Felt paged wallet OK for all soft hackles?

[jaydawg]

Jason,
The posts here are all good advice. I doubt that felt wallets will ever become popular because of the extra trouble required to prevent rusty hooks. And the barbless hooks do indeed tend to come loose. But Leisenring and my father carried all their wet flies in such wallets when fishing, so they can work when properly used by people who are better at staying dry than Ray and I are.
Lance

I'm going to give it a try as soon as I find the time to sit down and transfer my flies over to the felt wallet. I'm not what anyone would call an "adventurous" wader and tend to stay pretty dry. Also the ReCycled Waders bag that I'm using keeps it contents dry despite the occasional dunking. Anyway, I'll take a pic of wallet when I get it put together.

Just a side note. Even tho there has been solid blocks of ice filling the guides on my rod, the trout are still hitting my soft hackles. These flies really are deadly!

[William Anderson]

jaydawg, I'm looking forward to seeing you wallet loaded. I do have a soft spot for these, and the idea of having something leather and felt rather than plastic and foam is really appealing, on a sensory level, not so much for nostalgia. If you looked over that entire thread you will see that I made several, loaded a couple, carried one...once. It rained on me in showers the entire outing...as I thought it might, so I put it in a zip lock bag and never took it out. Thank god for the plastic and foam back-up boxes I had on me. I was actually very concerned that day about all of my flies, however they were carried, and no matter how much I tried to shield them. Anything that I opened was drenched. It was one of my favorite days fishing on the Gunpowder, but I never got to try out that wallet. I took all the flies out of the boxes that were opened and allowed them to dry as well as the boxes. Of course by the next outing the flies that I needed shifted from the wallet back to a box and eventually they all did. I'll give it another try.

Thinking on it now, after having handled Pete Hidy's wallet, he carried a lot of flies. Not like the wallets I've seen, usually salmon flies where 10-15 snelled flies would be expected. The number would be close to...(Lance ?) 100 in the wallet so he was not removing flies each time it rained. Those flies, most of them look fantastic today.

Good luck with your wallet and again, please post some pics.

w

[Ron Eagle Elk]

jaydawg,

Having your flies get wet by rain and wading accidents is only part of the problem. Many folks, myself included, have put flies back in the wallet after fishing them, without drying them first. The result is not just one rusty fly, but several due to the felt holding the moisture..

Can't wait to see pics of your filled wallet.

[jaydawg]

Finally got around to taking some pics of my felt wallet. Please excuse the quality of my pics. They are a deadly combination of poor photo skills and a cheap camera.

The flies are the latest batch from the vise waiting to tested on the water.

[Mataura mayfly]

Jaydawg, nice tidy looking wallet. You need to be out there getting some honest scuff and wear marks on it.

Excellent looking fly selection as well, would like to see them shared in the fly dressing section. Photos are fine, came out really well on my screen.

[Ron Eagle Elk]

Jaydawg,

I agree with Jeff completely. That is a fine looking wallet and good looking flies as well. The wallet does need some patina on it from being well used, being touched with fingers with a bit of mucellin on them, still damp from releasing a fine fish, etc.

May I ask where you found such a wallet?

REE

[jaydawg]

Yup, it definitely needs some wearing in.

The wallet came from a work buddy who used it as his streamer wallet. One day he showed up at work with a rod tube and a loaded vest and handed it to me. About 20 years ago he got a nice Sage setup and never really got into it. He's more of a trolling kinda guy. It was a very nice surprise indeed!

[letumgo]

Jaydawg - Lovely fly wallet. That should serve you well. Thanks for sharing.

[flytyerinpa]

I have used a fly wallet for wet flys for many years with no problems, yes when you first take a fly out of the wallet it will look distorted, tie it on make one or two casts then look at it in the water right in front of you and you'll see the fly looks like it was just tied.
Speaking of fly wallets does any body know where I can buy some felt paged for a fly wallet ? Ed

[swellcat]

Mr. Smith went to Washington on this thread.