A question related to tying

[day5 0]

I just like doing things with my own hands.

 

I don't care if I'm tying a traditional pattern or if I'm creating something new and bizarre.

 

 

Has any one seen my shoe strings to my wading boots! :hyst:

[N Parish 0]

I do feel that tying enhances the tradition of the sport, but not only from the standpoint of sticking with the "right" materials or patterns. I think that the biggest tradtion in tying is innovation. The fathers of fly tying didn't have antron and scud back, they had fur and feathers. They made flies with what they had available, and by tying with tire rubber or whiskers from my cat, I feel like I'm following this tradition. That is what makes tying so attractive to me. Just my thoughts.

Nick

[Sal Velinus 0]

I don't care about the tradition of the sport, but do find the history interesting. I wouldn't care nearly as much about flyfishing if it weren't for tying. While I don't think tying flies for fishing is an art per se (with an exception of some of the flies you'd never fish like some atlantic salmon and ultra-realistic flies), it does give a creative outlet that I don't get anywhere else except playing music. I don't fish flies I didn't tie. Period. To me, creating flies that look the way I want them to look, do what I want them to do, and then using them to fool trout is what it's all about.

[utyer 0]

Fly tying was "passed down" to me in the form of an old set of tools, and a Herters catalog. I found an old copy of the Wise Fishermans Encyclopedia. There were some segments on fly tying and fly patterns. I didn't get much in the way of instruction from anyone, I just started tying to copy what I saw in the Herters catalog. Most of the material I started with was (I found out later) for tying shad darts. I would tie a red tail wrap a purple floss body, and wind a yellow hackle. Real gaudy flies, but at least I learned how to get the material on the hooks, and gradually, my attempts started to look more and more like what I was seeing in the catalog, and the encyclopedia. I never used any of these things on trout, but I must have tossed some at a few perch and bass in my younger days. We camped on Indian Lake (upstate New York) every summer.

 

When I first started to fly fish for trout, it was after we moved to Salt Lake City in 1957. One lesson, I remember getting from my dad was how to make a floatant out of parafin wax and naptha or some such solvent. I do remember not catching too many fish in those days, but we did flail the water to a froth. As kids we follow along where our parents lead. During my teenage years, I drifted into other sports ( swimming, golf and skiing.) We didn't camp or fish much at all.

 

Finally in 1966 I went up to Jackson Hole to be a float guide on the Snake river. I didn't even bring a rod. My boss and long time friend Wayne Casto took me out to some beaver ponds one afternoon, and showed me how to use a fly cast behind a bubble on his spinning outfit. Twenty five fish and 5 hours later, it was dark, and I was hooked. I sent back home for a fly fishing outfit. It arrived with a level enamelled line, some old fiberglass rod, and a gladding click pawl reel. A few lessons from Wayne and I was able to get the line out 20 or 30 feet. Carmichaels fly shop in Moose was our source for flys. In those days flys were 50 cents, and 55 cents for hairwings. It was an outrageous expence then. All summer, we floated all morning and fished every afternoon and evening.

 

That winter, I dug out the old tools again and found out the materials had all been destroyed. I started on a search around town for fly-tying supplies. There were just a few places that carried fly tying materials, but I was able to piece together enough to get started again. By that next summer, I had a box of materials, and several boxes of flies ready. They were still crude flies, but they were mine.

 

The next summer in Jackson I fished every place with my flies, and they worked. I never looked back. For my birthday that summer, I got a copy of Flies. It was my first real book on fly tying and I still have it, and about 150 more. Finnally I started to learn a little of the history and tradition this sport held. I had started in the West where English and Eastern traditions had little impact. Innovation was more the game out there. I remember it took me a few months to figure out how to get the wings on a Humpy right. I had never seen a hair stacker, never even heard of one. Leonard doesn't even mention Deer Hair for winging. My first hair stacker was a made from a rod ferrule. Once I learned how to even up the hair tips and get the wings right, I never looked back. I haven't purchased a fly since. By the way that second summer, flys were up to 60 cents, and hair wings were 65 cents. I was able to sell all I wanted to my rafting partners, and clients on the foats.

 

I have been tying flies, selling flies, and fishing flies ever since. I have read many books on fly tying and fishing, and one thing I see over and over again in the "tradition" of the sport is CHANGE. New materials, new hooks, new tools new vices new patterns it never stops. There was a time when fishing a sunken fly on some waters was forbidden. Fishing was allowed only to actively feeding visable fish. Fishing was allowed only form the banks. Now we fly fish while wading, from drift boats, bass boats, float tubes, and kick boats. We fish with flies made of every conseviable material both natural and synthetic. I have tied with anything I could find that looked usefull. It doesn't matter to me what the fly is tied with as long as the fish like it.

 

We have many different reasons for tying, and there all good.

[purolohi kalastaja 0]

I just like doing things with my own hands.

 

I don't care if I'm tying a traditional pattern or if I'm creating something new and bizarre.

 

 

Has any one seen my shoe strings to my wading boots! :hyst:

 

They made great woven stones. you really should have upgraded to the new Korkers with the stainless steel laces....

 

I'm fascinated by how many everyday materials one can tie a fly out of and entice a fish with that fly.

[Batman 0]

I really enjoy tying flies, When i ee a cool pattern someone has come up with I can't wait to tweak

it to my own little end, I think if I had to tie flies just according to the original recipes I would probably

give it up, not because they aren't great patterns but because the patterns would not have that bit of

my personality in them, [ I am not sure if that is the right word but at this late hour its the best that I can do] I like to put my own spin on them,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,B,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

 

 

Good Question,,,,,

[Hot Tuna 0]

First off, forty years ago the internet didn't exist and fly tying was just coming out of what I'd like to call "it's a big secret phase". Back when the Dettes and Darbees and other greats were learning how to tie flies they would un-tie somebody else's fly to figure out what the tier did. Now if you want to know how to do something you ask in here; guys and gals from all over the world come to your assistance...quite simply amazing. Also, the materials available now are unbelievable. I used to have to get my Dad to drive me out to Eric Leiser's Fireside Angler to get materials...there was also Jim Deren's Anglers Roost in Manhattan.

Now if you need something, a quick click and James sends you just what you need...again amazing!

With all this convenience one could stay at home, never see another person(in person) and learn to tie excellent flies.

There is another piece and this is where tradition comes in....there is something special about showing somebody else the craft...a little piece of you gets passed down through the ages with the next tier. I'll never forget the first time Dick Talleur showed me how to use the Matarelli whip finisher...Glory Alleluia!!

People take this for granted today but not so long ago there were no Matarelli whip finishers. So it seems to me that two things fly tying can comfortably coexist...tradition and refinement. I feel blessed to have taken the craft up at a young age and been able to watch it continue to be refined through some of fly tying's great decades. Our craft is also in some very able younger hands who continue to come up with great fly designs ...on the freshwater front younger guys like Rich Strolis, Mike Schmidt, JZ....the list goes on.

On the saltwater front Mark Dysinger, Sean Murphy and many others keep it going in new and interesting directions. So while fly tying is rooted in tradition, it is also continuously set flight through creativity.

Take it where you will..."There is a road where no one may follow, that path is for your steps alone."

Jerry Garcia

Thanks to everyone, all my brothers and sisters of our craft,

John aka Hot Tuna

[Grunt 0]

I tie my own and fish my own. The reason I do it is because the act of tieing and fishing those flys engages me on several different levels. Those levels are intellectual, physical, and spiritual. The intellectual is the never ending search for the right bug for the right time, the physical is getting out in all weather wading or fishing from my kayak and the spiritual is standing in a stream and having the realization that I am related to all the beauty around me and all things are part of a grand scheme.

[Dnthmn 0]

I still consider myself very new to fly fishing/tying and the deeper into it I get the more I want to learn about every aspect of it. I could not agree more with the comment from N Parish about the biggest tradition being innovation. Without innovation there would be no advancement of the art/sport.

 

In terms of tying, the greatest appeal for me currently is the simple fact that I can get lost in it. I can have a bad morning followed by a terrible day at work that gets compounded by this and that and so on. When it is time to relax I pull out the tying stuff and by the 4th or 5th fly tied I am relaxed and having fun and all the :poop: from earlier in the day is a distant memory. It's similar to the feeling you get when you are relaxing after a good day fishing.

 

I guess the simple truth about it IMHO is that regardless of the motivation or what aspect that drives it the enjoyment is the important part of it.

[crappie 0]

I respect the history and tradion of fly tying and fly fishing. Most of the fly fishing I do is warm water and there is not alot of information n this compared to trout or saltwater.

I tie because the patterns I use the most are not available any other way. I use what ever materials I can get that will make a fly that will work for me. That is what the first fly tyers did and I think that is the main tradition of fly tying.

 

Crappie

[nemoblackdog 0]

I tend to not be interested in tradition for traditions sake. I don't specifically seek to replicate traditional standard patterns, nor do I feel any need to favor traditional materials over non traditional ones. Frankly, that aspect of tying and fly fishing are only passing curiosities to me, not a truly significant interest I actively pursue.

 

That said, to be totally honest with myself, there are aspects of tradition that can't be avoided. Simply tying ones own flies and using them to catch fish on my local waters must be viewed as following the tradition - no matter what the fly pattern, the rod used or the particular technique I use to present the fly.

 

I, too, simply like to make things with my own hands. I've made some of my own tying tools - including a whip-finisher. In some sense that is very non-standard - of all the tying shows I've been to, seeing many hundreds of tiers, I've never seen what I recognize to be a self-made whip-finish tool. But in another very real sense, it's perhaps ultra-traditional. The earliest fly fishers/tiers made do with whatever they could get - "fly shops" either didn't exist or only did so in a handful of far-away places. I think this goes to the other poster's comment that one of the greatest traditions of the sport is innovation.

 

I also tie a fair number of "standard" patterns - pheasant tails, adams, etc... This is not motivated by tradition, but because I learned them early and they are proven fish catchers. They look sort of cool, too. That said, I rarely tie them according to a "recipe" - I'll use what is most accessible on my tying desk to get the job done as quickly as possible. What I call an "adams" might be considered an unrecognizable hack by a more tradition minded tier.