I posted a link to this Hair Hackled wet fly a few days ago.
I've fished it twice now. It's not often a new fly idea turns
out to be so successful you feel confident about the assesment
after two tries. Sometimes I give up on an experimental design
a season or two later.

But this fly is hot. I've had two hot-as-pistol early season
days since the weekend. Once on the Yellowstone and once
on the Gallatin. When the fish are byting you get fast feedback
on what works and what doesn't. I fished a big, heavily weighted
foam stonefly nymph (it's almost Salmon Fly time) with a
variety of smaller, unweighted nymph and wetfly trailers.
That's how I always fish in the early season, when the water is
high and still a little off color.

And I have to say it: the hair hackled wet flies won the contest.
Hands down. If the fishing had been typically slow it would not
be so easy to jump to a conclusion. But when you get two days
of red hot fishing--where you bump a fish on every 3rd or so cast--you
notice the differences right away. This banded, hair hackled wet fly,
in sizes 10-12, was the best of the lot.

So here's my tentative assessment: soft hackled wet flies are for
spring creeks and tailwater fisheries. For the bigger freestone
rivers,
fish with hair hackled wetflies.

By the way, I did tie a handful of hair-hackled wetflies that followed
the modern model: with a nymph-like wing case on top of the thorax,
that split the hackles, so the leg-like hackles splayed out from the
sides and bottom, but not from the top. The fishing was so good,
these past two days, I think I could have caught fish on anything.
And those nymph-like hair hackles worked too. But NOT AS WELL
as the traditional Pott/Wombacher/Grant like wet flies that had
a 360 degree hair hackle. This is a hot damn fly.