This week’s Throw Back Thursday Fly is the Ray Bergman Pathfinder.
The Ray Bergman Pathfinder is a Ray Bergman wet fly listed in his book entitled Trout (1940 – fourth printing) on page 169, Plate No. 7.
As I’ve mentioned many times, I enjoy highlighting a Bergman wet fly because it forces me to sit down and tie it. It looks simple, but I’m still working on mounting the wings properly. I had some difficulty with the far side wing. I tied in a couple of wings, but settled on this one to show I’m still practicing and not all flies turn out perfectly.
Bergman was well known for his wet flies, but his book also lists dry flies, streamers, nymphs, steel head and land locked salmon flies.
If you are a regular at RiverKeeper Flies, you recall Bergman’s book includes colored plates to illustrate the dry and wet flies with a description of each fly in the back. It was the first book to provide color fly illustrations.
Other Ray Bergman flies I’ve included as Throw Back Thursday Flies are: the Arthur Hoyt, the Babcock, the Blue Bottle, the Bostwick, the Bouncer, the Brown Turkey, the Chantry, the Darling, the Light Blow, the Mark Lain, the Montreal, the Montreal Yellow, the Mrs. Haase, the Olive Dun, the Rio Grande King, the Loyal Sock, the Peacock, the Prime Gnat, the Silver Stork, the Walla-Walla, the Whirling Dun, and the Wilson Ant.
The Pathfinder
Tip:
Gold Tinsel
Body:
Scarlet Wool
Rib:
Gold Tinsel
Hackle:
Brown Furnace
Wing:
Light Slate
Enjoy…go fish!
