Tag Archives: best soft hackles for trout

CFFA Expo 2023: A Little Tyin’, A Little Buyin’, A Little Talkin’.

The best little fly fishing show in New England made its triumphant return last Saturday, and I was proud to be a part of it. Long held at Maneely’s in South Windsor, the CFFA shifted the Expo this year to Nomads. What the new venue lacks in coziness is made up for in space and a large casting area. It was gratifying to see so many familiar faces — even if I am terrible at remembering everyone’s name (a never-ending source of embarrassment for me). Thanks to everyone for your patience!

As usual with the CFFA Show, I had a space on Tyer’s Row. You generally don’t get the chance to do much tying — it’s mostly meeting and greeting and talking — but when I did get to work, I was focusing on soft hackles. (I’m tying a Hendrickson spider here, and you can see a cork of Squirrel & Gingers in front of the vise.) If you stopped by, thanks for taking the time. If you watched me tie, I hope it was useful. Many thanks to Phil Sheffield for taking this shot.
I took this shot around 11am with the show in full swing. What a great turnout! This angler does not live by tying alone, so I took a break and walked the floor. My purpose was twofold: meet and greet, and to do some shopping. I scored a couple patches of deer hair and some slotted tungsten beads from Nick Masi, and then two Whiting/Hebert Miner wet fly hen capes for just 10 bucks each. These capes were only bronze grade, but still, that’s a darn good deal.
I finished up with my 12:45 presentation, Fly Fishing CT’s Small Streams. How gratifying to not only fill every seat, but also have an SRO audience. This ends my show schedule for the season, but I’m still doing talks at clubs around the northeast. You can see me at TU225 in Rhode Island later this month.

Currentseams.com Makes “40 Best Fly Tying Blogs and Websites” List!

I’m pleased to say that Currentseams was just named to FeedSpot’s 40 Best Fly Tying Blogs and Websites list. We came in at a cool #11! The company is good, with sites like AvidMax, Fly Tyer, Tactical Fly Fisher, and Orvis in the mix. If you have some free time over the holiday break, I highly recommend you peruse the list. It includes both vendors and information-based sites. Woo-hoo!

Sweetwater, saltwater…we do it all on Currentseams, #11 on the 2022 FeedSpot 40 Best Fly Tying Blogs and Websites list!

Hot off the press: “Tying and Fishing Wet Flies — A Modern Take on the Ancient and Traditional Methods.” See it this Saturday at the IFTS!

In case you’ve been wondering where currentseams has been, I’ve been working on the presentation railroad, and getting ready for this weekend’s International Fly Tying Symposium in Somerset, NJ. Just finished: Tying and Fishing Wet Flies: A Modern Take On The Ancient And Traditional Methods. This is a brand new look at tying and fishing wet flies, with an emphasis on the tying aspect. You can be one of the first to see it at the International Fly Tying Symposium, this Saturday, Nov 12 at 10:30am. Still need more wet flies stuff? Join me for my tying class at 1pm, Tying Soft Hackles, Winged and Wingless Wets. Sunday, Nov 13 at 11am is another brand new presentation called Beyond Cast & Strip: Presentation Flies For Striped Bass. Both seminars are included in the price of admission to the Symposium (the class is extra). Holy smokes, I still gotta pack. See you there!

A belated thank you to MVFF & SEMASS TU; Marlborough Show coming up!

Many thanks to the Miami Valley Fly Fishers and Southeastern Massachusetts TU for hosting me this week. Thanks to the wonders of technology, I was able to be in Ohio Monday night from the comfort of my home office. I had the pleasure of presenting “The Little Things” to an enthusiastic, receptive audience. It was great to meet everyone — I hope we get the chance to do it again! Tuesday I was a road warrior, traveling to speak to SEMASS TU. This is another passionate group of anglers, and I enjoyed getting reacquainted with old familiar faces. I did “The Little Things 2.0,” followed by a most excellent Q&A session, including a long discussion about floating vs. intermediate lines in the salt.

Don’t forget about the Marlborough Fly Fishing Show next weekend. On Friday 4/22 at 2:30pm, I’ll be the Featured Fly Tier. Come watch me tie up Spiders, Winged & Wingless Wets. (I had a blast doing this in Edison!) Don’t go away, because at 4:30pm I’m presenting my new seminar, Modern Wet Fly Strategies. I think this is my best program to date, and I’m counting on you to be there. Both are included with the price of your admission ticket. On Saturday 4/23 I have a class, Tying and Fishing Wet Flies. This is a chance to get some basic tying instruction, along with tips on rigging and presentation, geared toward making you a dangerous wet fly machine. It’s a paid class; you have to pre-register to attend. I’m hoping to see plenty of currentseams readers at the show — please come say hello!

I love wet flies. Come learn why.

900 Followers Contest Swag

Congratulations to Glenn, Zak, and Steve. As I write this, their flies are en route, and should be in their hot little hands by Monday. In case you’ve never won, I thought this would be a good time to tell you a little bit about the process of how you get your swag.

Wets, soft hackles, striper flies, and striper/steelhead flies adapted for sea-run cutthroat trout. Good stuff, all of it. Clockwise from far left: shrimpy fare, Ray’s Fly Featherwings, two sets of Soft-Hackled Flatwings, doubles of the Ruthless and the Eelie, and center, some of my favorite, most productive soft-hackles.

Once I notify the winners, I ask them what they’re most interested in receiving. Not all requests are doable, but I try my best. A good case in point would be Zak’s flies. He wanted flies for sea-run cutthroat trout. After rummaging through my hook stash, I reckoned I could make it work. So even though I’ve never tied up flies for sea-run cutthroat trout, I was happy with where I ended up. I hope Zak is, too.

Which brings us to volume. All winners do not necessarily receive the same number of flies. This is a function of time, labor, and materials cost. So, if you’re like Glenn, and asked for soft-hackles and wets for trout, you’re probably going to get a dozen flies. Steve wanted some early season striper patterns; those are more involved and the materials harder to source, so I sent him a half dozen. If someone wanted a complex pattern like the Countermeasure, it might be as little as three. As one of my kids’ teachers used to say, “You get what you get and you don’t get upset.”

Enjoy your weekend, and catch ’em up!

A Busy April: Speaking Engagements and the Marlborough Fly Fishing Show!

It’s a busy month for me, between fishing and writing and speaking about fly fishing. Here are the details:

Monday, April 11: “The Little Things” with the Miami Valley Fly Fishers. This is a members-only Zoom. I mention it in case you’re the person in charge of finding a a speaker for your fly fishing club. Thanks to the wonders of technology, we can meet up even if we are geographically undesirable. Here’s a link to my current presentation menu. I’m really looking forward to making some new fishing friends in Ohio.

Tuesday, April 12: “The Little Things 2.0” with SEMASS TU, at the Mitchell Memorial Club in Middleboro, MA. This meeting is open to the public, so if you’re in the area, stop in and enjoy the show.

Thursday, April 21, “Tactical Advantage: Angler vs Trout” with FVTU, at the Back Nine Tavern in New Britain, CT. Another meeting that is open to the public, and a presentation that most people have not seen.

Friday-Sunday, April 22-23-24, The Fly Fishing Show, Marlborough, MA. On Friday 4/22 at 2:30pm, I’ll be the Featured Fly Tier. Come watch me tie up Spiders, Winged & Wingless Wets. (I had a blast doing this in Edison!) Don’t go away, because at 4:30pm I’m presenting my new seminar, Modern Wet Fly Strategies. I think this is my best program to date, and I’m counting on you to be there. Both are included with the price of your admission ticket. On Saturday 4/23 I have a class, Tying and Fishing Wet Flies. This is a chance to get some basic tying instruction, along with tips on rigging and presentation, geared toward making you a dangerous wet fly machine. This is paid class; you have to pre-register to attend. I’m hoping to see plenty of currentseams readers at the show — please come say hello!

You can see me tie the Magic Fly, aka the Pale Watery Wingless, hear about how to fish it, and learn why it makes such a deadly sulphur imitation at the Fly Fishing Show in Marlborough. Plus — need I say it? — tons more information on soft hackles, wet flies, and wet fly fishing.

Edison 2022 Redux: a great show, weather and Covid be damned

With the Edison Fly Fishing Show in the books, I thought it deserved a detailed re-cap. The bad news was that not only did the show have to contend with the still-looming specter of Covid, it lock had a double whammy of an incoming snowstorm Friday night into all day Saturday. The good news is that The Fly Fishing Show continues to be a tremendous experience regardless of what’s going on in the outside world. Where else can you meet and speak to and learn from some of the best tyers and anglers on the planet?

Being a risk-averse kind of guy, I wore my N95 mask both days, even when I was presenting. (I’d say the majority of people attending were masked.) The exhibitor turnout was smaller than usual. (Since I’m not a gear junkie, this didn’t really affect my experience. Give me the Keough booth and Badger Creek, both present this year, and I’m happy.) After a year’s hiatus, it was great to see old friends, and have the opportunity to make new ones. The Friday crowd was lighter than usual due to the impending storm. Saturday’s crowd was small, but surprisingly larger than I’d expected, what with much of the northeast locked down in a blizzard. Sunday was predictably busy, by far the best crowd of the weekend. Looking back, I wish I’d taken more photos. But here are a few to tide you over.

Not a bad lineup! This was Saturday’s schedule in just one of the seminar rooms. Seriously, this has to be the best bargain in all of fly fishing. For the price of admission you get to see and talk to George Daniel, Pat Dorsey, Andy Mill, Ed Engle, Tim Flagler, Joe Cordeiro, and a whole bunch of other great anglers I didn’t mention. I debuted my seminar Modern Wet Fly Strategies on Friday, drew a decent crowd, and we followed it up with some engaging Q&A. Shades of the Sunday ice storm in Marlborough three years ago: I feared that no one would show up for my Finding Small Stream Nirvana gig on Saturday (I had the first slot of the day). Not to worry! Thanks so much to everyone who attended.
The flatwing dudes, Joe and Greg Cordeiro, had a great stash of saddles and longer peacock herl. Since it was a slow day, they helped me rummage through the Keough bins in my never-ending search for a decent red grizzly saddle, which, I’m delighted to say, Joe found for me.
I wish I had a photo of my first ever tying demo at The Fly Fishing Show. Being a Featured Fly Tier was a great experience. You’re mic’d up, you’re on a large screen TV, and the audience sits in front of you. You basically have an hour, and I managed to cover a spider/soft hackle, wingless wet, and winged wet. Since this all happened on Saturday at the height of the storm, I was again concerned that no one would show. Once again, not to worry! I had one of the better crowds, and I believe we all had a good time. Another pleasant surprise was my Saturday class. Since it was a smaller group (thanks again everyone for showing up!) we were able to tailor it to meet everyone’s needs, which was very gratifying. I can’t remember a faster 150 minutes.
The guide booths also represent a tremendous opportunity to learn about a specific fishery. I’m already what you’d call Block Island-savvy, but if you’re not, my buddies Captain Hank (foreground) and Captain Willi from Block Island Fishworks are a fantastic resource for all things Block. We spent a good chunk of time on Friday talking about last year’s fishing, and salivating at the prospects for this year. They do spin fishing, too. A family charter is a most excellent way to spend a day.

And that about wraps it up. Don’t forget that the Marlborough show was postponed to April 22-23-24. I know it’s right when we’d all like to be out fishing, but I encourage everyone to support the show, and take advantage of its opportunities.

Thank you, APTU, for a wonderful wet fly Zoom!

Last night I presented Wet Flies 2.0 to the Ashokan-Pepacton Watershed Chapter of Trout Unlimited. I’m sure we would have all liked to have done it in person, but Zoom being the next best thing, we had at it, and a pleasant time was had by all. (Really good questions, group!) Thanks so much for being so welcoming, and let’s do it again, hopefully in person. Tonight, it’s The Little Things with Philadelphia’s Main Line Fly-Tyers, also via Zoom.

Tip of the week: When you’re matching the hatch with wet flies, pay attention to size and color. These are a bunch of Hendrickson soft hackles (with several variants in the mix). The trout liked all of them, and why not? They generally match the naturals in size and color.

“Spiders, Winged & Wingless Wets” tying demo added to Edison Fly Fishing Show

I was recently added as a “Featured Fly Tier” at the Fly Fishing Show in Edison, NJ, Saturday, January 29 at 12:30pm. The focus will be wet flies, specifically Spiders, Winged & Wingless Wets. It’s going to be a busy Saturday with a seminar (Finding Small Stream Nirvana), this demo, and a wet fly tying class, but busy is good! Please take the time to come say hello.

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A classic North Country spider, the Grey Partridge (Grey Watchet). I’ve always admired the look of this fly. Trout like it, too. Wet flies are generally very simple ties, but there are nuances to the art form. Come to my tying demo in Edison and see for yourself.

New seminar “Modern Wet Fly Strategies” debuts next Friday in Edison

I just finished rehearsing my new seminar, Modern Wet Fly Strategies. Folks, I’m really excited about this one! It’s almost entirely new material, with lots of new video. It’s a bit more fast-paced than previous presentations, and it represents my deepest dive yet into the ancient and traditional art of wet fly fishing.

“Modern Wet Fly Strategies” makes its debut next week at the Edison Fly Fishing Show, Friday, January 28, 4:30pm in the Catch Room. You’re coming, right?

Want more details? Here you go: Modern Wet Fly Strategies builds on the basics of Wet Flies 101 and expands on the tactics of Wet Flies 2.0. With new video and content, this is a more detailed program about wet flies and wet fly fishing. Topics include matching hatches, situational use of wet fly types, presentation options, gear, and the tactical use of wet flies under varying conditions and situations. A must for anyone who wants to improve his or her subsurface game!

Here’s a little sneak peak, part of a promo video I made for the Fly Fishing Show. Don’t forget, I’m also teaching a class on Saturday, January 29, at 2:00pm: Tying and Fishing Wet Flies with Steve Culton: Learn to tie and fish classic North Country spiders and other wet flies that trout can’t resist. The course also covers basics like leader construction, fly selection, where to fish wet flies, and how to fish them. Intermediate.  Click HERE for details and to register.