What's the smallest possible buck bug that can be tied?

Stroover:
Well, I stand corrected. You got me thinking, so I hit the tying table this morning and gave it a try.
First attempt with coarse, green-dyed whitetail deerhair was an abject failure on a #22 up-eye 94840, but I tried it with some fine red deer hair (i.e. hair off a red deer, not red-dyed deer hair), and it worked fine. Used 12/0 thread, laid a base wrap back to even with the hook point, and was REAL gentle with the spinning, and it worked. When finished, I ended up with a hook gap that was closer to that of a #24, but it could still work. Didn't bother with palmering a hackle through it, but it could be done for sure, and boy, would it look 'buggy', esp with a grizzly hackle. Its a very small-bodied fly, because there is no way to effectively spin the hair back of the point of the hook. Not sure where you could buy pre-dyed red deer hair, but I expect Bryant could do you a small batch. I used a bunch of hair 1/4" in diameter.

Sorry for the lack of a photo; camera's not at home right now.

The red deer piece I have is closer to a light elk in colour. By red deer, I mean the european 'red deer' which, I think, is probably more closely related to the elk than the whitetail. I think if you saw the whole hide it would have a 'reddish' tinge to it, not unlike the way whitetails look in midsummer from a distance. But its really a creamy grey colour. Hadn't considered working with the tips of whitetail. Sounds like a plan. The piece of green I had was very coarse with quickly tapering tips.. I expect if you have a large piece of a hide you could find some thinner bits somewhere on it. In fact, elk might be a reasonable substitute; not as buoyant as deer, I understand, but you're not looking for a floater anyway, right? The natural creamy grey is pretty buggy looking, like an old style buckbug. I suppose a green pantene marker would have it green in quick order.

Good luck! I'm looking forward to trying out your idea of tiny buck bugs Might break down and give 'em a shot this afternoon across the road. The trout are all long gone well up the gornish, but there's a great run of 10 to 14" fallfish that give a good account of themselves on the 3 wt. Not keeping them anyway, so a few 'hoovermouth trout' might be just the ticket.

Oh wait. Its mother's day. Make that tomorrow morning.