This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the No. 8 Water-hen Bloa. The Water-hen Bloa can be found in many of the old fly fishing and fly tying books. The first example is from page 24 of Yorkshire Trout Flies by T. E. Pritt (1885) “This fly is identical with the blue dun of Ronalds, and…
I’ve been tying flies and working on projects for March 2022. I’ll be teaching two Zoom fly tying classes and offering a presentation to Central Oregon Flyfishers. This is the time of year I spend more time at the vise. The image above are a few flies I’m tying for a good customer. There are…
This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the Atherton No. 6 dry fly. John Atherton (1900 – 1952) was an artist by trade and incorporated his impressionistic art into the flies he tied. Interestingly, he didn’t name the flies, choosing instead to number his dry flies from 1 to 7, representing lighter to darker shades…
I finished and mailed a steelhead fly order for a customer in the mid-west about a month ago and thought I’d share his order with you. I enjoy tying steelhead flies, but haven’t tied many the last few years because of the low steelhead runs of the Columbia basin. But these 16 flies were a…
This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is Broughton’s Point. I found this beautiful fly in Brook and River Trouting by Harfield H. Edmonds and Norman N. Lee (1916). It’s listed as fly No. 7 on page 18 – Broughton’s Point or Dark Bloa, with a note on the bottom as a fly to fish in March…
I finished a fly order recently, tying very small flies which challenged my fly tying skills. The order was for flies in sizes 18 to 22. Tying small flies is difficult if you don’t tie a lot. You feel like you’re tying with two thumbs! Trust me, I’ve been there! I remember a statement I…
This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the Skunk steelhead fly, one of Frank Moore’s favorite flies. Frank Moore passed away last Sunday at the age of 98. Here’s Frank at the 2015 NW Fly Tying and Fly Fishing Expo in Albany, OR demonstrating his casting technique at 90 years old. He was the Dean…
I wanted to share a recent experience on my home waters, fishing the Metolius. My preferred style of fishing is casting a dry fly to rising fish, but if I want to increase my odds of catching a fish, I would have a better chance fishing with nymphs during winter months. Read on and I’ll…
This week’s Throw Back Thursday fly is Pritt’s Water Cricket. Here is a fly from T.E. Pritt’s Yorkshire Trout Flies (1885). The link will take you to one of the free download books from an extensive list I have created on my Links to Free Old Fly Fishing and Fly Tying Books page. You can normally…
If you’ve followed RiverKeeper Flies for a while, it won’t come as a surprise I might be a little obsessed with Green Drakes, from tying effective imitations, fishing the flies during a hatch, and creating images through my photography. In fact, I’ve been thinking about them all week. I taught a Zoom fly tying class…
