Kite's Imperial SBS here.

richard

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Who resides on the right bank of the Derbyshire Wye and is lulled to sleep each night by the mutterings of a weir, dreaming that "When the rivers and their inhabitants come first, we ALL win..."

I always though that Kite's Imperial had a pronounced thorax ???

JC

In the original dressing a thorax was formed by doubling back the heron herl body feathers.

Kite also changed the hackle colour as the season progressed.

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[I]"I still don't know why I fish or why other men fish, except that we like it and it makes us think and feel."[/I] Roderick L Haig-Brown

[url]www.wildfly.net[/url]

[url]http://www.gameanglinginstructors.co.uk/[/url]

It still has but instead of making a thorax with the herl it is made by the list in the hackle. It is more effective this way. If Kite had been able to get the quality of hackles that we get today he would have surely eschewed the doubling back and forth (which doesn't reall show from underneath) and used the hackle list. It's the same effect that a badger hackle gives to a Grey Duster.

richard

---------- Post added at 12:43 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:40 PM ----------

Yes, I pointed that out in the blogpost. The way shewn in the blogpost makes a more effective fly.

This was also recommended and explained why in the blogpost.

richard

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Who resides on the right bank of the Derbyshire Wye and is lulled to sleep each night by the mutterings of a weir, dreaming that "When the rivers and their inhabitants come first, we ALL win..."

Apologies Richard, I hadn't fully read your blog.

With regard to the pronounced thorax ... although in the original dressing, I never bother with it myself either and I doubt Mr Trout would refuse it due to any lack of authenticity.

Paul

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[I]"I still don't know why I fish or why other men fish, except that we like it and it makes us think and feel."[/I] Roderick L Haig-Brown

[url]www.wildfly.net[/url]

[url]http://www.gameanglinginstructors.co.uk/[/url]

No need to apologise Paul. If I was being pedantic I should have called the fly Kite's Imperial Variant. The effect of a thorax is still there, but it is in the hackle rather than the body. I used to make them with the thorax but found without to make a more effective fly. It has caught me many fish.

richard

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Who resides on the right bank of the Derbyshire Wye and is lulled to sleep each night by the mutterings of a weir, dreaming that "When the rivers and their inhabitants come first, we ALL win..."

Here's Dave Collyer's take on it. His book was published in 1981 and this is the dressing I've used for 30 years, so on the principle that if it ain't busted, I'm not fixing it I'm quite sure that the trout don't mind one way or the other

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Game fish are too valuable to be caught only once - Lee Wulff

The advantage of using a drawing to illustrate a fly is that you can make the pictured fly look perfect and insect-like, when in reality the fly is often a fat and misformed thing. A photograph gives a more honest marker for the reader to aim for. Also I use a brush every time to put on the varnish...

Books are great for the author, no one can answer you back like on a forum or blog.

richard

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Who resides on the right bank of the Derbyshire Wye and is lulled to sleep each night by the mutterings of a weir, dreaming that "When the rivers and their inhabitants come first, we ALL win..."

Quite.

How about a photograph - by Richard himself (nice example if slightly too many whisks?) - and a book quote by Major Oliver Kite himself? All from previous threads here:

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Save the softmouth trout

I used to get Jean Williams of Sweets in Usk to tie mine with a pronounced thorax and "Pobst" style which is basically upside down and they work very well. This is my "go to" fly anytime before May unless I've got good reason to have something else on.

I saw a dead heron on the A55 near Bangor last week but was past it too quickly to stop and go back and nick the primaries!!!

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“There is no more lovely country than Monmouthshire in early spring. Nowhere do the larks sing quite so passionately, as if somehow inspired by the Welsh themselves. There is a blackbird on every thorn and a cock chaffinch, a twink as they call him there, on every bush...... It moved me profoundly. I had been spared to see another spring, and I thank God for it.”

Oliver Kite
“A Spring Day on the Usk”
A Fisherman’s Diary