Alpaca!

[William Anderson]

I have received alpaca from several generous tiers over the years and a few months ago I took some really sweet dyed alpaca from Carl and chopped it for dubbing. Using the jar and water method I came up with some very rich and nicely spectral blends. Tonight i tied a few caddis pups in shades of green with a d-rib and scrubbed out the fibers a bit. Excellent material.

Geek time. Here's the interesting part. I have some crystal clear baggies, small, that I use for dubbing blends, etc. Not your regular packaging baggie, much clear. So I took the alpaca flies along with a few others into the bathroom with bright lights, and filed the little baggies half full with water. You've got to try this. Not unlike the acrylic tub I used for photographing some flies but this allows infinite trials and manipulation. First the alpaca, like many other fibers has excellent hydrofuge qualities and was actually tough to sink. I wouldn't have expected it to ride so high for so long, even as I reproduced a "riffle" condition by shaking and jostling the bag. It's lovely and retains the original color very well. The views and hydrofuge of a Griffiths gnat was a revelation, as was a couple Usual patterns using the snow shoe.

Then I fooled around with a number of other materials in the tiny /slender "wet tank." It's great because you get the results of doing it in a glass or planning it in a saucer, but you can squeeze it against the walls of the bag and get an amazing wet view, closer and clearer than I've seen before. Definitely something to carry to the stream. You can't tell crap about a fly when wet when you lift it out of the water. These things are so lively viewed this way. (Can you tell I geeked out about 20 minutes longer than I should have?)

[Mataura mayfly]

William..... William.... William. Do NOT try this kind of thing in public.
Sneak into a public bathroom with little plastic bags, spend 20 minutes in there and come out with a silly grin on your face and someone is going to call the narcotics squad on you!

Good idea on the visualising wet though, especially "on the water", little plastic bags are a lot easier to carry then small glass jars..... safer to.

[letumgo]

William - Will you be posting any pics from your experiments, and the flies you tyed? I'd love to see them.

[novabass]

I agree with Ray, pics...pics!!

[swellcat]

I have some crystal clear baggies, small, that I use for dubbing blends, etc. Not your regular packaging baggie, much clear. So I took the alpaca flies along with a few others into the bathroom with bright lights, and filed the little baggies half full with water. You've got to try this. Not unlike the acrylic tub I used for photographing some flies but this allows infinite trials and manipulation. First the alpaca, like many other fibers has excellent hydrofuge qualities and was actually tough to sink. I wouldn't have expected it to ride so high for so long, even as I reproduced a "riffle" condition by shaking and jostling the bag. It's lovely and retains the original color very well. The views and hydrofuge of a Griffiths gnat was a revelation, as was a couple Usual patterns using the snow shoe.

Then I fooled around with a number of other materials in the tiny /slender "wet tank." It's great because you get the results of doing it in a glass or planning it in a saucer, but you can squeeze it against the walls of the bag and get an amazing wet view, closer and clearer than I've seen before.

All that, and nary a photo? You're killin' us, dawg.
___

[William Anderson]

Yes, of course. It's been too long since I put together the photo set up.