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The Internet is a powerful resource. It provides us instant
access to information, and brings us together via email,
bulletin boards, chat rooms, and instant messaging. FAOL
is a wonderful example of the Internet at its best. The Internet,
however, will never replace the printed page.
I've loved books and fishing since my youngest years, although
I did not start fly fishing until 1993. This column will give
me an opportunity to share reviews of some of my favorite fly
fishing and tying books (and some that are not such favorites)
with my friends here at FAOL. My library reflects my tastes
and interests, and so will this column. It will be heavily
slanted towards cold water fishing and tying for trout and
steelhead, and won't touch much on areas of which I know little,
such as warm or salt water fishing.
I hope that these reviews will motivate some of you to pick up
a good book, on this or any subject, and read.
~ Stu Farnham
Three Short Reviews
The Fly Fisher's Illustrated Dictionary
The Fly Fisher's Illustrated Dictionary
by Darrel Martin
Hardcover: 292 pages
1 edition (September 1, 2000)
Publisher: The Lyons Press
ISBN: 1585740535
Darrel Marin is the master of fly fishing and fly tying minutiae,
both in size (he wrote the book Micropatterns, which
I covered in an earlier column) and in detail. Here he has tapped
his broad and deep knowledge of the details of fly tying to produce
an entertaining and informative book.
The book is organized alphabetically covering topics from 'Advanced
Wing' through 'Z-Twist.' Want to know about the Greenwell of
Greenwell's Glory? You'll find the information here. Looking for
a short history of the type of fly called a spider? That's here too.
You can use this book as a reference, or for entertainment.
Leave it by your reading chair, pick it up now and then, open
to a random page, and read. You'll be both informed and entertained.
Fly-Tying Tips & Reference Guide
by Dick Stewart
Paperback: 143 pages
3rd edition (February 1999)
Publisher: Countryman Press
ISBN: 0936644222
Here's the print counterpart to the weekly 'Tying Tips' here on
FAOL. Dick Stewart, best known as the co-author with Farrow Allen
of the "Flies for..." series of pattern books, has assembled a
book full of useful tips to help you tie better, save money, and
solve a whole range of tying problems.
Stewart's tidbits are seldom more than a paragraph or two long.
He organizes them into chapters on topics including storage and
organization, tools, materials, dubbing, weighting flies, and
a number of others. The book is a gold mine of ideas not found
in any book on patterns or tying techniques. These are the sort
of tricks one accumulates over a lifetime of tying and fishing
flies.
Hooks for the Fly
by Bill Schmidt
Paperback: 119 pages
(September 2000)
Publisher: Stackpole Books
ISBN: 081172803X
Want to find a 4XL 1XH nymph hook? Does the recipe in front
of you specify a Kamasan hook, when all your local fly shop
carries is Dai Riki? This is the book for you. Bill Schmidt
has put together the definitive book on modern fly hooks.
Schmidt starts with a chapter describing the basics about
hooks: bends, eyes, shanks, and spears. He also bemoans a
problem which he must have felt more acutely than the rest
of us when putting this book together: the lack of
standardization across manufacturers.
The bulk of the book comprises a set of tables, one for each
of the major (and some of the minor) manufacturers of hooks
for flies active at the time the book was written in 2000,
from Daiichi through VMC. For each manufacturer, there is a
table cross-referencing that manufacturer's hooks with the
corresponding hooks, if any, made by the others. There is
also a table describing the important characteristics of
each hook model: model number, intended use, wire stoutness,
shank length, eye type, bend, finish, barb type, point type,
common name, available sizes, and any special remarks worthy
of note. Pictures of each hook are also provided.
~ Stu Farnham
About Stu
Stu Farnham is a New Englander by birth, who was transplanted to
and put down roots in Oregon in the early 1990s. A software
engineering manager by vocation, he can be found in his spare
time chasing trout and steelhead in the rivers of the Pacific
Northwest, chasing his four Gordon Setters (who in turn are
chasing chukar), tying flies, reading, or working on his website.
Colleen, his long suffering wife of 28 years, is a professionally
trained personal chef.
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