Quote Originally Posted by Ron Eagle Elk View Post
I have fished flies that had hackle stems trailing along the side, wings that were badly beat up, missing tails and the darn things still caught fish.

REE
The success that we have with old, beat-up, absolutely mangled flies makes you wonder why we agonize so over the tying process. Proportion, stray hackle, missing components and loose ends don't seem to make much difference.


John,

I absolutely hate scraping flies down to the bare hook. Even when I'm careful, the finish always seems to be damaged and the new flies are highly prone to rust. 8T