Читать книгу Fishing Flies - Smalley - Страница 35

In these the body consists of tying thread, wound from behind the hook eye to the end of the hook shank and then back to behind the hook eye in touching turns. Sometimes there is a rib, or a rib is optional.

GOLDEN PLOVER & ORANGE

Thread: Orange.

Hackle: Golden plover upperwing covert, with gold markings.

ORANGE PARTRIDGE

Thread: Orange (traditionally a plain orange, though recently hot orange has been used).

Rib: Fine gold wire (optional).

Hackle: Brown speckled feather from the neck of a grey (English) partridge.

Probably the most famous of these flies, the ORANGE PARTRIDGE is a great catcher of fish and has even been known to catch salmon!

GREENWELL’S GLORY (SPIDER VERSION)

Thread: Yellow waxed with dark cobbler’s wax.

Rib: Fine gold wire.

Hackle: Furnace or coch-y-bonddu hen (black centred with natural red sides).

The original GREENWELL’S GLORY, tied by James Wright for Canon William Greenwell in May 1854, had an upright wing of hen blackbird secondary feather fibres. It fishes better without the wing.

The Greenwell’s Glory also makes a splendid dry fly for fishing during hatches of olive duns. Add tails (a few fibres from a cock furnace hackle) and use several turns of cock hackle instead of the 2½ turns of hen hackle.

The following five patterns are summer patterns, for when light-coloured flies are on the water.

YELLOW PARTRIDGE

Thread: Yellow.

Rib: Fine silver wire (optional).

Hackle: Grey speckled feather from the lower part of the neck of a grey (English) partridge.

LIGHT SNIPE

Thread: Primrose.

Hackle: Snipe underwing covert.

SNIPE BLOA

Thread: Straw.

Hackle: Snipe underwing covert.

POULT BLOA

Thread: Yellow.

Hackle: Grey underwing covert of a young (= poult) red grouse.

LIGHT WOODCOCK

Thread: Yellow.

Hackle: Woodcock underwing covert.

The following four flies are outstanding during a hatch of black midges or smuts, or during a fall of black land-bred flies such as black gnats.

BLACK GNAT

Thread: Black, brown, grey or olive.

Hackle: Feather from the neck or back of the starling.

BLACK SPIDER

Thread: Black or red.

Hackle: Black hen.

WILLIAMS’S FAVOURITE

Thread: Black.

Rib: Fine oval silver tinsel.

Hackle: Black hen.

Invented by the father of A. Courtney Williams, author of A Dictionary of Trout Flies, this can be turned into a very useful dry fly by the addition of tails (a few fibres of black cock hackle) and using a black cock instead of hen as hackle.

RUZ-DU

Thread: Black.

Body: Rear half orange thread, front half black thread.

Hackle: Black hen.

This is an extremely useful wet fly in rivers and lakes during a hatch of black midges. It comes from Brittany and was devised by André Ragot.

SNIPE & PURPLE

Thread: Purple.

Hackle: Snipe upperwing covert.

Though originally used to match very dark upwinged flies in rivers, this is a most useful lake fly during a midge hatch.

WATER CRICKET

Thread: Yellow.

Rib: Black thread.

Hackle: Feather from the back of a starling.

A very useful pattern when strong winds are blowing a wide range of land-bred insects (beetles, dung flies, leaf hoppers etc.) onto the water.