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ACTIVITIES
Dissecting the Dry Fly
Building a Bivisible
There is one style of dry fly that represents the ultimate in simplicity: the Bivisible. It has only two components, both of which are hackle feathers wrapped around a fine-wire hook. The second, or frontal, hackle is always white, which gives the fly its"bivisibility." The other, or main, hackle can be any color you desire. Matching a given size fly with a particular feather depends on the length of the barbs in the wrapped position. When gauging the size of a feather, flex it into a simulation of that wrapped position so that the barbs protrude, allowing you to gauge their length. This can be tricky, especially with saddles, where the barbs in repose tend to lie at a severe angle. A hackle gauge is helpful for beginners.
On a conventional fly with a standard hook, the rule of thumb is that the hackle should be 1½ times the gap of the hook. In the case of the Bivisible, the fly works better with shorter hackle — approximately equal to the gap, or slightly longer. These flies are designed for use in faster, more diffused currents and balance better when they ride lower on the water.
| Brown Bivisible Dressing Hook: Fine wire dry fly, standard shank length. Typically sizes 10 to 16.
Thread: Fine black or brown, 6/0 or 8/0.
Main Hackle: Brown, preferably a saddle feather.
Front Hackle: White, either saddle or cape.
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The style of hackle used here is known for some obscure reason as palmered hackle, which means it is wrapped over the length of the hook shank, rather than concentrated fore and aft of the wings like conventional hackle. Saddle feathers are ideal for this sort of work. We're talking about the main hackle here — the few turns of white at the front can be done with either cape or saddle hackle and can be a bit longer than the main hackle, if you wish. Again, the main hackle can be ever color you choose. Here, we'll use brown.
Tying Steps
1. Select a brown hackle and prepare it by stripping off any soft material at the butt end that doesn't have dry-fly characteristics. In other words, strip back to the sweet spot. Leave about 1/4 inch (6 mm) of quill for tying in.
2. Tie on a little way to the rear of the eye and wrap neatly and smoothly to the rear. The smoother the thread base, the better the hackle will deploy.
Steps 1-4: Hackle feather tied in. Note tiny bit of exposed quill. |
Step 5: The hackle feather being wrapped. Note that the pretty side is in front. |
Step 6: Tying off the hackle. Note that the thread intercepts the quill. |
Step 7: The white feather for the front of the hackle. |
Steps 8-9: The completed fly. |
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3. Tie in the feather with the front , or more colorful, side of the feather facing you; this ensures that the colorful side remains in front during wrapping, which is very important. Leave a tiny bit of bare quill exposed. This permits the feather to rotate to a position perpendicular to the hook shank, which ensures that no barbs will deploy prematurely and end up slanted rearward at an angle. We want all barbs to protrude at virtually a right angle to the shank.4. Wrap the thread forward, binding down the quill butt in the process. Be neat, and cut off any excess quill well short of the eye area. Stop about 25 percent of the shank length before the eye.
5.With a nice, long saddle hackle, you're better off not using hackle pliers, which would only get in the way. Pick up the feather and start wrapping forward, with each turn adjacent to the preceding one. Be sure the colorful side of the feather is in front, or the barbs will start to lean forward after a few turns. Maintain moderate tension, well short of the breaking point of the quill.
6. When you reach the spot where the thread hangs in wait, hold the feather under tension with your right hand. Pick up the bobbin with your left hand, and execute several lift-over moves, thus binding the quill to the hook. Then switch the bobbin to your right hand and take several more firm wraps. When you are sure the feather is secure, trim off the excess, and lay it aside for future use. Then take a few wraps over the spot where you trimmed, smoothing it out.
7. Prepare a white feather as you did the brown, and tie it in such that the first turn will be contiguous to the last of the brown. Advance the thread forward, but don't crowd the eye.
8. Take a few turns of white, then tie that feather off, as you did the brown.
9. After trimming and securing, make a whip finish.
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