Fountains of Youth – Classic trout flies that have withstood the test of time … flies that remain “forever young”

by Rusty Dunn

The hopes and dreams of most dry-fly anglers rest on the shoulders of but two groups of insects, the mayflies and the caddisflies. Admittedly, stoneflies, midges, and terrestrials have their periods of glory, but day in and day out, mayflies and caddisflies are the bread and but­ter of fly fishing. But look inside your fly boxes. Are the bread and the butter represented equally? Probably not. Most anglers practice what famous authors or influencers preach, and mayflies have been the dar­lings of fly-fish­ing books and media for centuries. Cad­disflies and other insect orders received their justified recognition in recent decades, but mayflies still enjoy an inherited legacy of prominence and privilege. For example, fly tyers often discuss may­flies in code (aka. Latin names) and dwell on mi­nute details of size, color, form, and behavior. They carry multiple fly boxes onstream, each devoted to a single mayfly species. Those boxes, furthermore, hold flies of immense vari­ety. High floating, low floating, half-sub­merged, wings held up, wings held back, wings held for­ward, no wings, no hackle, hair hackle, re­verse hackle, and on and on. Such is the legacy of mayfly privilege. Read More

Fountains of Youth – Classic trout flies that have withstood the test of time … flies that remain “forever young”

by Rusty Dunn

Have a sip of New York City municipal water, and you’re drinking a cup of fly-fishing history. About half of The Big Apple’s water supply comes from the Catskill Mountains, birthplace of American fly fishing. The Catskills are where Theodore Gordon began the “Cats­kill style” of fly tying, where George LaBranche and Edward Hewitt pioneered and popularized American fly fishing, where Preston Jennings com­piled the first com­prehensive list of aquatic insects available to North American trout, and where the H.L. Leonard and E.F. Payne rod compa­nies tested and built some of the fin­est split cane fly rods ever made. Read More