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Ronan's report


Tuesday June 26th, 2007

Tying-kits the man said - Paul decided on this one - something about border hopping mice? Tying-kits had me thinking of boxed fly-tying kits, sort of thing Aunty Jean gives her nephew for his birthday - they can be ok but chances are we're happily beyond that. So, I decided to pick out three bits of my tying kit I'd rather not do without.

  • Matarelli Bobbin holder
  • Nylon thread
  • Genetic neck cape
Matarelli Bobbin holder

Matarelli Bobbin holder
When I bought my first, the story was that Frank Matarelli made his tools by hand in his shed. (Brits have sheds; Americans have basements - so I guess it was his basement?) An incredibly simple tool: stainless steel tube, steel legs, brass lugs. The economy of design is part of the attraction, Matarelli decided to make the legs by bending a single piece of steel wire, fitting a brass collar and soldering the tube in place. Older designs used a big chunk of brass, two wire legs fit into angled holes and a metal tube runs through the centre.

The purpose of wire legs on bobbin holder is the ability to adjust tension, that means bending them open and closed again and again. The legs on those conventional holders work ok, but over time they work loose - Matarelli's don't. High-grade stainless steel tubing posed a couple of problems. SS tube is hard, very hard, so it's tough stuff to cut and tends to have jagged edges. Matarelli managed to cut these fine tubes exactly and polished the ends smooth (and included instructions on how to re-polish the tip should it be damaged, using a piece of leather and some jewellers rouge, in twelve years I've never needed to do that.) Drop a ceramic bobbin and it shatters, drop a conventional steel tubed bobbin and it bends or dents - drop a Matarelli pick it up and resume tying. This tool can be no simpler; can be no more durable or more functional.

Nylon thread

Nylon thread
Nylon is just my preference; I like the slight elasticity and colours offered by nylon threads. For general tying I guess this really means modern multifilament thread. Older threads were twisted, the filaments were short, bundling and twisting spun them into useable thread. Those threads were unforgiving, unpredictable and bulky. Modern threads are tough, reliable and cooperative. If you tie right-handed - twist anticlockwise and the thread twists into a round cord, spin clockwise and your thread untwists into a bundle of fibres. Tie with a corded thread when you want it to bite, use an untwisted flattened bundle when you want to control bulk or cover and smooth. Slip a needle through an untwisted thread and you have a split-thread dubbing loop.

Genetic Neck Capes

Genetic Neck Capes
Again my preference. Indian and Chinese capes were the standards when I started tying. Metz capes, the only brand we knew anything about, were exotic and expensive. The talk then was of more rigorous colour selection, dun and grizzle that caused a dry-fly fishers trousers to throb. Now, we have well bred chickens producing all sorts of colours. So I'll pick a grade 4 Hoffman (Whiting) in the UK we'd call this red game, medium brown is so prosaic. I bought this years ago for commercial tying, for its range of sizes and stiffness. Trout sized dries, wets and palmers from the head end, tailing barbs from the edges, salmon, pike or salt sizes from the rear. In time, every feather on this skin will go to work. Why neck not saddle? Taper! Top grade saddle hackles have little or no taper. Palmer a wet fly, wind a salmon body or throat with a parallel hackle and your fly looks like a flue-brush.

Magnus


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