The next logical step
Following on from the last post, it seemed logical to tie up a Blue Zulu (or two) for the fly box. An interesting palmered hackle wet fly and one which I haven’t fished for years, it sports a rather fetching blue hackle, as the name of the palmered wet fly suggests. When tying this wet fly I wanted the blue hackle to be quite subtle, not overly blue or too ‘in your face’. The hackle used was from a teal dyed grizzle hen cape which I had bought from Lathkill and which I am very happy with – not too light a shade of blue and the black barring of the grizzle hackle helped it appear not too garish. I normally shy away from incorporating wool as a tailing material. However, I opted to keep it in this time as I felt it would help the fly stand out more, particularly in the peaty coloured water of a loch I fish as the wool tail creates a more solid looking focal point than the red cockerel fibre tail I usually opt for.
I separated the wool strands to just two (in order to thin it down a bit) and used the two strands to create the tail. The body was dubbed using fine black dubbing and then palmered with soft black hen hackle. The rib was would, just plain, fine silver tying tinsel. I then gave the the head hackle one turn of sparse black hen hackle followed by one turn of the teal grizzle hen hackle.
I will need to wait and fish the fly next season of course, but plan to use it during windy, low light conditions or in coloured or peaty water. It is a handsome fly and fairly unusual in that it sports a blue hackle; a colour you don’t see a huge amount of in brown trout flies. It will be interesting to see how it performs and the soft black palmered hen hackle along with the soft head hackles, should give it plenty of movement in the waves on a grey, windy and overcast atmospheric day on the loch.
SoftHackles 