Kitabı oku: «Fishing Flies», sayfa 2
THREADS
Up to the second half of the twentieth century the choice of threads (then mostly real ‘silks’) available to the fly-tyer was very limited – with Pearsall’s Naples and Gossamer probably most popular. Today there are several manufacturers, producing ever stronger and finer threads. As with hooks, some writers specify precisely what thread (manufacturer and thread thickness) should be used to tie their flies. In general, this is unnecessary.
TIP: All fly-tyers are advised to find a brand and thickness of thread that they find they get on with for most of their small to medium-sized flies (hooks about size 10 and smaller). A thickness of approximately 10/0 to 12/0 is ideal. Buy several spools of every colour. Tune all your bobbin holders to the spool size of the brand of thread, by bending the bobbin arms so that the thread will run off the spool easily when pulled, but the spool will not turn unless the thread is pulled. Without different-sized spools of thread from several manufacturers, you avoid the need to retune your bobbin holders with every change of thread.
Buy some thicker and stronger threads for larger flies (size 8 and larger), and perhaps a very fine thread (Spider Web 20/0 is the finest currently available, though it comes only in white and must be coloured with a spirit-based pen) for the smallest of flies, and give them their own, tuned bobbin holder.
FUR AND FEATHER
There is of course some natural variation in the colour, shade and texture of natural materials, especially those taken from wild birds and mammals (e.g. hare’s ear, speckled brown partridge). Fish seem not to notice. When it comes to other natural materials, there is a wider range of high-quality product now available to the fly-tyer than there has ever been. Half a century ago, cock hackles for dry flies came mostly from the Indian subcontinent and the best of them were grossly inferior to the specially bred ‘genetic’ capes available today.
TIP: The only problem with the genetic cock hackle is that it often has a thick stalk that, when the hackle is wound, twists around unless very tightly bound down with many turns of thread. Take the hackle from its cape and trim away the lower barbs. Then, before tying the hackle in, soften with stalk close to where it will be first wound, between the nails of thumb and forefinger.
Many flies were devised years ago, before there were worldwide concerns about endangered CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) species. This Encyclopedia includes mention of no CITES species, other than in the sections dealing with historical fly-tyings (where the feathers used come from very old collections) or with species bred in captivity for fly-tying (e.g. jungle cock). There is no need to use CITES species when tying flies to catch fish.
Legislation varies from country to country when it comes down to owning and using feathers of birds that are protected. In the UK, the grey heron and waterhen are protected, but it is not unlawful to gather moulted heron quills from the riverside in summer or the feathers from a roadkill waterhen. Always check the legal situation – especially if planning to travel abroad – with fly-tying materials.
Synthetic materials have increasingly been used in the design of many fishing flies since the Second World War. They often have properties lacking in natural materials. They are usually consistent in colour and texture: contrast the variation of hare’s ear or natural rabbit fur with a synthetic fur such as FlyRite. Sometimes they have properties not provided by any natural material: for example, no natural material provides such a soft, realistically segmented and translucent body for nymphs as Flexibody. However, there is a problem with synthetics. Rarely are they made solely for the fly-tying market and usually the fly-tying market is a tiny part of their sales. Consider Antron, made by the Dupont Corporation, which just about every fly-tyer in the world now uses. Almost 100 per cent of Dupont’s production goes into carpet or similar manufacture and a fraction over zero per cent to fly-tying. So should furnishing fashions change and Dupont stop manufacturing Antron, fly-tyers could find many of their tying techniques compromised.
In 1924 J. W. Dunne published Sunshine and the Dry Fly (2nd edn, 1950), in which he described a new range of dry flies. These, he argued, were ‘far more natural looking’ than previous dry flies. Their bodies had a natural translucency brought about by winding ‘cellulite floss’ fibres over a hook shank that had been painted white. Cellulite flosses came in a variety of colours and shades that were given code numbers by their manufacturer, Wardle & Davenport. For the body of any fly, two or three strands of different shades had to be wound together according to Dunne’s formulae. The angling wholesaler of these flosses, Messeena & Co, also sold cock hackles dyed to Dunne’s instructions and special tying threads, and they too had their codes. The following is one typical tying, DUNNE’S DARK MAYFLY SPINNER (presented in modern form, but with quotes from Dunne’s recipe):
Hook: Size 9.
Thread: Silk M2.
Tails: Cock pheasant tail herls, not dyed. ‘Ends of whisks should be 1 ½ inches from eye of hook.’
Body: ‘2 (298A) + 2 (298) + 2(226). Thickness behind hackle, about 8/100 inch. Taper to half this thickness.’
Rib: Fine gold wire.
Outspread wings: Cut from hackle H2 (including plenty of brown markings). Total spread, 1 ½ inches.
Hackles: Four turns of N behind wings, and four turns of N in front. Maximum width across shank, ¾ inch.
Eyes: ‘Unnecessary.’
Wardle & Davenport ceased production and so today we have no idea what M2, 298A, 298, 226, H2 or N were, we cannot obtain them, and Dunne’s flies will never be tied again.
More recently, a material called Swannundaze, which was highly recommended in the 1970s for forming the segmented bodies of larvae and nymphs, has vanished from the fly-tying scene (see here).
Many fly-tying recipes in this book include synthetic materials, such as Krystal Hair and Poly Yarn. It is likely, should such synthetics disappear from the market, that reasonable alternatives will become available.
TIP: One of the greatest pleasures in fly-tying is to gather materials for nothing. It may be a road-kill, or some distant aunt may have a fur coat that she wants to get rid of, or the local game dealer may have some rabbit or deer skins that he doesn’t want, or a shooting friend may have a bag of mallard or pheasants that need plucking, or the family next door may have some hens and an aged cockerel with the most superb grizzle hackles! Never say no! Rub borax into skins and the cut ends of wings to prevent fungal and bacterial growth. If you are unsure that the material may hold parasites (e.g. feather mites or moth larvae) that could ruin a fly-tying collection, put the item in a plastic bag, knot the bag and put it in the deep freeze for a month. Store all natural materials in sealed plastic bags.
Often recipes require dyed fur or feather. Dyeing your own materials is good fun, provided the kitchen remains undyed! And when a colour is required for a tying recipe, consider a blend of material that gives that colour. For instance, if medium olive fur is needed, mix the fur from two or three sources (such as hare, rabbit and perhaps a synthetic) so that there is variety in texture. Perhaps also mix in a little yellow or red or orange to break up the flat tone of the olive. For a good example of this, see JC HATCHING BUZZER, see here.
DO WE NEED SO MANY DIFFERENT FLIES?
The answer is, of course, no! This Encyclopedia contains the tyings for nearly 250 different dry flies designed for catching trout and other fish that take insects from the water surface. By varying size and, sometimes, colour/shade, it would be possible to use one pattern to match several species of real fly, so from the practical fishing point-of-view, the 250 could become over a thousand flies in the box. If it were essential to carry so many imitations, the hatch would be over before a fly was cast! In The Floating Fly (2008), Malcolm Greenhalgh described just eleven different dry and emerger patterns that, he argued, would catch any fish eating any insect floating at the surface of any river or lake anywhere in the world! Seventy-five years earlier, Edward Hewitt listed ten dry flies (five winged and five hackled) in Hewitt’s Handbook of Fly Fishing (1933) and added: ‘Personally, I would not want any more patterns of dry flies than the above … Don’t get a raft of patterns. They are not necessary at all [his italics].’ Ray Bergman (in Just Fishing, also 1933) agreed, noting that: ‘I think it is possible to get along with half a dozen [dry fly] patterns ranging from [sizes] 10 to 15.’
Life would, however, be incredibly boring if we tied and carried only a few patterns that we knew nearly always caught fish. Most of us do carry our favourite flies, the ones in which we have lots of faith. But we do enjoy tying and trying new ones. The worst scenario would be the discovery of the Holy Grail, the fly that catches every fish it is cast to. For then there would be no need to tie or carry any other fishing fly, there would be no challenge, and it would signal the end of fly-tying and fly-fishing.
THE PRESENTATION OF FLY-TYING RECIPES
There are two main ways of presenting fly-tying recipes.
The first is to list the parts of the fly in the order that they are tied in. So if the wing is tied in first, it appears after hook and thread detail, whereas if the wing is tied in last, it appears at the end of the recipe. This way lacks uniformity in that the order changes depending on what fly is being tied.
The second is to consider the finished flies (shown in this volume as photographs) and to list all the parts in order beginning with hook, then thread, then tail, body, rib, hackle and so on. In seeking to present the recipes in a clear uniform manner, this method will be used throughout this Encyclopedia.
PARTS OF A FLY
Hook: This may be one of several types (e.g. wet fly, dry fly, nymph, streamer, low-water salmon) and sizes. Some flies may also be tied on double and single hooks, tandem mounts, and tubes or Waddington shanks to which a separate hook is fixed. Note that often there may be restrictions as to what hooks may be used on particular stretches of water.
Thread: The ability to use thread well marks the difference between a good tyer and a poor one. The great tyer Terry Ruane used to say that, for the fly-dresser: ‘the hook is the canvas, the thread the brush, and the materials the paint. A good artist is one who can use the brush.’
Tag (sometimes called ‘butt’): Small amount of material (e.g. two or three turns of tinsel or floss silk) wound around the shank before the tail. But note that sometimes ‘tag’ means ‘tail’ (e.g. RED TAG, see here).
Tail: Represents the real tail in some flies based on insects and fish, but added simply to lend movement in, for instance, modern salmon and saltwater flies.
Butt (sometimes called ‘tip’): At the base of the tail and immediately before the body, this is usually added to salmon flies and some loch/lough/sea-trout flies to add a hot spot that might attract the fish’s attention (e.g. a turn of fluorescent floss).
Body: May be separated in insect imitations into abdomen and thorax.
Rib: Suggests segmentation in many imitative flies or, adds extra ‘flash’ (a tinsel rib) in salmon and other flies. Note that, when tying flies that imitate insects, the novice tyer is urged by the expert to rib evenly so that every segment is the same width. Yet in real larvae, pupae and adult insects, the segments will vary in width!
Body hackle: This is a hackle wound spirally around the body. It may be tied in at the end of the body, wound forward and then tied in at the front. Or, it is tied in at the front of the body, wound back around the body, and then fixed in place by bringing the tinsel ribbing forward through it. Note too that in some flies the body hackle is wound in touching turns (e.g. BIVISIBLES, see here), whereas in others it is wound in open turns (e.g. Troth’s ELK HAIR CADDIS, see here).
Wing cases: In nymphs. Usually a slip from a feather, tied in on the dorsal surface between abdomen and thorax, and then brought forward over the back of the thorax after the thorax has been completed and legs tied in.
Shellback: In scud/freshwater shrimps. Usually some synthetic strip tied in at the end of the hook shank and then brought forward over the back of the fly just before completion.
Hackle: Wound at the front of the fly. In a false hackle, hackle fibres are tied in, in front of the body or in front of a fully wound hackle (e.g. GOLDEN-OLIVE BUMBLE, see here). In a parachute hackle, the hackle is tied in and wound around a ‘posted’ wing (e.g. KLINKHAMER SPECIAL, see here).
Legs: In imitative flies. May be a false hackle. Or a feather is tied in by its tip on top of the hook shank, pointing backwards, either before the body (in scuds/freshwater shrimps) or thorax (nymphs) is created. The feather is then brought over the back of the body or thorax and tied in. The fibres sticking out to either side to imitate legs.
Wings: In early flies represented the wings of real insects. Now also means feathers or hairs tied back over or alongside the body in streamers, salmon flies, many saltwater patterns etc. In parachute dry flies and emergers a single wing is tied in first, brought upright and then ‘posted’ with several turns of thread around its base. The parachute hackle is later wound around this posted base.
Topping: Fibres of herl or golden pheasant ‘topping’ feather etc. tied over the top of wings.
Cheeks: Small feathers, e.g. jungle cock eyes, tied in at sides of wings.
Head: Often not mentioned if only of tying thread.
THE EARLIEST FLIES
The history of fly fishing is so long that we will never know who first had the inspired idea of tying feathers round a hook.
Andrew Herd, The Fly, 2003.
THE MACEDONIAN FLY
The first recorded fly was published by a Roman called Claudius Aelianus in a manuscript book De Animalium Natura in about AD200. The fly was used to catch fish ‘with speckled fins’, which must have been trout. The trout rose to catch flies at the surface of a river then called the Astraeus in what was then Macedonia. Research by Andrew Herd and Dr Gorin Grubil has shown that the Astraeus is now known as the Arapitsa, and it flows through modern Greece. The real flies were known at the time as hippouros and they appear to have had combined characteristics of a midge, a wasp and a bee. Investigations by Fred Buller (in The American Fly Fisher, vol. 22, 1996) into the identity of hippouros indicated that it was either a horsefly Therioplectes tricolor or a drone-fly Episyrphus balteatus.
The imitation of the MACEDONIAN FLY was simple: ‘They fasten red wool around a hook, and fix onto the hook two feathers which grow under a cock’s wattle, and which in colour are like wax’. Or, to give it as a tyer’s recipe:
Hook: Not given; suggest dry fly, size 14.
Thread: Not given; suggest red or brown.
Body: Red wool.
Wings: Two wax-coloured cock hackle points. [Wax coloured? Beeswax is a light creamy-buff.]
It seems clear that fly-fishing is a very ancient way of catching fish. Andrew Herd traced it back as far, perhaps, as the ninth century BC, and showed that by the early Middle Ages (late twelfth and early thirteenth century) fly-fishing was well established in Japan, in Spain, in central Europe and in Britain. The central European school is especially interesting for it produced an early fifteenth-century Bavarian manuscript, translated into English by Professor Richard Hoffmann, and called Fisher’s Craft and Lettered Art. It included flies for catching several species of European freshwater fish, but the way the flies were tied and some of the terms used (for example, ‘stingel’) are not clear in their meaning. Two examples are given below. The resultant flies were tied with a great deal of guesswork!
BAVARIAN CHUB FLY
This is an imitation of a beetle called ‘wengril’. ‘The feathering should be black brown with the silks green and black and around the stingel green and brown.’
BAVARIAN PIKE FLY
The feathering should be of different sorts mixed together, with lead coloured and light blackish and ash coloured therein a black feather, with the silk pale coloured and around the heart black light blue silk, around the stingel pinkish coloured silk.
It is highly likely that many other manuscripts describing flytying and fly-fishing were produced in the early Middle Ages. Some will have been destroyed; others may be hidden deep in the vast library of the Vatican or in some other dustgathering ancient corner. There can be no doubt, however, that the compiler of the first printed book on fishing used several of these manuscripts as sources.
THE FIRST FLIES TO APPEAR IN PRINT
William Caxton was born in Kent in about 1420. In 1441 he left England for Bruges and then Cologne, where he learnt the art and business of being a printer. In 1474 he published the first book ever to be printed in the English language, The Recuyell of the Histories of Troye. Two years later, Caxton returned to England and set up a printing press in London at Westminster, where he printed 96 books. One of these was The Book of Hawking, Hunting and Blasing of Arms, published in 1486, and also known as The Boke of St Albans. When Caxton died in 1491 his German assistant Wynkyn de Worde took over the press and, in 1496, he produced a new edition of The Boke of St Albans. This included the first slender volume on angling, A Treatyse of Fysshynge with an Angle. Many years later the authorship of the Treatyse was attributed to an abbess called Dame Juliana Berners, but there is no documentary evidence that she ever existed (see Fred Buller and Hugh Falkus, Dame Juliana, the Angling Treatyse and its Mysteries, 2001). What is certain is that Wynkyn gathered the material contained in the Treatyse from across Europe, something no fictitious abbess could ever have done.
The opening page of the Treatyse of 1496. The gist of the introduction to the Treatyse is that fly-fishers live a long and happy life: ‘Here begins the Treatyse of fishing with an angle [rod]. Solomon in his parables says that a good spirit makes for a flowering age, that is, a fair age and a long one …’ Note that fishing vests and waders had not been invented in 1496!
The Treatyse outlined twelve artificial flies, but the way that they were tied is unknown. Sadly few, if any, actual flies tied before the middle of the nineteenth century have survived, for natural silk threads rot in light and humid conditions, and moth and mites move in quickly to devastate unprotected fur and feather. So any modern tyings of these flies may not be as they were tied more than 500 years ago. Two fly-tying historians produced plates of flies for Buller and Falkus (2001): Malcolm Greenhalgh and Jack Heddon. Examination of the plates in Buller and Falkus will reveal differences between their tyings – the set illustrated below were tied afresh by Greenhalgh without reference to his earlier tyings. Again there are differences in interpretation. It is quite likely that different tyers five centuries ago, having only the Treatyse as reference, would have tied the flies differently. The same applies to the other ancient flies illustrated in this section.
In the following, medieval spellings have been modernised.
FOR MARCH
THE DUN FLY
The body of dun wool and the wings of the partridge.
ANOTHER DUN FLY
The body of black wool; the wings of the blackest drake and the jay under the wings and under the tail.
FOR APRIL
THE STONE-FLY
The body of black wool and yellow under the wings and under the tail, and the wings of the drake.
IN THE BEGINNING OF MAY
A GOOD FLY
The body of red wool and ribbed with black silk; the wings of the drake and of the red capon’s hackle.
MAY
THE YELLOW FLY
The body of yellow wool, the wings of the red cock’s hackle and that of the drake dyed yellow.
JUNE
THE BLACK LOUPER
The body of black wool and ribbed with the herl of the peacock’s tail and the wings of the capon with a blue head.
THE DUN CUT
The body of black wool and a yellow band along either side; the wings of the buzzard tied on with barked hemp.
THE MAURE FLY
The body of dusky wool; the wings of the blackest mail of the wild drake.
THE TANDY FLY AT ST WILLIAMS’S DAY
The body of tandy wool and a pair of wings of the whitest mail of the wild drake.
JULY
THE WASP FLY
The body of black wool and ribbed with yellow thread; the wings of the buzzard.
THE SHELL FLY AT ST THOMAS’S DAY
The body of green wool and ribbed with the herl from the peacock’s tail; wings of the buzzard.
AUGUST
THE DRAKE FLY
The body of black wool and ribbed with black silk; wings of the mail of the black drake with a black head.
Today we rarely tie and use flies that were devised over a hundred years ago. However the flies contained in the Treatyse were reprinted and recommended by several other writers up to and including Izaak Walton in The Compleat Angler (first published over 150 years later, in 1653).
