FLYMPH FORUM

I've been experimenting a little with the tenkara flies and got thinking (dangerous I know). Nothing too ground breaking but when I tie the hackle in by the tip there is the little bit that you have to snip off so why not just leave it on? Here it is. The P & O tenkara with a tail. Simple, three ingredients, hook, partridge hackle and tying thread. Can't get much simpler!






Vicki

killer take on a staple flie pattern. what are the ideal conditions to present these flies. They all seem to be about the same size (which I know is naive in reality) and constructed very similarly. As if there is only one type of water that best suits this technique, based on the limited variety of design variations. Not that you would want to muck around with a P & O. This is a nice tie.

w

kanutripr wrote: there is the little bit that you have to snip off so why not just leave it on?
Vicki

Can't tell you how often I've wanted to do that. Haven't yet, but will now.

Thank you for breaking trail.

william,

Ideal conditions would probably be pocket water or a small stream with plunge pools. On being mostly all the same size, there is little to no attemp to match a hatch so size isn't terribly important. Many experienced tenkara anglers in Japan would say that choice of fly doesn't matter, and if that is true, then certainly size doesn't either (within reason of course). There are many more design variations of tenkara flies, we here in the US have tended to focus on only one, the reversed hackle sakasa kebari.

See
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/fly ... nkara.html
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/fly ... kara3.html
http://www.itow.com/amago/b-streams/fly ... kara4.html

The tenkara flies, with the exception of the reverse hackle, really aren't so much different from anything we would tie. The difference is the tools used to fish them. What I like about the reverse hackle (in my very limited experience) is the way the hackle behaves when wet. I find sometimes the hackle collapses on itself when there is no thorax on the fly with the way we would regularly wrap hackles but with the reverse method there is less tendency for that. I think this may be really beneficial for that type of fly. A lot of fly fisherman are traditionalists and will continue to tie that way but a tenkara fly IS traditional to the Japanese so give it a try!



Vicki

Chris,

Nice bit of information in those links. Thanks for posting. Itching to try out my Ayu when the rivers drop a bit.

REE

Chris, thanks for the links. Those flies are incredibly familiar. They could have come right out of Listers list. Even the Stewart style thorax softhackles. Very interesting.

w

I really like that fly, Vicki; clever trick, the tail ...

Beautiful tye Vicki.....gorgeous little tenkara fly. i've been using the tip of the feather when doing collars and or when palmering for years........not always, but very often. i did a fly recently that went into the box i donated at the FFF Gulf Coast Council Conclave show in Texas, that had two feather tips incorporated into the design.....one at the rear where i tyed in the hackle to be palmered.....and one up front which was the collar feather. The one in the rear was folded back and straped in so it went well beyond the bend on the far side of the shank, pretty much looking and fucntioning as a tail. And the other was folded back and underneath, so as to appear to be a Spey blade type a deal, with it's very tip reaching just beyond the bend, on the near side of the shank. Fly came out way cool actually. i don't do it that often at the back, but very often incorporate the tip just under the shank as part of the collar. i c no sense in wasting it.....unless you really have some need for a very sparse fishing fly. The effect is very nice especially when using speckled or mottled feathers.
Your tying is fantastic.....keep an eye out for another package........the Helen Shaw book, the Sylvester Nemes video, three more packages of hooks, a bunch of materials (foam/rabbit strips/silly legs/thin skin/etc.), a book on Uni-thread, a post card that is the smaller version of the show poster from the FFF North Idaho Fly Fishing Expo, and some window stickers for the FFF, TGF, and the CFFC&M, plus other "goodies."
Oh, btw, when i do use the tip of the feather.....two wraps ONLY before "folding back & lashing".....then more (the actuall lashing) to snug everything, before proceeding forward.

I never met a Partridge and Orange that I didn't like -- even if the hackle is tied on "backwards".