Wingless wet or not?

[daringduffer]

Would you consider this a wingless wet if fished sunk?



http://www.flytying.ro/coltul_legatorul ... r-duns-470

Or would you have to substitute the cdc with soft hackle fibers?

When is a hackle not a wing?

Like hankeye; just askin'...

dd

[tie2fish]

Whatever one calls it, this is certainly a beautiful fly.

[William Anderson]

I cant think of anything softer than cdc. That is really nicely done.

w

[Roadkill]

Nice fly!

IMO with either CDC or hackle fibers fished sunk it is a wet winged fly since there is only a wing on the fly. Tied in a wingless fashion using the same CDC or hackle fibers it can be a wingless wet. Tied as pictured I would call it a CDC emerger either sunk or in the film .

[Old Hat]

Not a wingless wet. The stiff profile of tail fibers, the long profile of the body and the parachute design in the "wing" all say dry or topwater emerger. Whether sunk or not, intended purpose and tying technique does not say "wingless wet" to me at all.

However, cdc is a good wingless wet hackle material, not my favorite, but decent. To me it it's not the material as much as the how its tied in. Shorten the tail, prop it up a bit, shorten the body and wrap the cdc hackle radially around the hook shank and then you might have a wingless wet.

Lucian does tie a nice dry fly though. On most of the water I'm fishing, that style of fly would float about 1.5 seconds.

[Otter]

That simle looking pattern is the culmination of many years work by Lucian, and this latest prototpye with a CDC parachute hackle effect looks very promising and may well enhance what already is a very successful style for upwings. My box is crammed with this style of fly, most of them simple combinations of various colured silk, waxed and unwaxed , Coq de leon tails and CDC wing s upright and forward facing over the eye.

These are some other examples of these styles without lucians latest technique.

http://www.flytying.ro/coltul_legatorul ... r-duns-470

In my view the only place CDC should be submerged is when it is firmly attached to a ducks bum, or racing through the water attached to a fine trout that just sipped it off the surface.

This style can take fish when sunk for the first time and I have done so but as a wet fly in general I believe that you will find it to be a very poor one with the CDC being rendered next to useless when it becomes waterlogged.

[DNicolson]

It doesn't pay to be dogmatic, these flies are sometimes fished
as wets and sometimes as dries.
http://donaldnicolson.webplus.net/page110.html

They are called West Country wet-flies but are as often fished as dries.

[William Anderson]

Hm. Old Hat, are you citing the use of a stiffer tail or a longer than Clyde body as grounds to disqualify a fly as a soft-hackle? I tie lots of soft-hackles with or without tails...both softer or stiffer and with bodies of varied lengths. If you wrapped this fly with a hen hackle palmered through a muskrat thorax it would look like half the flies I tie. I like a silk bodied/game bird hackled/Tweed length bodied fly as much as anyone, but imho, defining soft-hackles has to allow for some variety.

Giving it a second look...the hackle is tied parachute style. I didn't realize to what extent with it being cdc and a bit messy. I thought it wrapped that shank more than it does. Tying the hackle in, or wrapping it in a uniform way around the hook I think is a mark of a soft-hackle, however you want to tie it in. This is definitely an emerger pattern.

Quote: Otter: "In my view the only place CDC should be submerged is when it is firmly attached to a ducks bum, or racing through the water attached to a fine trout that just sipped it off the surface. This style can take fish when sunk for the first time and I have done so but as a wet fly in general I believe that you will find it to be a very poor one with the CDC being rendered next to useless when it becomes waterlogged."

Otter, I disagree regarding the use of cdc under water. Wrapped as a body or tied in as a hackle, the tiny fibers and flexibility are lively, even if you move away from the idea of CDC providing floatation. It also allows for both large and small air bubbles to collect on the body of the fly or in the hackle...which some believe is a good thing.

Hmm. Am I alone in this?

w

[daringduffer]

My intention with this question was not really to discuss this fly, even if it is interesting by itself. I was asking myself "what defines a wingless wet"? I saw this fly and thought "what if you tie it upside down"? Would it still be a winged fly? What decides? The intention, the possible interpretation or something else? The reason for these thoughts was the discussion regarding setting the hackle and then the picture of the Webster flies. The latter obviously incorporates wings. Flies with set hackles could be regarded as if. But then again, so could also flies with umbrella hackle...

Well...just thinking...

dd

[daringduffer]

It doesn't pay to be dogmatic, these flies are sometimes fished
as wets and sometimes as dries.
http://donaldnicolson.webplus.net/page110.html

They are called West Country wet-flies but are as often fished as dries.

Yes, how we dress - and how we fish - a fly decides what it is intended to represent. In the end it is the fish that decides what it is.

dd