What is a name?

It is a way to identify a specific item, as different from another item.

For example, a Royal Wulff. We all know the pattern and the name indicates a very specific pattern. How about noted fly tier and author Charles Meek's Patriot. Instead of describing it as a Royal Wulff tied with red crystal flash for the peacock herl and brown hackle for the tail, it is a lot simpler to say Patriot.

So did author Charles Meek (Fishing Small Streams With a Fly Rod, Meeting and Fishing the Hatches, 101 Innovative Fly-Tying Tips, Fishing Tandem Flies, Fishing Limestone Streams, The Hatches Made Simple, Great Rivers: Great Hatches, Mid-Atlantic Trout Streams and Their Hatches, Pennsylvania Trout Streams & Hatches) steal a pattern?

http://charlesmeck.com/a20000600.html





There are a lot of very famous flies that are modifications of other flies. What is the Caucci and Natasi's Compardun but a version of Fran Better's Haystack and the Craig Mathews and John Juracek's Sparkle Dun but a version of the Comparadun? So 4 famous fly tiers built thier signature fly on Fran Better's Haystack. Who am I to decide if the Comparadun or the Saprkle Dun was enouogh of a change to deserve its own name?