The Birds Stone Fly was created by Cal Bird and is this week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly.
Cal Bird had a small fly shop in San Francisco in the 1940s and 50s. At least that’s what my quick Internet search found. An interesting side note is he lived across the street from Frank Matarelli. Does that name sound familiar? If you are a fly tyer, you might be using one of his bobbins…very popular. In addition, many fly tyers utilize a Cal Bird dubbing tool – a hook to help in the dubbing loop process.
The Birds Stone Fly was invented somewhere around 1960, give or take a few years. I found the pattern in Randall Kaufmann’s American Nymph Fly Tying Manual in the 1970’s and fished it in the Metolius River…and caught fish. It really made a believer out of me. I’ve made it a variant by changing the original pattern which used a turkey quill for the wing case. It worked, but I changed it over the years to use peacock herl. Yes, both wing cases are fragile, but somehow it worked for me.
This is a really old fly I tied many years ago. That would be a few hundred dozen ago.
Another popular fly was the Birds Nest. Perhaps you’ll see it in a future post…
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