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Brown Owl

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Published on Aug 17. 2020 - 4 years ago
Updated or edited 4 years ago

Wet flies

Soft hackles and spiders

Learn to dress this classic soft-hackled north country spider from Pritt’s famous book North Country Flies.
For the sake of authenticity, I have dressed this traditional pattern with a Tawny Owl overcovert feather taken from a Victorian fly tying collection. The only real suitable substitute hackle I have found to date with the required colouration and mottling is a hackle taken from a Hen Reeves Pheasant rump, though sadly even these feathers do not have the same softness which is a character of the owl hackle.

Hook: Size 14 (Partridge SUD2)
Silk: Orange (Vintage Miller’s Tying silk from the 1890’s)
Hackle: Reddish feather from the outside of a Brown Owl’s wing
Head: Peacock herl

Video by

Robert Smith

Whalsay Hamill's Spider

This is a variant of a Shetland fly that was inspired by the Hamill's Killer streamer from New Zealand.

Nov 27. 2024

Silver Goat's Toe

A popular fly in the North and West of Scotland, the Goat's Toe, is fairly easy to tie, and its variants, like this one aren't much different on that front.

Oct 22. 2024

Partridge and Soft Hackle

Great wet fly...has segmentation and a variegated hackle and a bit of shiny thorax.
All of which attract fish. Hope you tie this simple fly and have fun fishing.

The North Country Fly

Mar 25. 2015

When it comes to books, there's nothing I like more than focus. A book that has a well defined subject and covers in depth rather than broad has my vote already before I have opened it.
When I then open it and find well structured, thoroughly researched and beautifully presented content from cover to cover, I'm sold!
Such a book is Robert L. Smith's "The North Country Fly".

May 7. 2013

Buying Soft Hackle

The soft hackle is supposed to be - as the name implies - soft. Soft hackle can come from many birds. Chickens, gamebirds like partridge, grouse and quail, pheasant and even crows and jackdaws.

Plu Stiniog

Jul 1. 2011

The story of this books is a fascinating one. The author Emrys Evans passed away in 2008 at the age of 91. In his life he had collected Welsh fly patterns. He was also a historian of Welsh fishing, and kept notes about the flies. After his death these notes were turned into a book manuscript by Geraint Vaughan Jones and the flies were photographed by his son-in-law Gareth Tudor Jones.

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