2019 NW Fly Tying and Fly Fishing Expo

The 2019 NW Fly Tying and Fly Fishing Expo in Albany, OR begins in a couple of days. It’s one of the largest events of its kind in the country. Besides being a Demonstration Tyer on Friday and Saturday, I’ll be teaching Fine Tuning Your Tying Techniques class on Friday afternoon.

I tied two flies for plates to be auctioned on Friday night – the Legend’s Plate and a plate from my local Central Oregon Fly Tyer’s Guild.

The Legend’s plate is a long-time tradition which includes flies tied by members of an exclusive group – those selected as a Stan Walters Memorial Fly Tyer of the Year. There are some terrific fly tyers on this plate! I am honored to be part of it.

I submitted a Benn’s Coachman steelhead fly for this year’s Legend’s plate.

Benn's Coachman | www.johnkreft.com
Benn’s Coachman

My local Central Oregon Fly Tyer’s Guild continues to create fly plates for the NW Expo to auction. I’ve had flies on those plates and this year was no exception. This year’s theme was the Green Drake Life Cycle.

Here is the Mercer’s Poxyback Green Drake Nymph I tied for the plate. UV resin has replaced epoxy for my flies. It’s much faster and cleaner to apply

Mercer's Poxyback Green Drake Nymph | www.johnkreft.com

Lastly, I’ve been tying lots of flies the last few weeks to fill orders. Here are some Clark’s Stones. You’ll see the original Clark’s Golden Stone, a Clark’s Lady Stone and the Salmonfly versions. These are tied in sizes 8 and 4 respectively.

Here are other blog posts from previous NW Expo’s I’ve written about. If you haven’t seen them, I encourage you to check them out.

I hope to see you at the 2019 NW Expo!

Enjoy…go fish!

Similar Posts

  • Fishing Changes in November

    I’ve said for the last couple of years the fish gods flip a switch and the fishing changes in November. But this year, the weather forecast is such that I might get another week of good fishing. Each day is different and the hatches are getting shorter, just like daylight hours. What this means is…

  • Roy Palm’s Special Emerger

    This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is Roy Palm’s Special Emerger, tied below in size 20. I was introduced to this fly recently when a customer asked if I had heard of Roy’s Special Emerger, a midge pattern. He relayed a story of watching a guide with clients catching fish on a river in Colorado….

  • 9 Years

    Another year. My how time flies. That’s right, RiverKeeper Flies quietly celebrated another milestone earlier this month, turning 9 years old! Website RiverKeeper Flies began in early 2014 when I first learned about websites and published my initial post on March 5, 2014. I wasn’t sure where this journey would take me. Initially, I thought…

  • Gartside Sparrow Fly

    This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the Gartside Sparrow Fly. This is a fly my friend purchased from a fly shop in Big Sky, MT in the 1970’s. He fished the fly on the Gallatin and Madison Rivers, MT. The Sparrow Fly was created by Jack Gartside. I have heard the name Gartside before,…

  • Prime Gnat

    This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the Prime Gnat, another fly from the Ray Bergman collection. I’ve featured flies that Dan Bailey tied the last few weeks for my Throw Back Thursday Flies and I thought it was time to return to a Ray Bergman fly. For some reason, I just like the elegance…

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *