Some of these full dress flies are easier to dress than
others, and I can never exactly put my finger on why. This
is a fly that on the surface, seems rather nondescript,
with a simple body, straightforward wing, typical tippet
under wing, just really nothing special. Well, for whatever
reason, this Scottish gem drove me absolutely nuts, and I'm
not alone. An excellent tier, Dave Carne, who posts his flies
on the Internet regularly recently spoke of his difficulties
with the Dunkeld. Every once in a while you get one of these.
Other flies, the Jock Scott leaps to mind, seem to be very
complicated and difficult, and they're really a piece of cake,
flies that just fall together. I'll figure it all out one of
these days, probably after I tie another couple hundred.
The Dunkeld is listed in Francis Francis as a fly for the river
Tay in Scotland. He calls it "A warm handsome fly." The fly he
refers to however is something completely different than the
Pryce-Tannatt version depicted here. Yes, the wing is similar,
but every last ingredient other than that is changed. How two
so completely dissimilar flies can be named the same thing is
beyond me. Kelson's version is very similar to the Pryce-Tannatt,
with the exception of the wing, which is a much simpler affair
made of just peacock wing and a mallard roof. Pryce-Tannatt's
version, which came much later than both Kelson's and Francis
Francis,' seems to be something of an amalgam of the two others,
with the body from Kelson and the wing from Francis Francis.
One of the problems with this fly, at least for me, is
trying to get it to look like something. The first
version I did with the requisite flat tinsel and
straightforward wing just left me cold. I had some
fancy antique embossed tinsel that Fred Bridge sent
me awhile back and decided to give it a try, I was
just so unimpressed with the look of the first fly.
I also expanded the yellow, scarlet and blue portions
of the fly to add a little life. If I had it to do over
again, I'd probably change the wing completely, as I'm
just not too wild about all the dark colors of the rest
of the wing lumped together. Alas, time ran out, so here
it is.
I hope you have better luck with this one than I did. I
tried to keep a low profile, and tie this one in a more
traditional style. I'll list all three versions below,
and let you decide the one that works the best for you.
Here they are:
The Dunkeld, Francis Francis
Tag: Silver Twist and pale blue floss.
Tail: A topping and some wood-duck, without the
black and white tips.
Butt: Black ostrich.
Body: Three turns of yellow orange floss, the
rest of brighter orange pig's wool.
Hackle: Of same colour(sic) all the way up, with
pale blue at shoulder.
Rib: Wide silver tinsel.
Underwing: Black partridge and wood-duck.
Wing: A bit of dark turkey with white tops, with
fibres(sic) of green peacock, golden pheasant, blue, red
and yellow swan.
Horns: Blue macaw.
Head: Black.
The Dunkeld, Kelson
Tag: Gold twist and orange silk.
Tail: A topping and point of jungle cock.
Butt: Black herl.
Body: Gold tinsel.
Ribs: Gold tinsel (oval).
Hackle: Orange hackle from second turn.
Throat: Jay.
Wings: Two strips of peacock wing, mallard and
a topping.
Horns: Blue and red macaw.
Cheeks: Chatterer.
The Dunkeld, Pryce-Tannatt
Tag: Gold twist and orange silk.
Tail: A topping and point of jungle cock veiled
with small Indian crow feathers.
Butt: Black herl.
Body: Gold tinsel.
Ribs: Silver tinsel (oval).
Hackle: Orange hackle from second turn.
Throat: Jay.
Underwing: Golden pheasant tippet.
Wings: Sections of scarlet, yellow and blue swan,
peacock wing, bustard, florican, golden pheasant tail and
mottled brown turkey tail, plus two strips of brown mallard
over, and a topping.
Sides: Jungle cock feathers and cheeks of small chatterer
feathers.
Horns: Blue and yellow macaw.
Credits: A Book on Angling by Francis Fransic;
Classic Salmon Flies by Mikael Frodin,
Building Classic Salmon Flies by Ron Alcott. ~ EA
About Eric:
I started fly fishing as a teen in and around my hometown
of Plattsburgh, New York, primarily on the Saranac River.
I started tying flies almost immediately and spent hours
with library books written by Ray Bergman, Art Lee, and
A. J. McClane. Almost from the beginning I liked tying
just as much as I liked fishing and spent considerable
time at the vise creating hideous monstrosities that
somehow caught fish anyway. Then one day I came upon a
group of flies that had been put out at a local drug store
that had been tied by Francis Betters of Wilmington, N.Y.
My life changed that day and so did my flies, dramatically.
Even though I never met Fran back then, I've always
considered him to be one of my biggest influences.
I had a career in music for twenty years or so and didn't
fish much, though I did fish at times. The band I was with
had its fifteen seconds of fame when we were asked to be in
John Mellencamp's movie "Falling From Grace." I am the
keyboard player on the right in the country club scene in
the middle of the movie. Don't blink. It's on HBO all the
time. We got to meet big Hollywood stars and record in John's
studio. It was a blast.
So how did I wind up contributing to the Just Old Flies
column on FAOL? I'm not sure, it was something that I simply
wanted very badly to do, and they let me. Many of the old flies
take me back to the Adirondacs and my youth, and I guess I get
to relive some of it through the column. I've spent many happy
hours fishing and tying over the years, and tying these flies
brings back memories of great days on the water, and intense
hours spent looking at the flies in the fly plates in the old
books and trying to get my flies to look like them. And now,
here I am, still doing that to this day. ~ EA
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