The longest day...

21st June 2009, the longest day of the year. And the date of my fly tying marathon for Solar Aid



Things got underway just before 0900 with a few simple paraduns on TMC101's, kindly supplied by Phil Holding and I kept going strong until the scheduled interview with Jeremy Leggett at midday. It's always a pleasure to speak with Jeremy, one of the key players in shaping the UK's understanding of the post energy and climate crunch landscape, and last Sunday had something of a sense of occassion, not least as Jeremy is the founder and Chairman of Solar Aid. Always insightful and engaging, he also provides a pragmatic and optimistic assessment of how the next decade or so is likely to play out. There is a better future ahead if only society and government can re-engineer priorities away from consumption and waste towards a more sustainable approach. There was even time to discuss Jeremy's salmon fishing trips to Iceland. On the third consecutive year of trying, he landed a prized, fly caught salmon...

The afternoon tying session broke for an interview with Roy Christie and covered his genius fly design, the reverse parachute emerger and a thorough discussion about dubbing mixes. Every time I speak with Roy I learn something new and valuable about fly tying, and he is always generous with his time and sharing of experience.

All this conversation, and regular chats with Marc Fauvet helped maintain a good pace and concentration. As our Father's Day dinner was served among family, I tied on... and made do with lots of water and fresh fruit.

It was great to speak with Nik Wright and hear about the development of his Deer Creek Flies business, not least as Nik sponsored the event with a very generous mixed set of his flies. The auction ends midnight today, and further adds to the fundraising effort. It was also a treat to chat about another interest we share - whiskey and cigars. Man, I've got to get my ass over to Rhyl and check out Nik's drinks cabinet f'real.

As the evening session got underway, the last interview with Phil Holding included a really interesting review of his search for specialsit, hard-to-source tying materials. Mick Hall also dropped by to listen in from his base in Australia. And so Phil described the new Enrico Puglisi TPI fibres wing material that Mick was involved in developing.



So, a busy and varied first half. As midnight approached, and with a long nine hour stint ahead the house fell very quiet. A wood fire was lit in the tying room, I played some Jazz, Sonny Rollins in the background and kept going. The last transmission with Marc was around this time and it's fair to say the going got a bit tough... my legs, back and eyes were now very sore, repeated dubbing had chaffed skin from my finger tips but I kept going.


Sunrise is early on the north coast of antrim, so first light appeared arounf 0400 AM and I got a second wind. I was now tying simpler patterns, nymphs and tiny thread midges so it hepled to see the box filling up.


I even got to tie a handful of these wee #18 buggers that should be well recieved by the winning bidder.


The last fly was completed at 0918 on Monday morning and a final call from Marc in France provided a welcome fanfare to the end of the marathon.

There's so many people to thank...

Paul - for RFU's and admin support
Eric - for admin support
Roy - for kick-ass RPE's
Nik & Deer Creek flies - for sponsorship, interview time and amazing fly sets
Phil & Spiders Plus & the Fly Tying Boutique - for generous hook supplies and interview time
Mick Hall - for fly set
Hans Weilenmann - for fly set
Niklas Dahlin - for signature fly set and presentation box

Thanks also to Jeremy Leggett for an insightful and enagaging interview.

Thanks to everyone who listened in to the interviews, hope you enjoyed the content.

Finally, a further thank you to Roy, Marc (La Mouche) and Niklas for your chat and support through the long hours... it made all the difference.

On Monday, I wondered if I would ever tie another fly again, such was the sense of exhaustion. By Wednesday night, I was itching to get back to the tying bench... and relieved and I hadn't completely burnt out my enthusiasm for tying.

Roll on next year!

Andy

The DC Kripple

This is the first fly design for Nik Wright of Deer Creek (www.deercreek.co.uk), menu as follows:

Hook: TMC 200R #20
Thread: Sheer 14/0
Shuck: Niche Shuck Yarn
Tailing: Olive microfibbets, curled between thumb and forefinger
Rib: Uni-mylar pearl #16
Abdomen: Natural turkey biot (hard as nails applied before wrapping)
Wings: Blend of white and grey (with a few strands of black) Niche siliconised polypropylene yarn
Thorax: Fly-rite #10 (BWO)

This is essentially a crippled, olive emerger tied to imitate the natural in it's most vulnerable state - a mess of shuck, tails, legs and wings. I have observed stuck-in-the-shuck emergers and many patterns are just-pre or just-post emergent, rather than capturing that point when nature is a trapped in a highly vulnerable state of morphosis.

The pattern includes a small trailing shuck but also three tails, curled between thumb and forefinger to imitate the new, yet-to-dry tails. The biot body is ribbed with fine pearl mylar to further imitate the emergence of the adult and the siliconised poly yarn wings are tied back and up to reinforce the emergent phase, whilst offering superb floatation.

I should also mention the sources of inspiration. Mick Hall (www.kossiedun.com.au) is running a thread on the www.sexyloops.com forum where he presents amazing macro photography of native Australian naturals and invites tiers to imitate them. He posted an awesome image of a mid-emergent natural, literally trapped in it's own morphosis - and pretty tricky to imitate. The DC Kripple isn't a direct imitation of the natural (Roy Christie nailed that with a breathtaking copper wire hare's ear design and his legendary reversed parachute emerger, sign-up and check out the post!) more it is a fly that captures the key triggers of this phase of the life-cycle, with a pattern that's covers most small olive hatches.

So big THANKS to Mick and Roy for the inspiration... and to Nik Wright for sharing my enthusiasm for the DC Kripple.

This level of skill takes decades of tying and on-the-water experience... images reproduced with kind permission of Mick Hall (www.kossiedun.com.au) and Roy Christie.