Herman Christian frame

Made this frame with some known flies from Herman Christian. Hard to find patterns with his label on them in the books. Anyway, Herman was one of he pioneers within the Catskill Style flytyers. He was known as a great fisherman, a guy who caught the bigger ones. Was a close friend to Theodore Gordon, learned to tie flies by taking apart Gordon´s flies. More about Mr Christian here.

Just finished

I like to have some stuff with me to help me to get that right atmosphere when tying at events. Next weekend on Friday I will be at "Call of the wild´s" to show some Catskill patterns and talk a little about them. For this occasion I chosed to make a frame of Theodore Gordon and two of his more famous patterns, made three of them. Why Theodore Gordon? Well, In my opinion he´s the guy behind the "Catskill Style" flies and as it is that I will talk about during the show....

Mosquito

Was searching for something new to try out this morning. Scrolled through one of my favourite books "The Dettes" by Eric Leiser. By the way, my copy is actually a signed first edition that I bought from my friend Joe Fox grandson to Mary Dette, yep the shop is still running Dette trout flies, check it out..
Well, back to my search...Found this little "bugger" that I believe will make a great contribution to my box. Will make some in smaller sizes #16-18 for the fall fishing for the Grayling. This one however is tied on a #12 Allcock W170 and will make a contribution to my demo portofolio. Tied it in true Catskill Dry Fly Style.

A little something.... Made one just before this one, proborably one of my better ties.. But one of the wings slated slightly so I just wanted to fix it a little... Yep I teared it of, shit happens doesn´t it?

Been away fishing

Once more I have to excuse myself for not taking care of my blog. Well, anyway here I am...

My brother and a couple of friends took a few days of for going up north to wet our lines in Lars-Åke Olssons Idsjöströmmen, located in Gimdalen. The place in Sweden if you aim for the "lady of the stream" or the Grayling. This strem contains loads of big nice Graylings so at this place even I couldnt miss getting a fish or two.

This time was a little special for me as I recently got my self a Ulf Löfdahl Cane rod, a 7" #4. For the occation I tied up a couple of #16 Quill Gordons, classic rod - classic fly.. Don´t wan´t it another way..

Said and done... A sip of single malt, a nice cigarr then of down in the water. Splitcane, Quill Gordon and Baetis Rhodanis hatching all over, what could go wrong.. on my third cast this year..

Gottcha.. And with this my new sniper rod in this heavy stream and a Grayling 45 cm, well do I need to tell you it was funny? The fight took some time but offcourse it was worth it.

A little later during the day I got my biggest one this weekend. I took it on one of Roy Christies fantastic back to front emergers, thank´s Roy... 50 cm big.

Believe it, it is me, and it was I who got them nice fishes.

Red Quill

Here we have a really old pattern 1803, first tied by an english gentleman by the name of Thomas Rushworth. I believe this fly was the one that Mr Art Flick borrowed the name from to his Red Quill.

The Complete Flytier

“From Reuben R. Cross Lew Beach , New York” A trademark full of respect by anglers from the past and present. Theodore Gordon might very well be the one that popularized the dry fly to the American flyfishers, but from looking at pictures of flies from Cross and others my opinion is that it´s Cross who set the standards to the Catskill style dry fly of today. Cross was the first professional flytier to write a book about flytying, Tying American trout lures (1936). He wrote three more books, Cowdung of Shrin Creek, Fur Feathers and Steel (1940) and finally The Complete Flytier (1950).

Reuben Cross grew up in the Neversink area, the domains of the master himself, Theodore Gordon. Cross claims to have learned to tie flies from Gordon, who knows? The stories tells othervise, not even Herman Christian who was a close friend to Gordon got any hints or lessons from him. On the other hand it´s known that Gordon taught Roy Steenrod to tie flies. Later Cross said he learned to tie flies by taking apart Gordon´s flies, this feels more reasonable as it seems to have been a common way to learn the art those days. Cross himself wasn´t that eager to share his knowledge either, Walt Dette said that he offered Cross 50$ if he taught him to tie flies, an offer Cross quickly turned down. Other stories tells that Cross did show his techniques and secrets as long as he didn´t felt any competition, a fact I can relate to as he was a semiprofessional flytier and partly tied flies for a living. Later in Cross´s flytying career he did great efforts in sharing his knowledge, attending at angling fairs etc.

The Cross Special

Reuben´s most known fly was the “Cross Special” named by the way it´s originated, a “Cross” between a “Quill Gordon” and a “Light Cahill”. Cross was once asked about what made the “Cross Special” so special, “Not a damned thing”, he replied.

During the time my own interest of the “Catskill style dry fly” grown into the passion of today I have learned that Cross was kind of a grumpy guy. After have reading his last book “The Complete Flytier” and after writing this little piece I have slightly changed my mind about Mr Cross. The book is about flytying in general, techniques, patterns and materials. The book is easy to read and understand, kind of laid back written and here and there I also found some laughs, so how grumpy could Mr Cross be? One of the laughs were the “Tie a dry fly” part were in the book is shown, tie in the tails first. Walt Dette who learedn to tie by taking Cross´s flies apart said that that wasn´t the way he tied them, so maybe he tried to hide some secrets even in his own book. My favourite parts of the book was the chapter of “Effective Patterns” were I found the “Ken Lockwood” Gray hackle and tails, Woodduck split wing and gold wired raffia straw body.
Ken Lockwood

Another chapter that fascinated me was the “favourite patterns”. Her I found the “Monsignore” originated by a Mr Claude Norton a flytier active in Newburgh, New York.
Monsignore

Also found the “Cochy Knight” originated by Jack Knight.
Cochy Knight

Herman Christian

Herman Christian 1882-1975

An old woodsman, trout fisherman, farmer, fishing guide, hunter and one of the hallowed four flytyers who founded the Catskill fly-tying tradition.

Christian was a great trout fisherman, widely known for his skills of finding the bigger fish. Christian learned to know Theodore Gordon around 1906 as a result of that he needed some decent flies, he had heard the rumors of Gordon’s flies so off course he decided that he needed some of those. As time went by they became friends. Christian was on a regularly basis fishing with Gordon, showed him where the really big trout’s were to be found. Despite the fact of Christian guiding Gordon in the Catskills after the big ones, Gordon never showed Christian anything regarding fly-tying. Gordon even put away his materials etc whenever Christian came by. Christian learned the secrets and how to tie flies by taking apart Gordon’s flies.

The most known patterns Christian left us are the “Christian Red Body” and the “Christian Green Body”. Two similar flies with the color of the body to separate the two patterns. The tail and hackle uses stiff fibers of dark dun, a peacock quill makes a nice dark rib over the glossy floss body leaving a nice segmentation and finally a lovely divided wood duck wing.

I think these two flies are amongst the most beautiful Catskill patterns. Now I only have to try them on the trout as well, and as Christian was known for his big catches he should know what he was doing when he created these masterpieces.