I was wondering if anyone in here has tested La Fontaine’s theory of attraction, and if so, what kind of success have you had. I have been busy trying to tie some Double Wings, with varying degrees of success. His instructions say to use chopped sparkle yarn and touch dub it. I tried cutting up some yarn and it wouldn’t stick to anything. I wound up just loosely wrapping some of the yarn around the hook, but it doesn’t have the look I want. Here is a link to a photo of my latest attempt. http://i109.photobucket.com/albums/n48/ … ies002.jpg
I agree with your assessment of Gary La Fontaine’s books. I also have his book Trout Flies: Proven Patterns. It’s an awesome book of his favorite original patterns along with a day from his journal recounting his experiences with each fly. It’s a great read, and very entertaining.
I will definitely try to find some blended antron dubbing, that sounds like a good solution. I don’t know why I didn’t think to use a longer hook, that is a lot of material to fit on a standard dry fly hook.
Thanks for the comments on my Double Wing, I’ll keep working on them.
I tie and use the double wing in the colors and conditions lafontaine recommends and have found it to be rather effective.
for touch dubbing you need to wax the thread and just dab a ball of dubbing to it. I do n ot use wax but have used a glue stick in the past. just one light pass w/ the stick. I don’t really like to do that either so I usually just dub very very lightly and then ruff it up w/ a makeup brush. works for me.
Here it is, new and improved. I used a Mustad 9671 #8 It was much easier to tie with that hook, now I need to get some smaller ones. I also chopped up some antron yarn and blended it some fine dry fly dubbing, it worked great http://i109.photobucket.com/albums/n48/ … ies004.jpg
Gary’s theory can be tested with patterns other than the Double-Wing. I have been testing it with some simple foam patterns. I think there may be a little something to the theory, but then, I fish waters where the trout are not that difficult, so it is hard to quantify results. I have found that different species of trout seem to be more aggressive to certain colors, but again hard to quantify.
If you have finely chopped sparkle yarn, touch dubbing is pretty easy. Just wax the thread with some tacky wax (I use BT’s Tacky and Super Tacky waxes) and brush a clump of the dubbing along the thread on all sides. The chopped sparkle yarn adheres to the wax just fine. Gary, according to Al Beatty, did not twist the dubbing onto the thread, but preferred the spikey, buggy look of the straight touch dubbing.
If your having trouble finding the sparkle yarn in the colors Gary suggested or the dubbing, it’s available in all the colors from The Book Mailer.
By the way, those double wings look great and they should work very well.
No affiliation to the Book Mailer, just a satisfied customer.
Gary showed me how touch dub years ago. The flies you have tied are very nicely done, but the antron you are using is way too coarse. Gary used a very fine and soft sparkle yarn. At the time it was a common as dirt at the fabric stores. Today that is not the case. Here is a link to Gary’s old bookstore, they still sell the original sparkle yarn. http://www.thebookmailer.com/Supplies/FlyTying.html
Touch dubbing is easy to make, just comb out some sparkle yarn and chop it into 1/8 inch long pieces. Run it through a coffee mill and it is good to go. You also need a very tacky wax, BT’s is the best I’ve found. Run it on the thread and lightly dab the touch dubbing to it. Then just wrap it on the hook. The effect is very subtle and creates tranluscent glow around the hook shank when held up to the light.
