WOW!

Posted by Unknown on 6th Dec 2012

The book Synthetic Flies, Flies with an 'Edited Hackle'& Catch the Hatch by John Betts has been much anticipated. When a person reads about the origins of an artist’s craft from the artist himself you will gain great insight about his processes. John Betts’ bold adventure into the unknown, which it was in the early eighties for manmade materials for the tying of the fly, has benefited the entire fly tying community. You can get some of the information today on the internet but the internet information is like reading photo static copies of photo static copies! The information is blurred and sometimes misleading. If I didn’t know better I would say that Mr. Betts was scientifically trained by the way he would go about developing the use of manmade materials for fly tying. The use of the style of tying wings on the fly so that the almost indestructible nylon may never come out I first saw illustrated in Frederic Michael Halford 1886 book Floating Flies and How to Dress Them. The 'Edited Hackle' section of the book has come in a most opportune timely manner with the traditionally hackles of today being used for hair accents thus the prices are soaring out of sight. In the Catch the Hatch fly tiers will find the descriptions, sizes and coloration an invaluable aid to tying imitations and also making tools such as wings burners to scale. I am very pleased with my copy of Synthetic Flies, Flies with an 'Edited Hackle'& Catch the Hatch and I will be passing it down to my grandsons after the next century! John F. Maloy