North Country Spiders and other classics

[tennswede]

Hello,

I'm a Swedish-American living in Knoxville, TN since 20 plus years. I got interested in the Spiders or Soft Hackles as we say over here about a decade ago. I have read and watched movies about the methods and the tying of said flies for the better part of the last decade. I started fly fishing in my early teens in Sweden in the late 70's. I fondly remember receiving mail order catalogs from the U.K. such as from Dermot Wilson in Nether Wallop, later to be acquired by Orvis. They were still talking about the leader as a cast with two or more flies tied to the leader. We fished winged wets and nymphs mostly along with a handful of classic English dries such as Greenwell's Glory and March Brown.

My favorite flies lately have been the classic Red Tag and the Black Zulu, two very European patterns. My other favorite the last few years have been the Iron Blue Dun wet tied with mole as dubbing.

I'm very excited to be here and hope to learn something new and share ideas.

Hans

[Roadkill]

Hans,

Welcome to the forum! There us a wealth of information in past topics so enjoy the search feature and join in in the fun.

[Old Hat]

A hardy welcome Hans. If my reach could extend from Oregon to Tennessee I would shake your hand.

Glad you you found us.

Carl

[DUBBN]

Welcome Hans! I share your affection with the Red Tag. One of my all time favorites.

[tennswede]

Thanks folks, I'm not a good fly tier so I tell my friends that' s my excuse for tying simple spiders. Lol. In all honesty, I really like them and I think they fish better than a lot of overdressed flies do. I really need to tie some this weekend, running behind this spring.

[tennswede]

Welcome Hans! I share your affection with the Red Tag. One of my all time favorites.

I'm glad I found some folks over here that know what I'm talking about. I fish and tie a Red Tag wet, in Europe a lot of people fish a Red Tag dry. I never do though.

[hankaye]

tennswede, Howdy;

Welcome to the forum. Our overworked and under paid engineer in residence
Ray (letumgo), has just done a bit of a remodel to the reference section, please
excuse to the dust. Wander around and by-all-means make yourself comfortable.

hank

[letumgo]

Hans - Welcome aboard! It's nice to meet you (virtually that is). Make yourself at comfortable and look around thru the various subsections of the forum. I think you will find many things of interest. I look forward to interacting with you on the forum.

Hank -

[Smuggler]

Glad you found us, Hans. Make yourself at home and don't be shy!

Great introduction

[tennswede]

Again, I appreciate the welcome. I am kind of an oddball among the few fishing friends I have. By no means do I intend on being different on purpose but not only am I an immigrant to the U.S. I also insist on fishing the classic way. Not all the time but most of the time. I have not to this day for an instance used a strike indicator. People wonder all the time how you do it but it can't be explained fully. Intuition perhaps.

Not saying that my methods are finer or any better but I enjoy the old ways. Btw, I'm curious of Pete Hidy's son Lance is on this forum. I had a brief email correspondence with him a few years ago as we discussed a book put out by a fellow Swede Gunnar Johnson who is a reknown artist, fly fisher etc in Sweden. Anyway, it's getting late and I'm not as young as I used to be so I'm retiring for the night.