I like to tie and fish parachute styles. I typically tie my posts a bit sparse, leave them about a hook shank long, and trim them at an angle from font to back to represent the slope of a duns wing. I believe the post represents a wing, and can be seen as the fly enters the trouts view. I also find that leaving the post longer helps me identify my fly on the water better than a shorter white post where I often lose the fly among the various bubbles and foam in drift. Leaving the post a bit sparser keeps the post material from getting waterlogged, and tipping the fly over when it lands.
The obvious counter argument is all those high visibility posts representing the orange yellow and pink winged duns not found in nature that are fished successfully every day of the week. I do not have the same success with high visibility posts, but that could be a confidence thing on my part because I don't believe in the pink winged bug.
To add to the above point, on parachute emerger patterns such as the Klinkhammer where I am not trying to imitate a dun, but to establish another trigger, I use high visibility posts to great effect with no change in catch rates. Here I don't need to believe in a pink winged bug, as the post isn't representitive of a wing, and I think ignored by the fish, as the key trigger is the submerged abdomen.
I wonder if the fish will take a long posted parachute as a dun, and a short posted parachute as a spinner, or an emerger/cripple. With that said, I always wondered about a "sparkle parachute" much like a sparkle dun wasn't a more popular pattern. This maybe something I spend some time with in the spring.
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