Hi

Should you always apply something like gink to a dry fly? I notice if I apply gink to flies that have a delicate hackle the hairs tend to stick together and then don't look like they did 'out of the box'.

Also how do I fish an emerger fly? Do I apply gink? I assume it is suposed to sit part above and part below the surface film.

Yesterday I fished Weslow, the fish were feeding on the surface but the flies coming out were tiny, it almost looked like it was raining as I guess the flies were hatching and breaking from of the surface. I tried my dries but they were all probably too big and had to resort to lures, bloodworms and blobs. Some people were using gnat type flies that were very very small. I was thinking that an emerger would be effective as the fish appeared to be taking from just below the surface.

I generally put a small ammount of gink on the knuckle of my index finger and then rub the fly on the "pool" of gink. This gives greater control of where it goes, just on the top of the hackle etc. As its melted due to body heat its a lot thinner than straight from the tube and there fore you don't get the normal resulting "oil slick" when the fly lands on the water.
I think I got this tip from an article by Bob Church

John H

Don't use gink with CDC.......these feathers have their own built in oils..............birdsnest

__________________
Fear not if I steal from your side, as of yore, from paradise streams to fish Teifi once more.
BN based in Wolverhampton

use gink sparingly on cdc plumes, after dying or drying them a lot of the natural oils are no longer present (most of the floatation properties comes from the barbs on the feathers, not the oils), a mere film of gink on your skin works well on cdc.