NO HACKLES

If you want to fill your fly boxes with traditional No-Hackles, you may be in for a surprise—those flies require patience to master, and even the typically mild-spoken east Idaho legend Mike Lawson calls them, “a real bitch” to learn to tie.

Lawson should know—Rene Harrop (also of east Idaho fly-tying fame) once asked him to tie 25 dozen size-14 No-Hackle Hendricksons. Lawson filled that order and never looked back, eventually tying thousands more for his own shop, Henry’s Fork Anglers.

No-Hackles are best suited for spring creeks and flat water sections of tailwater rivers. They can tied in colors and sizes to match a variety of mayflies, including Baetis, Callibaetis, PMDs, flavs, and mahogany duns.

Still, the No-Hackle isn’t held in as high regard as some of its modern cousins, even though Joe Brooks, Doug Swisher and Carl Richards brought the fly to relative prominence in the 1970s and touted it as one of the most versatile and productive spring creek patterns of all time. Yet, in Tom Rosenbauer’s book, The Orvis Guide to The Essential American Flies, the No-Hackle is nowhere to be seen, although the book does cover Craig Matthews’ Sparkle Dun, which is a version of a No-Hackle using a deer-hair wing and a Z-Lon tail. Comparaduns tied with hair wings or Cul de Canard feathers are additional versions of no-hackles, but not the real deal. These types of no-hackles are easier to tie than the original No-Hackle and they are very effective. Which is another reason why those flies dominate fly bins East and West while traditional No- Hackles may be difficult to find.

I, too, have mostly ignored the No-Hackle, even through I’ve spent significant portions of my life stalking around the banks of western spring creeks, including Idaho’s Silver Creek and the Railroad Ranch.

The way I saw it, little parachutes, cripples and emergers, along with down-wing spinners were, in fact, easy to tie and I caught scads of trout on them, rarely getting refusals. I considered the No-Hackle as too frail and always worried about damaging the fly’s duck-quill wings. I’m not alone in that assessment. And that’s a problem—Lawson says most anglers call the traditional No-Hackle fragile when, in his opinion, it’s one of the more durable flies you could throw.

“Everyone has misconceptions about this fly,” Lawson told me back in the early 2000s when I was writing the book, Best Flies For Idaho. “People say it is not durable because the duck-quill wing doesn’t hold together. People come into my shop to fish the Ranch section of the Henry’s Fork and they don’t want No-Hackles. They say it’s a one-fish fly. I tell them I wouldn’t ever fish the Ranch without some No-Hackles with me.

“The thing is, this pattern is most effective when the wing splits up,” Lawson added. “But that’s when people think the fly is shot. Frankly, sometimes I’ll take a brand new No-Hackle and flare the wings out and break them up. You don’t want to throw away a No-Hackle until the hook breaks, or it unravels, or you lose it to a fish.

“The main thing is to avoid tying the wings so they look perfect,” Lawson urged. “Just tie it to look right. If the wings split, big deal—you’ve saved yourself an extra step.”

Harrop also is a connoisseur of classic flies and fishes a variety of no-hackle patterns on the Henry’s Fork and other waters. And he believes them to be key to success on heavily pressured waters. In his book Trout Hunter he writes, “Competition for fishing space and fish is a harsh reality for today’s anglers. Skill requirements for us are far more acute than for our predecessors, who had the best waters to themselves. Taking large trout on small dry flies is still possible, but it demands a flawless presentation and a near-perfect representation of the natural food source . . . although no hackles are far too simple to be classified as realistic, their resemblance to living mayflies is very strong. In addition to emphasizing the dun’s strongest wing and body features, no-hackles accurately reflect the actual physical bulk of the insect . . . a no-hackle fly is a specialized tool in what has become a specialized sport. When used in combination with on-stream observation and refined angling techniques, no-hackles work very well.”

I consider Lawson and Harrop to be fly-fishing legends and sought them out when I started writing about the sport. I still don’t carry many traditional No-Hackles with me, but I do think about the history of that fly and those two men’s assessment of it. When I see mayfly duns on the water this season I’ll try to refrain from my standard routine, which is to pluck a cripple, Sparkle Dun or Comparadun from the box . . . and, instead, fish the real deal. I need to learn firsthand, is the No-Hackle a one-fish fly?

I know what Lawson would say. During his seminars he is frequently asked to tie the No-Hackle and share the tricks he uses to do so. His standard reply? “Believe in them, fish them, and tie lots of them,” he says “To this day, I don’t think there is a more realistic, life-like, durable representation of a mayfly dun, cripple or emerger than the No-Hackle with duck-quill wings. It’s the fly that won’t die . . . it takes a little bit of time and a little bit of practice to tie, but it’s worth a little bit of grief. It’s a great fly.”

Hook: TMC 100, sizes 16/18/20

Thread: Yellow or olive 8/0

Wing: Gray duck quill cut from left and right primary feathers

Tail: Blue dun hackle fibers (split)

Body: Light yellow or olive Super Fine dubbing