Stan Gula wrote:
Mike Connor wrote:
On the other hand, an Adams requires two hackles, otherwise it is not
an Adams, just a general hamfisted ****up, of which there are far too
many nowadays.

( No offence Stan!)

Why would I take offence? My point (which you probably know) is that an
Adams is an OK fly, but too fussy. I'll go heretic for a moment and say I
rarely ever follow a named pattern exactly. I *could*, and I *have*, but
don't *want*. That's the freedom of rolling your own, isn't it? Mixing the
hackle fibers for the tail and then winding a double hackle on a fly that's
just a 'near nuff' kind of fly in the first place is, well, too much work.


I've started an experiment, by the way. After tying an Adams, I always
have two feathers without tips (which were sacrificed for the upwings),
a piece of Brown and another piece of Grizzly from the hackle, and a
pinch of dubbing. So I tie a 'NearNuff" with the leftovers. I use the
tipless hackles for the new upwings (which look truncated at this
point), snip a bit off the midsection of one of the feathers to
generate fibers for the tail, wrap the thorax with the leftover dubbing
(plus a pinch of new, if needed. Dubbing is cheap), then I use the
second tipless feather for the hackle, along with the remnant of the
brown hackle. Last of all, I trip the (rather weird) wings into shape.

So far, my 'NearNuff' flies don't look to unappetizing, assuming that
old adage about the ugliest flies catching the most fish. In fact, they
look almost normal, just not as 'delicate'. I look forward to trying
out some of these on the river, or at least sending them around in a
'practical fly' flyswap. (A 'practical fly' meaning one that is tied
for fishing, not for showing.)

--riverman