Speaking of wire bodies...

2000 years ago on the advice of none other than Vince Marinaro, I stated messing around with horsehair for bodies which I got from violin bows.

Vince told me how to "wash the strands" which removed some of the whitish exterior on the hair and made it clear. I would then dye the horsehair different colors. I found that the color was more pronounced if I painted the hook shank white, so I did that in advance and soaked the hair before winding it on the hook.

The hair was fine enough to be able to fashion really small flies, although in those days for me it was nymphs and a small red worm which was the ticket at Falling Springs.

Later I discovered if I took Swannundaze (remember that?) or D-Rib and heated it in boiling water, I could stretch it to make REALLY thin ribbing so horsehair went out the window.

Same here, although the small red worm was more effective in Big Spring.

I fish both places with soft hackles now.

yeah I remember the 'Swannundaze Craze" and eventually throwing away several packages of Swannundaze. I don't recall the patterns it was bought for but I know that I never caught a single fish on them. I never thought to heat and stretch the stuff, I did consider square braiding it into key fobs.

BB you can get full pheasant and partridge skins for not a lot of money and each will yield 100s or more flies from each.I fish 99% warmwater and the sunfish tear the partridge to pieces.They love those little barred fibers.I tie them in clumps on the flanks of nymphs and are a little more durable but are not as effective.They really appreciate the action of a soft hackle as it kicks and pulses on slow fall.They never seem to make it to the deeper darker water where the larger fish wait as the dinks destroy in fractions of a second which took me 10 minutes to create.

The Noll Guide to Trout Flies is another for viewing old standards. Personally, I think spending time fishing is better than plowing through too many of these books. Read enough of them to know what to forget. In fishing or flytying, it is most valuable to learn the HOW and pay less attention to the what.

Presentation, not pattern, is what makes a fly look like what a fish wants it to be. Materials and tying style need to lend themselves to the desired presentation(s). That's why the "soft" hackle form is so versatile.

That's also why, as Trev mentioned, you want to be careful observing styled up, in-the-vise or display tray, beautifully tied, perfect-to-pattern flies. Great craft than can lead to great fishing.

Nevertheless, most are vastly overdressed when it comes to fishing. Chunky attractor patterns that imitate larger terristrials might be the exception. Otherwise, the less material, the more supple the motion and color blending of materials once wet, thus the more lifelike the form.

That said, when it comes to soft hackles, about all I have the dexterity to tie any more, I put a fairly compact body, but one that can be picked out if I want to modify it astream for more bulk. Similarly, I put more hackle/soft fiber than usually needed, to be modified astream as need be. Ribbing can be for appearance, durability of the body, weight distribution, and so on. with wire ribbing or full wire for mostly subsurface fishing.

Because soft hackles are such versatile patterns, you can pretty much forget patterns and just have a range of sizes and color combos. The presentation will make one of them look exactly like what the fish wants.

Did not know partridge became so pricey.I have a full skin and a bag of pieces someone gave me.You can get a full pheasant skin minus head and tail feathers for 15 bucks.I still have bags of pheasant and chukar wood duck etc from hunting and friends who hunt alot still.I bought 3 strarling full skins for 10.00,I could shoot them in my yard but why for that price.

Another bonafide soft hackle addict here. As others have stated, the books by Nemes and Hughs are excellent references, packed with great stories, history, and patterns. Sizes 12 and 14 are my go-to and I like partridge a lot. After reading Nemes's books I started using starling for smaller patterns. The brookies seem to especially like the "Little Black". You can see it in the photo, working as advertised. I've had good success fishing soft-hackles across and down, with takes both on dead-drifts and the swing.




Nemes describes well, water that is best suited for these flies. I'll fish 'em with a small bead head if the water is a running a littler faster.

Thanks for detail pics, Big Heavy. The flies shown made me think of a few other points they illustrate well. First, the sparse look of a soft hackle when wet, as in the beadhead fly. The one shown dry might appear about the same once wet, or perhaps fuller. Doesn't matter, it illustrates a good default appearance, easily trimmed down astream according to conditions. As shown, it will float better and "higher" after a few false casts, than one with, let's say, half that in hackle.
On the beadhead--whether it is an official "soft hackle" pattern or not, a tail of soft fibers is good to throw into some flies. Like excess hackle, it can always be trimmed away astream. As for the bead and ribbing, they add durability and influence sink rate. Being too lazy to do the additional step of putting a bead on, I just wrap wire ribbing to form that shape, if I want that element. There are other ways to get a fly down, so I think of beads or the forewrap of wire as a control element that helps the fly maintain a downward or flat attitude, regardless of the depth. It does seem to help the most when the fly is fished deep.

Thanks again for great pics of default styles.

Wow. Thanks for sharing. I’ve never understood soft hackle fishing before but now you guys have me sold. Thanks.

Inspired by Dave Hughes book on Wet Flies, an attempt at a March Brown Flymph

I like this forum you guys fish. Most of the time when talking soft hackles and wet flies on other forums or on the rivers and after hours the bulk of replies are,- I don't fish them, I don't catch any fish on them. ever. Thats old school stuff that is not effective and rarely works. I look in disbelief.

I also like flymphs,I even swing those even on my two handed rods, lots of trout and salmon came to hand. I tie a variety of soft hackles some weighted with lead free wrap, different colors, shapes, some with tinsel and holographic tinsel, old classics as well. My choices vary but I have to look a the river, time of year, color of the water, what is hatching, cloudy or stained water from rain high water events.

Besides all that there are the different ways to fish them, wake and skate, dead drift and grease line (one of my favorites) dead drift and swing just under the surface, swinging like streamers, get them deep by mending and get them to lift quickly. I don't practice multi fly because one is enough for me but I could add in dapping, casting up river in riffles and let them swim back down to me. up river curve casts and let them sink and drift back stripping line, the curve cast upstream and across is work but its really deadly.

SO many good times, great fishing and big fish on flymphs, soft hackles and wets. Lift swinging for me works best when a hatch just starts and an occasional fish comes up, What are they midges? caddis? mayflies? Tie on a green and black, or small black, Partridge and gold, fish it just right and work the river down and back up an hour or so later when they are rising much better.

Very versatile flies that can be fished so many ways effectively and usually I have to be creative, and find the speed, or the depth or the rise and usually all the above, and when its right you will know.

Fished the March Brown Flymph as well as a Zug Bug yesterday afternoon on a small river near me. Both produced fish, Zug brought up the biggest, a 13" rainbow with a decent humped back that put up a good fight on my Fenwick 806! I greased the flymph during what seemed like a Hendrickson hatch, though there were also some Stoneflies hatching or laying eggs (they were dropping out of the sky so likely the latter!) and they smacked it repeatedly and aggressively. They also seemed to take it below surface (missed a few strikes) and when dangling in the current downstream. I had never fished either of those patterns until yesterday! Hughes book had me exploring different ways to fish flies than I had before - can't wait to tie more soft hackles!
Here's the Zug:
!

Last year I swung the soft hackles and quill Winged wets on my 3 wt Spey and did well on heavily pressured trout rivers.
This year I am tying up some “bent hackle” flies as described in “What the Trout Said” by Datus Proper. I will fish them as dries, greased line dead drift style.