Clipped hackles

[AndyBaird]

Hi Jp.

Vince Marinaro designed the thorax dun for educated trout on flat water, a sparse, clipped hackle reinforces a natural footrpint presentation. By increasng hackle density, clipped hackle flies can be fished on the choppiest of riffles with confidence. I fished the #22 caddis above for several hours early last week, covering flat, broken and very choppy water without issue. A touch of your preferred floatant should work wonders (not least as Marinaro tended NOT to use floatants, and I assume the quality of our genetic hackles today improves on the material qualities he used). I've found a very light dressing of old mucilin to work very well.

Another approach to assist floatation is to treat the fly during the tie with Fly-rite Dilly Wax - add to the thorax before dubbing and/or winding hackle to place floatant right in to the heart of the fly.

Just one small point RE: AK's spent caddis - if the fly takes on water and sits lower... then sub-surface, don't automatically re-treat with floatant but try a few drifts looking for takes on the drowned caddis. Same tactic works very well with spent spinners. You WILL find fish that haven't risen to take up top :ugeek:

Hope this helps.

Best,
Andy

[jmp]

Thanks for the info, Andy. You clearly know your stuff! I'll tie some of those up for our season opener in late May. I'm looking forward to trying them out.

jp

[Ernest]

I started fishing a size 24 version of the clipped hackle flies with a trico spinner pattern that I picked up from a book in the 1970's. They have three turns of hackle wrapped over a throax, which are then clipped close on the bottom. The flies are so small and the dubbed thorax adds enough to the flotation so that floatant is rarely needed, at least where fish line up to eat the tricos.

The hackle that was available in the 1970's was quite poor by our standards today. It was hard to find hackle small enough, and now we can find it anywhere, for a price. One of my gripes about today's hackle is that it's so stiff that I think that sometimes it acts like a hackle guard in the smallest sizes, and the fly bumps off the fish before the hook catches. One more reason to use a clipped hackle pattern.

The thorax flies, as described in Marinaro's books, are tough to tie according to his instructions. I carry some patterns that have wings shaped with wing burners, and hackle applied behind and in front of the wings. The smaller ones have their hackle clipped straight across, and the larger ones have a "V" cut out of the bottom of the hackle. Depending on how much hackle I use, these will float anywhere, but I usually save them for that particular fish that won't come up for my standard offerings. On picky fish they are very good.

[trout-nut]

There are times when I keep a small collaspable sccissors in my vest. I will tye them with a full hackle and sometimes if they keep looking and not hitting I will clip hackles right then and there and then BAM!!!! the little buggers will smack it . Something different I guess. :)