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FlyTieDad

What materials do you miss?

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As someone new to fly tying I keep stumbling across names of lost materials that fly tiers of old lament.

I’ve heard of and even had the painful joy of using some Overton’s Wonder Wax.
A tube will usually set you back about $50 on eBay

But now I’ve just heard of something called Chadwicks 477.
Back to eBay I went and found a square still in bidding at $69.85!!!

That’s a bit too rich for my blood, but it got me wondering.

What other materials are long lost that people pine over?

Do you have something special locked away only to be taken out when you want to tie the perfect fly?

 

What is your holy grail of materials that you scour garage sales and flea markets in hopes of finding?


-FlyTieDad

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+1 to the above.

 

You can add jungle cock to the above

 

Fly tying materiald no longer sold:

 

McMurrayBodies.jpg

 

Then there are materials that no longer are sold in craft stores

 

Aunt Lydia's Rug yarn - the real vintage version specified by Dell Brown for his merkin pattern

Black swiss straw in the craft stores.

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Add another vote for Polar Bear.

 

Jungle cock is being imported in much higher amounts compared to about 5-6 years ago, but they are still keeping the price too high and the quality is.... almost non existant. I still need to learn of a good way to repair the split nails.

 

The Classic Salmon flies call for a lot of different materials that are so rare that a few seem more myth than real these days...but the loss of hook manufacturers is going to have to make the finiky tyers rethink the need of blind-eyes for tying...I cant even touch the silk-worm gut to tie any since the price of it seems to be about on par with gold if done by weight.

 

But the loss of animals realy makes me see what kind of impact over-population seems to cause....

 

My biggest lementing is the loss of good populations of fish...if that keeps declining we may pine over any kind of recreational fishing. That scares me the most...tying flies for what?

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I agree the shrinking produces of hooks etc is a bad thing. And maybe well go the way field sports have gone and have a person as bait. Instead of dogs chasing a smelly rag attached to a runner, we would cast out to unemployed Olympic swimmers who would inspect our offerings and 'bite' the one they fancy most. We claim a catch when we touch there head.

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Well i found out today that the super thin thread i use to use to make very small and/or intricate flies is no longer available...If i can't find a strong enough sub i will have to quitt tying several of my favorites. I know danville made a extra-fine mono that would work but that isn't showing in my local shop's lists any more either. I am hunting again...

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go to your local fabric store. they sell the mono thread and a whole lot more that can be used for fly tying

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Thanks guys! I will look into this more. What i use to use was a thread that was called wonder silk. I don't think it was actually silk though but would strech better than the dansville stuff. Monos that i have seen don't strech like that stuff did. I went to order some and the site is no longer in existence. It might have been wonder web??? I just can't remember which means i may never find it again.

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I too, miss polar bear. I don't remember it ever being cheap though. I only once had a small patch of it and it was some nice stuff. I got it from E. Hille in about 70'.

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With the vast amount of tying materials coming from non fly shop sources its hard to miss long ago available materials. There's always a good substitute if you use a bit of energy to find them.

 

There are items that have become extinct like the dinosaurs. We don't seem to miss them and I'm sure it will be the same with tying material.

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I agree with Norm. I don't miss anything. There are so many materials available today from so many sources that the only thing difficult about it is knowing when to stop buying. To be sure, there's some stuff that's either NLA or expensive, but there are plenty of substitutes that work just as well. We are living in the Golden Age of Fly Tying in more ways than one. With the internet and places like Ebay, the world has become one giant fly shop.

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Peter

 

You just said exactly what I was going to say

 

New tyers today shouldn't even be worried about what was then and should embrace the tying materials of today. The quality of hackle was shit back then compared to today

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These three would be nice to have around - AGAIN...

 

8917114-origpic-baefe1_zpsbd9595ee.jpg

 

Need I say more...

 

oan688_zps55f5e266.jpg

 

The real stuff, not what is now made in China...

 

dubbing_scintilla_multi_purpose_Scintill

 

Good dubbing...

 

PT/TB

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I've seen that Chadwick's yarn being sold by the INCH before. Ridiculous.

 

Only thing I miss are Mustad "classic" fly hooks.

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