My first commercial order was for two dozen Adams. I was 16 at the time, and quality control was letting the glue dry and giving it a couple of half hearted tugs – followed by a rigorous review of proportions.

By the time I’d completed 24 flies that passed muster I’d actually tied about 60 – and suffering through 60 flies of the same size and pattern was pure torture to a fellow that tied something different everytime he sat down.

It would be the better part of a decade before I could face the Adams without cringing, which is why the Mosquito figured so prominently in my angling development.

Hackle tip wings were my undoing. Grizzly specifically, and the lessons learned on that first order apply to the many flies since. Thousands of patterns pair materials for wings, cheeks, or body components – and attention has to be paid to the coloration of the pair chosen, as their mottling and coloration can make a perfect fly look less so.

Color can visually deceive the eye into thinking your proportions are wrong.

The above picture shows us a “bad pairing.” The hackles themselves are fine – their coloration is good, but using the above pair will make the fly’s left wing appear shorter than the right.

It’s the tips of the feather that cause the issue. The left feather is tipped in black, the right feather is tipped in white; using the two together will make the left wing appear shorter. Add in the hackle in front of the wings – a mixture of brown and grizzly that will bust up the barring of the wing segments and exaggerate the color difference further.

Here’s another pairing that will eliminate this simple problem. This “right” feather was next to the other “righty” above, yet has a black tip. Note how the bars are matched exactly with the left feather. This pairing will yield an Adams where the colors don’t upset the balance.

From the quarter view above, nothing really looks amiss. Wings are cocked and extend above the hackle, both look equal length, and proportions look solid.

Here is where the problem displays itself nicely. The black tipped wing (right) vanishes leaving only the last white segment visible. The white tipped wing (left) is strident and obvious, making the left look much too short.

Color. Normally it’s your friend but occasionally it can diminish or enhance a feature and throw your nicely tied fly into a tizzy. It’s the last thing to check before wrenching those precious hackles off the hide.

Tags: Adams, dry fly wing, grizzly hackle, fly tying tips, dry fly proportion, Mosquito,

My lampooning of dry fly fishermen is well documented, so I thought I’d take my comeuppance like a Man…

I’ve got a half dozen experimental colors of “Dubbing X” made, about an ounce of each, all hand made at the cost of most of my fingernails, lots of swearing, and the skin of both forefingers…

A medium gray (Adam’s), a Blue Wing Olive, Pale Morning Dun, Upper Sacramento Pink, and an Ocher. The above are the California colors for those insects and may not be correct for your local watershed.

An “accidental color” is one that occurs while learning an unfamiliar dye process, where you’ve written the material off thinking nothing good could come of it – didn’t write down the formula, so you can’t reliably make it again … and it turned out pretty darn good – which was a complete shock.

… and then you destroy both fingernails and flesh in a series of ill advised attempts to render it to base fur before finding some process that partially works.

I could use a little feedback on the next Great Dry Fly Dubbing, drop me a note and I’ll toss some in the mail.

This is only for dry fly use. The material floats without assistance (specific gravity less than 1), and is a micro-filament – or “Nano-dubbing” as OldTrout58 calls it.

… while supplies last – I’ll need time to regrow some fingernails before the next batch.

Tags: Dubbing X, dry fly dubbing, Blue Wing Olive, gray, Pale Morning Dun, fly tying materials, Upper Sacramento pink,