Soft-Hackled Flies, Wet-Flies & How to Fish Them

This is by no means an exhaustive list and further relevant books will be found in the section headed ‘The History of Fly Fishing for Trout and Books of Historical Interest’.

Edmonds, H.H. and Lee, N.N., Bradford, 1916, Brook and River Trouting An excellent facsimile edition in a slipcase was published by Orange Partridge Press in 1980.  This edition has an introduction and notes by Oliver Edwards.  Along with Pritt, Brook and River Trouting is a seminal text on soft-hackled wet-flies and provides standard detailed dressing notes accompanied by coloured plates of flies.  The sections on fishing techniques are fairly brief but certainly pertinent.

Pritt, T.E., Yorkshire Trout Flies, Goodall & Siddick, Leeds, 1885 (re-published as North-Country Flies by Low, London, 1886).  An excellent slipcased edition of North-Country Flies was published by Smith Settle in 1995.  This edition has a foreword by Leslie Magee whose own well researched book, Flyfishing: the North Country Tradition (Smith Settle, 1994) is required reading.  Pritt’s book is of course the most famous text on soft-hackled spider patterns listing 62 dressings illustrated in colour.  Many of these patterns had been around for some time when Pritt wrote his book and were gleaned from other writers such as John Jackson and Michael Theakston.

Leisenring, J.E., The Art of Tying the Wet Fly, 1941 (re-printed with additions by Vernon S. Hidy as Tying the Wet Fly and Fishing the Flymph by Crown in 1970).  A classic text on soft-hackled flies from the USA.  Leisenring developed a famous induced take method (the ‘Leisenring Lift’) although his original book focuses on dressing flies rather than fishing them.  His ‘pupil’, Vernon ‘Pete’ Hidy, added notes on using soft-hackled flies to imitate insects in the process of emergence – ‘flymphs’.

Nemes, S., The Soft-Hackled Fly, Chatham Press, 1975; The Soft-Hackled Fly Addict, Chicago, 1981.  Sylvester Nemes is a self-confessed spider ‘addict’ and has done much to popularise this style of fly on the other side of the pond.  He has recently published a further book which I have yet to read: Two Centuries of Soft-Hackled Flies: Survey of the Literature Complete and Original Patterns 1747 to the Present.  The date 1747 leads me to think that he begins with Richard and Charles Bowlker yet James Chetham definitely gives the dressings of soft-hackled wet-flies as early as 1681.

Stewart, W.C., The Practical Angler, Edinburgh, 1857.  Another key text on fishing soft-hackled wet-flies.  Stewart is famous for his semi-palmered trio of spiders (actually developed by James Baillie) and his insistence, as with Pritt and Edmonds and Lee, that wet-flies such be fished upstream and across.  That is something I am happy to challenge in my own writing.  A good reprint of Stewart’s book is long overdue but if you can acquire The Fishing in Print, by Arnold Gingrich, then you will find good chunks of Stewart’s book reproduced there.

Tod, E.M., Wet Fly-Fishing, London, 1903.  A good standard book on fishing wet-flies but difficult to acquire.

Apart from the above books there is much of interest for the soft-hackled fly enthusiast in the list of books included in the historical section of the bibliography and particularly books by W.H. Aldam, G.C. Bainbridge, W. Blacker, J. Chetham, C. Cotton, H.C. Cutcliffe, J. Jackson, J. Ogden, M. Theakston and J. Turton.

A book I have not read yet, Tying and Fishing Soft Hackle Nymphs, by Allen McGee, may prove of interest.  Further, Mike Harding has a book due out soon on tying North-Country spider patterns and that promises to be both informative and highly entertaining.  If you tend to take your fishing rather too seriously then a good dose of Mike Harding is certainly called for!

Finally, if you will forgive a little self-promotion, you may wish to read The Art of the Wet Flyor A Handbook of North Country Trout Flies or Wet-Fly Tying & Fishing.