Over the last couple of seasons I have been tying and using these flies with some good results. I have never met anyone else that ties or uses them. These flies are a little dificult to tie but they float nicely and have worked well for me. Do any of you out there tie this type fly and if so do you have any tips on tying them.
nope i dont tie them but i would like to. could you post your recipe for this pattern?
These flies can be tied with the same materials as normal dry files. As an example for a blue winged olive they would be.
Hook; Mustad 94838 Size 12-16
Thread; brown
Wings; Grey Elk Hair tied upright and divided
Tail; Light grey hackle fibers
Body; brown olive dubbing
Hackle; Light grey tied waterwalker style
Water walker style means the hackle is tied around the base of the wings much as you would on the post of a parachute fly. When the wings are tied in they should be set with about a 70 degree angle between them. This allows the hackle to more accurately represent the legs of a real fly.
By “70 degree angle between them”, I assume you mean angling down below the body of the fly? How do you achieve this?
Joe
Sorry for the crude drawing, but the Waterwalker dry flies are tied with divided wings and the hackles are wrapped around each wing. A good reference would be the books by Terry Hellekson.
The total angle between the wings would equal about 70 degrees.
Might this same effect be achieved by a thicker, “normal” hackling and cutting a notch in the bottom of the hackle?
Joe
Also, my apologies. I did not notice you said 70 degrees between the wings.
cutting the notch would only lower the pattern closer to the water.
from terry hellecksons book “trout flies, vol 2, page 385” :
“The Waterwalker style gives the fly the ability to stand on the water, not lay on it and places the imitation in a more natural field of vision”.
terrys words, not mine 
Normand,
Since you say those are Terry’s words, not yours, do you agree with him? Please understand that I’m not arguing, just thinking here (dangerous, for me). A normal hackled fly sits higher out of the water than a parachute hackled fly. By extending the parachute hackles below the body it would ride a little higher. By cutting the notch out of the normal hackled fly (Hairwing Dun, for example) it would ride lower. See what I’m getting at? I like the parachute fly, but sometimes I would like it to ride a little higher than normal, but for me anyway it would be much easier and faster to cut the notch than it would to add a parachute hackle to each wing. Yours and everybody’s thoughts would be appreciated.
Joe
Final thoughts
Another advantage I have found with these flies is that they always float upright. flies with regular hackle sometimes tend to roll over on there side. I don’t know how cutting a notch in the bottom of the hackle on a regular fly wood work. You might want to try it and let us know how it works.