all, he is going to be eaten by a mouth full of razor blades. So a sloppy thread wrap, or a poorly positioned wing are not going to make a difference. Just remember it’s about having fun, and don’t worry about Petey, he’s tough and will keep on smiling. 

1. Wrap your thread from the eye back to just as the thread touches the hook point. The thread will give the glue holding the popper body something to grab on.

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1. Tie in a clump of marabou for the tail. I like to tie in my marabou so that when the popper body is put over it, the wraps are inside the body and only the marabou is coming out the back. This helps protect the wraps from the teeth of the shark.

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1. Bring the thread forward to about the mid point. Tie in a small clump of red rabbit hair pointing down. This is Petey’s bleeding injury that has caused him to be distressed. Bring thread all the way forward, tie off.

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1. Color the face of the popper body red. I just use a red Sharpie marker. (2 coats)

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1. Color the front ¾ of the popper body black. Again I just use a black Sharpie marker for this. (2 coats)

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1. On the red face of the popper, draw a smiley face. This could be the most important step in tying Petey. The smiley face is “Required” for the pattern to be a true Petey. It’s to remember the bold little one legged petrel that originated the pattern, and to remind everyone that this is for fun and not to be so serious while on the water.

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1. Place the popper body on the hook, but do not glue it yet.
2. Take a hot bodkin or other hot pointy item, and burn a hole in the popper body a little under half way up and at a slight angle to the back on each side. You want the position of the holes to be such, that the wings will sit just on top of the water.

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1. Select 3-4 hackles of about 3 inches for each side. Rotate the fly so that the holes are pointing vertically up and down. This will allow you to work on the top hole using gravity to hold the wing in place as you build it. One by one place the hackles in place to form the wing. Insure that the wing has a slight angle to the rear. This will help keep the wing from fouling forward and helps the winds fold back when being cast.

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2. Use a touch of cylentracite  glue (super glue) at the base of the wing allowing it to soak into the wing and down into the hole. 

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3. I use an accelerator to instantly set the cylandracite glue in place. Rotate and do the same step for the wing on the other side.

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4. Repeat the same steps for the wing on the other side.
5. Once your happy with the wings, ensure the body is positioned correctly and didn’t shift as you built the wings. Glue the body in place. Again I like to use cylindracite glue along with an accelerator to instantly and permanently set the body in place. Be careful to not get any glue into the red clump of rabbit. Once the glue is set, use your marker to touch up round where the wings are glued in place, and along the bottom of the popper.
6. Petey is complete. I don’t bother coating the popper with an epoxy or anything. I’ve had one Petey last thru 8 sharks, so they are pretty tough just like the original one legged Petey.

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Fishing Instructions

1.  Set up a good chum slick.
2.  As the shark comes into your slick. Cast Petey out in front and just to the side of the shark. For some reason, directly in front of the shark does not seem as effective.
3.  Give Petey one good chug. Do not keep chugging him like a popper. The sharks do not seem to like a chugging Petey and will usually turn away from it.
4.  Usually the one chug will get the attention of the shark. As his attention focuses in on Petey begin to just bump the line enough to get Petey to twitch. Think, wounded bird stuck to the water trying to get up.
5.  As the shark takes Petey, let him take it. Due to the sharks lower jaw being further back than the upper, and the shark usually coming towards you, the shark tends to push the fly around a bit before getting a hold of it. Watch for the sharks mouth to close down on it as the que to set the hook. I like to just stand there and say “Swim Petey, Swim!!” to help me keep from setting the hook too soon.
6.  Set the hook and get ready to watch the backing come off your reel. Once you catch a shark on fly you’ll be hooked. Don’t worry about Petey, he loves the abuse. 
7.  Let me know what Petey adventures you have!

 
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Petey's Story

   Petey was derived from exactly that kind of thinking. Petey’s story starts on a summer day about 23 miles offshore of Virginia Beach as we were riding the chum bag waiting for some sharks to arrive. We always notice how the Wilson Storm Petrels are the first ones to arrive after the slick starts to set up, and as they get closer, the fish usually arrive.  The Petrels will usually keep a comfortable distance of about 12 ft from the boat, but on this day there seemed to be one Petrel a little bolder than the others. He kept coming right up to the boat trying to get on the chum bag. Even with some gentle swipes of the fly rod, he kept coming right back. At the same time discussion on the boat turned to the shows on TV where the sharks come in and eat the seagulls on the water. We happened to also have 2 seagulls posted up in our chum slick at the time begging for some scraps. As we were talking about the sharks eating birds, I noticed that the bold petrel only had one leg. He was then dubbed “Petey the one legged Storm Petrel”.  I started joking how Petey must have lost a leg to a shark or bluefish at some point. As we were chuckling about the demise of Petey’s lost leg, one of the seagulls jumped off the water, and our first shark of the day rolled in behind the boat.  The focus then shifted from bird talk to sharkin'. We caught quite a few sharks that day, but we missed or foul hooked a lot of fish do to the sharks rejecting our patterns. Yes, sharks can be very finicky. They will ride with their nose right on your fly all the way to the boat. You can try different strips and pauses, but it usually ends in frustration as you work your way through every pattern in your box.  

   A day or two later, I’m sitting at the vise thinking about shark flies. What has worked, and what hasn’t. I started tying up some of the patterns that we had been using with some success, but I couldn’t help but wonder if there was anything we might not have thought of yet or something that would be more effective. I started thinking about Petey and the little storm petrels as a whole. Petrels are pelagic birds, coming to shore only to breed and spend the majority of their lives at sea. I assume that the paths of petrels and sharks must cross frequently. So I tied up the first Petey Petrel Popper. As that first Petey sat in the vise, I thought to myself, “man that is not going to cast easy, but dang that might just work!”. So I tied up two and decided it would at least be a good joke if nothing else.   The next weekend a buddy and I were back on the water, and we had two very picky black tip sharks circling the back of the boat. We had gone thru every fly in both our boxes with nothing but  refusals. I had been waiting until we had the skunk off the boat to pull Petey out, but at this point it didn’t seem like the skunk was going anywhere. So with nothing to lose, Petey was pulled out and tied on for the first time. As the sharks started to come in for their next pass, Petey was thrown out in front of the oncoming sharks. As soon as Petey hit the water and made a couple of twitches, both sharks immediately turned and went after him. The first shark to him didn’t hesitate in the least, and ate Petey with reckless abandon. That first shark caught on Petey was landed with disbelief in that the shark had actually eaten Petey. So as the next shark rolled into the slick, Petey was thrown out for another swim to see if it was a fluke or if Petey was really a valid pattern. Again, the shark immediately turned and ate Petey. Unfortunately the second shark broke off with the original Petey, but luckily I tied up two. Petey number 2 proceeded to catch 8 more sharks that day, establishing Petey as one of the go to flies for sharking in my box.  We have actually had a shark grab Petey and get stung by the hook. Instead of being discouraged from the sting of the hook, the shark immediately turned right back around as quick as he could and ate Petey again this time getting the hook set.    Sometimes when you hook a shark on a subsurface fly, there is a pretty good chance that you foul hooked the fish. Not intentionally, it’s just what happens as the shark swims over your fly nudging it but doesn’t eat it. Not with Petey, there is no doubt if the shark took it or not, it is a 100% intentional eat. The shark will usually come in slow from behind Petey with its pectoral fin out of the water cruising in. Then its nose will come out of the water and grab Petey. On occasion a shark will come straight up from underneath for an explosive strike. If anyone has ever dealt with getting a hook out of a shark, you can also appreciate that 95% of the hooksets with Petey are in the corner of the mouth.