I was in conversation with a noted vendor of fly tying materials today who told me that the quantities of quality capes and natural materials sold today are only a fraction of what what was sold 25 years ago. The most popular materials today seen to be different colours and shades of fritz, used of course for the construction of blobs!!!

To say that a "blob" is actually a trout fly is laughable, but such is the way of things I guess.

But what do you think? Is Fly Dressing a dying art?

Personally if I couldn't dress my own flies, in wonderful natural materials, as suggestions of what the trout actually eat, I don't think I'd want to go fly fishing any more!

An I do like to read all the old fly tying books by Skues, Halford, Goddard, Walker, Clegg, CF Walker, Collyer, Church and a few more.

The same cannot be said of this side of the pond with alot of retailers not even bothering to sell fritz or similar products.

__________________
Sean


>>>>>>>MEMBER OF THE S.S.F.D.<<<<<<<<<

If they don't supply the rest of the bird with the capes then I'm not interested - have you seen the price of chicken in Tesco's?

Ron's latest wind up!

Just had my busiest ever month with Cookshill Fly Tying since I started 12 years ago - and I specialise purely in natural materials with about 65% of my sales being UK mainland. So hopefully there are still plenty of tyers out there.

Steve Cooper

Steve, I am glad to hear it.

This thread is not started as a wind-up, I started it hopefully to get a response, one way or the other, on what the state of our great obsession is in.

Sawyer could not have tied a blob - he couldn't have got hold of the pattern or the materials. Even a rank beginner like me can obtain the materials and pattern for a PTN - therefore, fly dressing is a growing art.

I think the number of active swaps, and the amount of "new to tying advice please" type threads on this forum suggest it is alive and well.

__________________
Around the steel no tortur'd worm shall twine,
No blood of living insect stain my line;
Let me, less cruel, cast feather'd hook,
With pliant rod athwart the pebbled brook,
Silent along the mazy margin stray,
And with fur-wrought fly delude the prey

Ron
I thought your great obsession was starting idiotic threads.

Paul

Thanks Steve C but the duck carcass was missing from my last CDC order, not surprised as the envelope was no where near big enough for your average Canard and full of poxy feathers which I put straight in the bin with your uselessly small packaging; I'm most annoyed as I was looking forward to a nice Confit

Isn't that what CDC stands for

I'll be ringing you in the morning for my money back

First off may i say i do not dress my own flies, but its something i wish to persue in the near future.

It seems to me that far fewer people are starting the sport of fly fishing rather than turning their hand to fly dressing.

I myself have only converted from coarse angling 2 years ago and have encounted some lovely people on the bank. Ive also met a lot of people who look at me a talk to me as if im some sort of invader and should not be their trout water with a fly rod in my hand.

In my humble opinion maybe we should be looking at why the art of fly dressing is declining....maybe its that many people still think that fly fishing is still for the rich gentlemen. In some respects the sport still has the "class" stigma attached to it, and untill we as fly fishermen strive to improve the image of fly fishing we will continue to see a decline in fly dressing and all aspects of fly fishing. If we dont encourage the youngsters and the converties then this sport will suffer in the future.