Hackled Deul Cruik

This dressing substitutes red-brown fur from a rabbit’s neck for the “brown fox’s ear” in the original dressing, following the cue from a similar dressing in Sylvester Lister’s later manuscript. It also uses an American woodcock covert in place of an English woodcock covert.

Thread:		Orange
Body:		Yellow and orange Pearsall's gossamer silk wound up the shank alongside each other and dubbed with red-brown rabbit's neck fur
Hackle:		Woodcock covert
		Robert L. Smith’s recently published The North Country Fly: Yorkshire’s Soft Hackle Tradition (2015), available at from Coch-y-Bonddu Books, highlights manuscripts and largely forgetten fly fishing publications dating back to the mid-eighteenth century. He cites “The Wharfe Dale List” from Joseph Wells’ Contemplative and Practical Angler (1842), which includes a Hackled and Winged Deul Cruik. The Hackled dressing is dressed with “Wings outside of woodcock’s wing, yellow and orange silk, brown fox’s ear for body.”  Smith notes that the Deul Cruik is includes in six additional texts. In other texts, its shows up under different names, like the Great Brown Deel Crook in William Lister’s manuscript (1712), the Deel Cruik in James Pickard’s manuscript (1794), and the Devil’s Crook (Hackle) in Stephen Braithwaite’s list (early eighteenth century). In his 1820 manuscript, Jonathan Pickard’s list notes that the Dule Crook is another name for the March Brown. The Hackled Deul Cruik almost identical to the dressing that Sylvester Lister includes in his manuscript (1898) for the March Brown or Drake. Like Smith, Leslie Magee includes the manuscript in his Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994). Lister’s March Brown or Drake is dressed with a “feather reddish speckled from a partridge tail or outside woodcock wing. Head, yellow silk, body orange and yellow silk twisted and dubbed with reddish fur from fox’s ear or rabbit’s neck. Remarks Appears about April 1st. Good killer until beginning of May.” Unlike many the dressings and lists Smith includes, Braithwaite's manuscript list gives separate dressings for the March Brown and Devil Crook (Hackle): the former is dressed with a buddy of "cinnamon silk dubbed with fur orbrown bear"; the latter, with "ash-coloured silk dubbed with a little fur from for a hare's ear." (Using alternating, side-by-side wraps of silk dubbed with fur is noteworthy body for the effect it creates, but it is by no means unique. The Little Dark Watchet that T. E. Pritt dressed used orange and purple wraps of silk dubbed with muskrat.)

Blue Partridge

Hook:		14-18
Thread:		Blue
Body:		Raw wool - New Zealand Romney, dubbed thinly on blue tying thread, heavier behind the hackle
Hackle:		Partridge
		As a point of terminology, flies named Blue Partridge, Gravel Spinner, Spider Fly, Gravel Bed Fly, and Sand Flie seem interchangeable in historical angling texts, but as a matter of entomology, the Blue Partridge seems to refer to the emergence (or reemergence) of the Diptera - midges, gnats, or craneflies - in early May, after the earlier emergence that Michael Theakston, Alfred Ronalds, and other anglers indicate. In North-Country Flies (1886), Pritt dresses the No. 44, the Blue Partridge with “WINGS.-Hackled with a feather from a Partridge’s back. BODY.-Blue silk dubbed with a little lead-coloured lamb’s wool” Harfield Edmonds and Norman Lee include an almost exact dressing in their Brook and River Trouting (1916), No. 19, the Gravel Bed, a "crane-fly." The only difference between their dressing and Pritt's is the dubbing: they recommend "blue-grey fur from the flank of an Opossum." And they note that the Gravel Bed is a "useful fly in a coloured water." Sylvester Lister also includes a Blue Patridge in his 1898 manuscript, printed by Leslie Magee in Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994). He dresses the Blue Partridge or “Gravel Bed Spinner,” No. 18, with the “Speckled feather (bluish) from partridge back or silver pheasant. Head, magpie herl. Body, light blue covered with heron’s herl. Remarks Comes on early in May, often kills well on bright days to end of July.” Magee notes that Lister’s No. 18 is the same as John Swarbrick’s Sand Flie, No. 17 on his List of Wharfedale Flies (1807), which Magee also reprints: “Sir if you Take notice upon the sand Beds Abought the 10 of May you will see these Flyes in Great Abundance as they bred in the sand She is a Winged Flie the Feather is Taken of a mallard what we call a Drake the feather Must be of a Sandey Brown much the same Collour as the Feather of a partridge feather some Times of a Silver pheasant Wing Sir it must be made Very small when I say small I mean Harld at the Head with a Magpie Harl purple silk Rapt down the Bodey with one turn of a feather for a Hearing saw (Heron Sheugh – a name still used in Yorkshire for the Grey heron) the Feather Comes of the Black Legd with a Black hen Neck Feather Sir Fish This Flie at the End.”

Roger Woolley chose to separate the Gravel Bed Spinner, a dressing he recommended fishing dry or wet, and the Blue Partridge. Under the heading "Yorkshire and North Country Wet Flies” in his Modern Trout Fly Dressing (1932), Woolley included a sparse, soft-hackled dressing, for the Blue Partridge: “Body.—Blue fur ribbed with blue tying sik. Hackle.—Pale brown partridge.”

Gravel Spinner (Spider Fly); Gravel Bed Fly; Spider Legs

This dressing uses raw Targhee wool rather than the dark brown mohair assigned to the fly.

Hook:		16-18
Thread:		Tan
Abdomen:		Silk buttonhole twist – Talon 533 light gray, size D
Thorax:		Raw brown Targhee wool
Hackle:		Crow undercovert
		Michael Theakston describes the Gravel Spinner in his List of Natural Flies (1853) as hatching in middle April to early May and suggests dressing the fly with an abdomen of a “lead or ashy colored silk; winged or hackled with a starling’s feather or the blue blo of a crow, with a few fibres of dark brown mohair at the breast.” Theakston dressed another Gravel Bed Spinner (Spider) for later in the season, from May on: “They are usually hackled with a feather out of the woodcock’s wing, lead colored silk, and legged with a black red hackle or coppery silk, tinged with water rat and a few fibres of red brown mohair, but must be made smart and fine.” Theakston's contemporary, John Jackson, included a similar dressing for April in his posthumous Practical Fly-Fisher (1854). No. 18, the Spider Legs was dressed with a "rusty coloured" hackle from a Fieldfare's back for wings," as well as a "lead coloured silk" body and a "dark grizzled hackle" for legs, rather than Theakston's woodcock.  In The Northern Angler (1837), John Kirkbride includes winged and hackled dressings for the Spider Fly and Gravel Spider, instructing the fly tier to dress the fly “as a spider, or hackle-fly, with the body of the fur from a water-rat’s back, and a hackle from the outside of a woodcock’s wing, near the butt, of not too dark a colour.” Alfred Ronalds dressed the Gravel Bed fly, No. 13, similarly to Kirkbride's dressing for April: “BODY.  Dark dun, or lead coloured silk thread dressed very fine. WINGS.  From the underside of a feather of the woodcock’s wing. LEGS.  A black cock’s hackle rather long, wound twice, only, round the body. To make it buzz, a dark dun cock’s hackle tinged with brown may be used.” The Bowlkers also include dressings for the Spider Fly in their Art of Angling. In his 1754 edition of the book, Richard Bowlker recommends a dressing with wings “made of a Woodcock’s Feather that lyes under the butt end of his Wing; the Body of a Lead-colour’d silk with a black Cock’s hackle twice or thrice around: The Body is to be made in the shape of the Ant Fly.” Charles Bowlker’s 1774 additions maintain the essential parts of the earlier dressing, but Charles gives the “black cock’s hackle wrapt twice or thrice under the but of the wings,” noting that “The fly cannot be made too fine.”

Light Spanish Needle; or the Light Needle

This dressing uses a snipe covert as a hackle rather than undercovert.

Hook:		14-16
Thread:		Red
Abdomen:		Red Pearsall’s marabou silk floss
Hackle:		Snipe covert
Head:		Peacock herl
		T. E. Pritt included the Light Spanish Needle in both his Yorkshire Trout Flies (1885) and North-Country Flies (1886) as No. 23, the complement to the Dark Spanish Needle, No. 22, that is "more suitable for warm days. The shades of the natural flies vary considerably.” Pritt dressed it thus: “WINGS.-Hackled with a feather from inside a Jack-Snipe’s wing, or the breast of a young Starling. BODY.-Crimson silk. HEAD.-Peacock herl.”

This dressing uses orange Pearsall’s marabou silk floss for the body.

In their Brook and River Trouting (1915), Harfield Edmonds and Norman Lee recommend the Light Needle, No. 15, which seems to roughly correspond with Pritt's Light Spanish Needle in its emergence. Their dressing uses orange silk for the body and head and the webby hackle “from a young Starling’s thigh or flank.” Leslie Magee includes a dressing of Pritt’s Light Spanish Needle among his favorite dressings in Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994), but he also includes dressings from an 1898 manuscript by Sylvester Lister, whose fly is dressed using a “feather from under snipe’s wing or under starling’s wing. Head, magpie herl. Body, orange silk. Remarks Capital standard fly all through the season.”

Dark Snipe and Purple; or, Dark Snipe

In keeping with established structure of the blog, the fly above is tied on a size 14 hook.

Hook:		16-20
Thread:		Purple Pearsall's Gossamer Silk
Body:		Purple Pearsall's Gossamer Silk
Hackle:		Snipe covert
		John Waller Hills suggests that the Dark Snipe and Purple is the most useful imitation for the Iron Blue in his History of Fly Fishing for Trout (1921). He prefers the Dark Snipe and Purple for its simplicity, particularly by comparison to contemporary imitations proposed by G.E.M. Skues, despite their usefulness. Sylvester Nemes included it in his first book, The Soft-Hackled Fly (1975), and in its second edition (2006) as both a soft hackle and a tiny soft hackle: “body: Purple silk floss hackle: Small covert hackle from snipe wing. These are the very short feathers on the leading edge of the wing.” T. E. Pritt lists this dressing almost verbatim as No. 10, the Dark Snipe, in North-Country Flies (1886), noting that the fly is a “splendid killer on cold days in the early part of the season, and is a favourite on the Ribble. In some districts it is not dressed until June, but the angler will find it too good to be neglected as a spring fly.” Leslie Magee includes Pritt’s dressing on the color plates of Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994) which illustrate the soft hackles he prefers. The manuscript “List of Artificial Flies used by Sylvester Lister Snr” from 1898  that Magee reprints also includes a dressing for the Snipe and Purple or Dark Snipe, but it adds a magpie herl head and recommends slightly speckled snipe coverts.  While authors like Hills give Pritt credit for the Dark Snipe, Magee points to a manuscript precedent earlier than Pritt or Lister, which was likely unknown to Hills. William Brumfitt, the professional fly tyer who lived all of his life in Otley, Yorkshire and whose illustrations Pritt copied directly for the color plates in Yorkshire Trout Flies (1885), listed two dressings for the Dark Snipe. In addition to the purple-bodied dressing Pritt listed, Brumfitt also favored an orange-bodied dressing, the aptly named Dark Snipe and Orange. While Pritt cites Brumfitt's fly tying prowess in the introduction Yorkshire Trout Flies (1885), he only chose to include the purple-bodied dressing. Perhaps Pritt's choice acknowledges the historical persistence of a purple-bodied, dark-hackled dressings. A version of this configuration appears in Charles Cottons' 1676 additions to Izaak Walton's Compleat Angler. Cotton includes a dressing for an April pattern that he calls the Violet Flie. Its simplicity and coloration make it a likely, Restoration-era precursor for the Snipe and Purple: "From the sixth of this Month to the tenth, we have also a Flie  call'd the violet Flie, made of a dark violet stuff, with the wings of the grey feather of a Mallard."

Winter Brown

This dressing of Roger Woolley's Winter Brown substitutes brown and black barring of a red grouse's covert for the more traditional tan-and-black undercovert of an English woodcock.

Hook:		14-18
Thread:		Orange
Abdomen:		A mixture of rust sculpin wool with a natural brown wool – in this instance, raw wool from the Targhee breed
Hackle:		Red grouse covert

Like various versions of the Snipe Bloa, different anglers’ dressings for the Winter Brown are variations on a general pattern, a rich brownish body, a brown and black barred hackle (usually an English woodcock’s undercovert), and a head of some green, iridescent herl.  In his Two Centuries of Soft-Hackled Flies (2004), Sylvester Nemes relates patterns from Roger Woolley’s Modern Trout Fly Dressing (1950) that “are not too common and might be worth a swing or two on your favorite water.” The first is Woolley’s Winter Brown: “Body: Orange tying silk dubbed with ruddy brown wool, the orange silk to show for three turns at tail. Hackle: Dark brown mottled feather from under woodcock wing. Head: Bronze peacock herl.” Woolley's dressing follows the dressing for the Winter Brown that Harfield Edmonds and Nornan Lee give in Brook and River Trouting (1916), where it is listed as a fly for "March to middle of April." Their dressing is worth listing here if for no other reason than the specificity they require  for a dressing that accurately represents early Perlidae (or stonefly) hatches: WINGS.—Hackled with a greyish feather, barred, from the under coverts of a Woodcock's wing. (The lighter side of the feather towards the head of the fly). BODY.—Orange silk, No. 6a, dubbed with ruddy brown wool, the three turns next the tail showing distinct orange. HEAD.—Bronze Peacock herl.” Leslie Magee, in Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994) prints the “List of Artificial Flies used by Sylvester Lister Snr” from 1898, which was “compiled upon an experience of 50 years as a fly-fisher and over 70 years residence on the banks of the river Wharfe.” Lister’s dressing for the Winter Brown calls for the “light mottled feather, from under woodcock’s wing, peacock herl head. Silk, brownish body well waxed. Remarks Comes on early in February. Kills well until the end of March. Hook 14.” T. E. Pritt also lists a dressing for the Winter Brown, No. 3, in North-Country Flies (1886): “Wings.-Hackled with a feather from the inside of a Woodcock’s wing. Body.-Orange silk—not too bright Head.-Peacock herl. Pritt notes that the Winter Brown is a “favourite early fly on all the Yorkshire rivers, killing well on wild, windy days in March and April. The wings assume a light shade in the course of the day ten days after its first appearance on the water, when it is common dressed as No. 4. Little Winter Brown; or, Light Woodcock.” It is Pritt's Little Winter Brown, No. 4, that later dressings like Edmonds and Lee and Woolley follow most closely. In fact, Sylvester Nemes recommends the Winter Brown dressed on a size 20 hook in his 2006 additions to his original Soft-Hackled Fly (1975).  Michael Theakston offered a similar dressing for the second fly of his List of Natural Flies (1843), variously the Early Brown, Dark Brown, or Winter Brown: he preferred an orange silk body, woodcock hackle, and a brown mohair thorax to the peacock herl head Pritt prescribes. John Turton lists a dressing for the Winter Brown, No. 69, in The Angler’s Manual (1836) that seems to incorporate the most striking aspects of Theakston's and Pritt's dressings. Turton gives his precedent pattern for “October and November: made with orange silk; wing, woodcock’s under wing feather; body, bright orange silk, headed with magpie’s tail green feather.”

 This dressing of John Swarbrick's Winter Brown, which is the version Leslie Magee lists as one of his preferred patterns in Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994), substitutes the grayish American woodcock covert for an English woodcock undercovert.

Leslie Magee reprints another list of flies older than Lister’s in Fly Fishing: The North Country Tradition (1994), John Swarbrick’s “List of Wharfdale Flies” (1807). Swarbrick’s list begins with the Winter Brown: “About the 26 of Feby you may begin Flie Fishing. Make the Winter Brown it is Made from underneath the Wood Cock wing one of the Large Feathers wich Covers the quill feathers you Must Make This a Hackle Flie you Must make the Bodey with Red silk and a little peacock Harl in the Head.”