Just a pile of flies that I dumped out on my desk recently and felt were worth a quick pic. Once I imported the photo, I went a bit old-school and tacked on a couple of retro-feeling filters. The end result brings my mind’s eye back to those cold, youthful Wisconsin winters of the 1970s [...]

For those following the weekly Drawing Fish 52 (DF52) project this year, here’s a look back at what was happening last year at this same time. The DF52 project in 2010 was Drawing Flies, and the fly from week 33 (corresponding with the Dolly Varden this year) was a Sakasa Kebari (for Tenkara fishing). The [...]

For those following the weekly Drawing Fish 52 (DF52) project this year, here’s a look back at what was happening last year at this same time. The DF52 project in 2010 was Drawing Flies, and the fly from week 31 (corresponding with the chum salmon this year) was a Brassie. The fly is shown above. [...]

For those following the weekly Drawing Fish 52 (DF52) project this year, I thought that I’d do a little look back this week at what was happening last year at this same time. The DF52 project in 2010 was Drawing Flies, and the fly from week 29 (corresponding with the muskellunge this year) was a [...]

As some of you know, I don’t tend to blog a lot about my actual fishing in “real time.” Fishing is often a rather personal affair for me, and I typically use fishing events to later enhance “how-to” pieces and so forth some time after the fact. This week, though, I wanted to do an [...]

For those following the weekly Drawing Fish 52 (DF52) project this year, a sockeye salmon is up next (tomorrow). For those readers who started following the project after 2010, I thought that I’d do a little look back this week at what was happening last year at this same time. The DF52 project in 2010 [...]

Began with a train wreck of a drawing, but managed to save something for this week by doing a quick conversion to vector art and making a mock-up tee out of it. Felt that the outlines of the bronze-colored tee (for the alternate “bronzeback” name for this fish) looked a lot like the bluelines of [...]

GB is busy tying the 39274957287456 flies he’s going to include in the upcoming Long Flies book (actually, I think it’s only 80 or so, but they have to be right), so I figured that a post on tying with GB was in order. One of the most memorable things about the frequent outings that my father [...]

For those interested, there’s a nice triple-play of fly tying by GB over at his blog. While the bit-by-bit recipes are focused on the Hendrickson, the core fly designs are applicable across a rather large spectrum of the mayfly world. Get them here: Red-Brown Nymph – Parachute Floating Nymph – Yarn Wing Dun (with a [...]

For you tyers out there in the FF&W readership, GB just ran a series of bobbin posts over at his blog. Mostly stuff he either already has, or some new goodies from the show circuit this last winter (that’s a new goodie from Marc Petitjean shown above). If you dig bobbins (they are sort of like like the [...]

Continuing the FF&W Art Archive series with another image from the book, Designing Trout Flies. This one is from page 45. The collection of numbers correspond to colored pencils that I used for the “presentation” edition of the book. That edition was quite a beauty: handmade wood boxes (with burled panels), leather covers, all of the [...]

See that soft-hackle? Tie one just like that, but add a trailing shuck. Fish it dead-drift in the film (don’t be afraid of floatant if necessary). I did a quick tying piece for my friends over at “Field & Stream” magazine’s TieTalk (the tying alter ego of the FlyTalk blog). The subject is a trailing-shuck soft-hackle [...]

For those of you who have a copy of the book, Designing Trout Flies, you’ll likely recognize this illustration (see page 25). What’s a bit different is the collection of numbers (corresponding to pencils) and colors. The notes were part of my artistic preparation for working on the “presentation” edition of the book. That edition [...]

So, I got an email asking about snail patterns. Told Bruno (he would be the one who emailed) that I’d get something up here for him. Figured that today was as good a day as any. Before I got started, I decided to check out GB’s blog, just to see how his posts from the [...]