If I could make a comment… We were a hackle poor bunch of fly tiers in the early seventies and soon welcomed the advent of the no-hackle concept. Tying a traditional fly was getting harder to accomplish with the supply of feathers we had available, especially in the smaller sizes. Swisher and Richards gave us all another approach and posited them in their book Selective Trout with all kinds of configurations with the idea that the body and the wing silhouette were all important. I agree with that.
The problem with most no hackle flies was that they didn’t cock correctly without some architectural help. The all important wing would present itself like a capsized ship. S&R gave us the split tail, the clump wing, and the parachute wound hackle to cock the fly upright on the water.
Along came all this wonderful hackle we have nowadays and tiers started piling it all on the post, I guess to beef up the fly for better flotation?(I don’t know about that). The split tails took too long for the commercial tier and they went back to the paint brush style tail for a quicker easier tie.
I carry the poly-wing paradun in a prime spot in my fly box. It is tied with split tails, and just a few wraps of hackle to cock it on the water. The fly fishes well. I use albolene to float the fly and will fish it anywhere I’d fish a rough water fly (like EHC or a Wulff).
Just a different look at it for you to consider.
Totally different method. !. Tie in post, reinforce at base with super glue. 2. Wind to rear and tie in tails. 3. Dub body, wind forward, leave tying thread dangling from rear of post. 4. Remove hook from vise, and reset 90 deg from original position, eye facing down. 5. Tie hackle to base of post (dull side facing body), advance thread up the post, allowing room for 3 or 4 turns of hackle. 6. Wind hackle up to tie off point, and secure with two turns of thread, and apply a SMALL amount of super glue at the tie off point. 7. Wait about 30 seconds and cut off working thread. Don’t handle the hackle for a few minutes.
Hackle should be one to two sizes larger than conventional hackle.
Parachutes tied this way are very neat and durable, as well as easy to tie.
The problem I have with the S&R no hackle is that you need to get the wings absolutely symetrical or else the differential drag causes the fly to spin. The torque in the twisted leader then causes the fly to lie to one side. I’ve given up on them except for very very selective trout. I keep a few in my box for them. You hardly ever see them in a fly shop, they are so hard to tie properly.
I think I’d have better luck tying full-dress salmon flies than a No-Hackle; I just don’t have that fly in me. I’ve tried something similar, Rick Osthoff’s Duck-Shoulder Dun; the shoulder feathers are sturdier than quill segment wings and a lot easier to align properly.
http://richosthoff.com/2378.html
Regards,
Scott
For parachute style dry fly patterns, I was taught that the post is wrapped from the top down, there should be no gap between the bottom wrap of the post, and the hook shank. It is helpful to do a couple of wraps of thread around the hook shank to secure the post wraps from riding up on the post.
Then you wrap the hook shank to the rear with thread and attach the tail.
Before adding the body material, you should wrap the hook shank, with thread wraps to help shape the body, before applying the body dubbing or other material to give the fly pattern a better shape.
The parachute collar hackle is tied in, high on the post (covering the previous thread wraps) and the hackle is wrapped around the post downward to the hook shank and then secured… The size of the hackle fibers should be one or two sizes larger than the hook size for a normal hackle wrap around the hook shank. It also helps at the completion of the hook dressing to clip out the section of the parachute hackle that extends over the eye of the hook (this allows easier attachment of the fly pattern onto the tippet line. ~Parnelli
There were a number of things that I was taught as a beginning tyer that I have changed to suit my own style. One of them was usung the bottom to top wind / super glue parachute method. Maybe not everyone’s cup of tea, but my parachutes are neater and more durable than ever, as well as easier to tie. I do agree that the bottom wrap of hackle should be right against the body. I just thought I’d throw it out there in case anyone would like to try a different method.
One thing I disagree with in your method is building up the body with thread before applying dubbing on a dry fly. Thread is heavier and will also absorb more water than most dubbing. In our tying classes we teach that the tapered body should be established by the dubbing, and as little thread as possible should be used in dressing any dry fly.
What if you use mono or firewire or some other material that won’t soak up water? Do you think that has the potential to effect how soggy a dry fly will get in a certain amount of time?
(Just asking out of curiosity, I’ve not yet tried to tie a fly with mono but I’m entertaining the thought.) 
Karli-Rae
is that based on actual weighing of materials? will the wax coated threads absorb or repel water? i would think todays 12/0, 14/0, 20/0 threads are pretty darn light.
just wondering
mono and firewire may repel water but i think they are too large in diameter to tie dry flies. soggy dry flies get that way from being underwater and from using the wrong tying materials.
Well, first of all, at least for mayfly imitations, you really don’t want to build up the body to any great extent. You want a slender body tapering slightly to the front, with a noticeable thickening at the thorax. This is very easily accomplished by tapering the dubbing. Why introduce another material to the process? The weight of the mono would also likely upset the balance of the fly. You want to keep a dry fly as light as possible. If you don’t want to use dubbing at all, I would suggest goose or turkey biots, or stripped quills before I wouls suggest mono.
If you use braided Firewire, then it will probably absorb water between the strands of the braid. The same would probably apply to any thread with multiple fibers. I use lots of head cement when I tye and lots of Gink before a dry gets wet. Don’t put on Gink once the fly is wet because it will seal in the moisture. Once the fly is wet, use “shake” to draw out the water.
Good luck.
Ed
I remember some years back we discussed this and someone talked about a small dot of CA glue on post and no need to tie the hackle off.Anyone else remember talking about this?
That was probably before my time but what makes me happy is thread and glue not just one. My last fishing outting though I do remember a stretch of very narrow spring creek where I made a cast, put it into the far bank bush and broke it off, then tied up everything new including nice fluro tippet and a very pretty fly only to put it in the same bush and break it off again. Those two flies I could have tied with no hackle or thread, forgot about the glue and they would have been just as effective on the fish as they were at that very moment.
In all seriousness if the flies last a couple of fish that is probably just fine if that makes you happy.