It was collateral damage, purely accidental, but he doomed us fly tiers to a bland palette of earth tones. The implement of destruction was the release of “Matching the Hatch” which debuted with little fanfare in 1962. Since then we’ve been limited to the colors of Mother Nature – not a bad thing, but it’s stifled the artist in all of us.

The richness of colors available in Salmon and Steelhead flies is all that remains of the pre-realism movement, and may be the reason why many tiers dabble in exotic patterns – color starvation.

In researching the latest craze, “Czech Nymphing” – the thought occurred to me that the style of fishing isn’t new, Western anglers call it “High Sticking” – a traditional pocket water nymphing style used with great effect for many decades. It’s the flies that are new – thin profiles, heavily weighted, and … colorful?

Little wonder it’s the latest craze, as every tyer on the planet suddenly has a use for red, yellow, and orange dubbing. After 25 years of drab flies, it’s time to let the beast loose.

I’ve been quietly letting my artistic bent have its way with my flies, relishing those colors that have been dormant in my trout flies for so long. I’m making some minor modifications to the Czech style of tying as I stopped using latex and vinyl in flies many years ago.

Vinyl oxidizes badly, even if contained in a dark fly box. The flies fish well, but you open your box the following season and find the vinyl broken or discolored. Latex was much worse, one season and you had a bare hook shank and loose rubber bands instead of flies.

I opted for no “shell back” – focusing instead on lots of lead and pretty colors. I may fiddle with some raffia or swiss straw later, but it’s the colors that are driving my sudden artistic bent; 18 turns of 1 AMP fuse wire for an underbody, about twice what I would normally use, enough to remove an ear if the forward cast catches an updraft…

While the “Little Stinking” is blown out, I’ll continue with my caffeine induced impressionism, the next batch will incorporate lead, riotous color, and Salvador Dali … don’t giggle until you see them.

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