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By Walt Young
sports@altoonamirror.com
This time of year, tying flies for a return to the trout streams in the warmer weather of the coming months has been a personal wintertime ritual for more than fifty years.
Many other avid fly anglers share that same routine. No other fishing-related hobby has meant as much to me as fly tying, and I can't imagine fly-fishing and not being a fly tier.
When I started fly-fishing in the early 1960s, tying your own flies was almost a necessity. Crafting your own flies cost only a fraction of what it cost to buy completed flies. Even for those who could afford to buy all the flies they needed, adequate supplies of flies were not always readily available. Fly-tying presented a wonderful creative outlet, enabling tiers to experiment and to design special patterns for the waters they fished regularly. Back then, unfortunately, fly-tying instruction for beginners was scarce. Unless you had a close friend or family member who was an experienced fly tier and willing to teach you, learning to tie flies could be a troublesome undertaking.
Nowadays, however, novice tiers will find an almost unlimited array of instructional resources. Although most in-person fly-tying classes continue to be on hold again this winter due to COVID-19 concerns, books, videos and online instruction are all viable alternatives for new fly tiers. Because I started tying when I was 12, well before the arrival of videos or the Internet, I've always been partial to books. I probably was almost 20 years old before I saw another person actually tie a fly. I was heavily influenced by many of the great fly-tying books of the 1970s and 1980s, which greatly contributed to the maturing of my tying skills.
But everyone learns differently. A few years ago, my younger brother wanted to learn to tie flies, and I was glad to be his personal tutor. Over the winter, I spent several evenings showing him how to tie most of the fly patterns he liked to fish with as well as some of my own special creations. He picked up the craft well and, most important, spent time on his own practicing each week's lesson. Not only did that dedicated practice hone his tying skills, but it also helped to fill his boxes with plenty of flies for the coming spring.
After a couple of lessons, my brother began asking me about tying techniques he had observed on YouTube and other Internet sources. I had to admit that I almost never looked at most of the fly-tying instruction online. In fact, I considered so much online content substandard at best, and most of the fly-tying instructions I had seen were downright dreadful. Too many of the folks demonstrating tying techniques or fly patterns were simply not good tiers and some were downright awful with dirty fingernails and cracked cuticles. The production value of most of the videos presented are often second-rate as well. The camera is placed on the opposite side of the tying vise with the tier's shirt as the backdrop while the fly is tied start to finish with that one perspective. The resulting footage is then posted online with little or no editing. Most of these efforts are presented by the hundreds online without charge, which undoubtedly makes them popular but also helps to prove the adage, "You get what you pay for."
I wondered why my brother would be attracted to all that Internet fare when in my fly-tying room we were literally surrounded by every worthwhile book on fly tying and fly patterns published in the past 60 years. And I could easily pick a book or two from my extensive library to provide the answer to any possible problem or question. I have always been an avid reader and a book person. My brother is not. Everyone has their preferred learning style. I am decidedly a book learner while plenty of other folks prefer demonstration and spoken directions.
Regardless of how you like to learn, it is important to get quality instruction. Not everyone who is skilled at something is capable of teaching others how to do it.
Almost by accident, I discovered the YouTube channel of a remarkably talented tier, Barry Ord Clarke, a native of the United Kingdom who now lives in Norway. Clarke's YouTube channel, known as the Feather Bender, comprises more than 400 hundred individual videos demonstrating a comprehensive collection of fly patterns and tying techniques with new ones added every few weeks. Back in March, he even featured a version of the Walt's Worm, a pattern I created more than 35 years ago. Clarke is a also professional photographer, so his videos are well done and shot from the tier's side for a proper perspective. His tying skills are superb and worthy for any tier from novice to expert to emulate.
And for book lovers like me, Clarke has authored two books that I would rate among the best works on fly tying in recent years. His "Fly Tying for Beginners" offers an extensive instruction on the necessary tools and materials to tie 12 specific fly patterns using step-by-step color photos with clear tying instructions. Some of the fly patterns include popular fish catchers like the Zebra Midge, Pheasant Tail Nymph, Hare's Ear Nymph, Elk Hair Caddis, Montana Nymph and Woolly Bugger. For those who prefer the "show me" learning style, links to are provided to YouTube videos demonstrating the tying techniques for each fly from start to finish.
Intermediate or advanced tiers who would like to improve or expand their tying skills, will want to check out Clarke's other recent book, "The Feather Bender's Fly Tying Techniques." This one features 28 individual fly patterns that employ a wide range of special and sometimes unique tying techniques, all with access to online videos demonstrating each of the featured patterns.