The earliest known account of fly fishing and fly making was written in the second century after Christ. it wasn't treated as something new, merely a factual account of a way that Macedonians took fish that fed on flies "too fragile to be impaled on a hook".

Compiling a book in those days was slow and laborious. Each word was lettered by hand. Little effort was wasted on anything so common-place as fishing. Even so, a few off-hand references to fly fishing occur still earlier. For instance a Roman poet says "Who has not seen the scaurus rise, decoyed and killed by fraudful flies," in an earlier work, completely unrelated to fishing. it would seem the sport was common enough so that such an analogy was not out of place.

After the invention of the printing press, works on fly fishing and fly making became quite common, some in English so archaic as to be barely decipherable today.

Anyway, the point is that since the sport is that ancient, so is the fly making craft. Tying procedures and standards formulated centuries ago, passed down by those earlier writers are, with few exceptions as applicable now as then. This is the second in a series of articles intended to acquaint novices with and remind experienced tyers of fly-making basics mostly by-passed by modern how-to articles and books.

The first, in last month's Badger Sportsman contained an explanation of fly tying terminology, instructions for securing a hook in a vise, making a base on the hook for material, construction sequence and some on winging and hackling both wet and dry flies.

This article will deal with proportions, more on winging and hackling not covered previously and a little about fishing the flies.

Generally speaking, a wet fly is one, whether winged or wingless, that bears some resemblance to an insect, and is meant to be fished underwater. Its design should take into consideration absorption, sparseness, profile, hook weight and color.

Materials must be absorbent enough to assure immediate sinking of the fly. Wool and chenille are very absorbent. Sparseness makes for quick sinking and allows individual fibers more freedom to move with the current or retrieve. The profile should suggest the creature being imitated. Proportion is important for the same reason.

To facilitate sinking, wet flies should be constructed on regular or extra stout hooks. Lead wire may be wound on the hook under the body. Do this over the thread base and make another base from thread and fly tying cement over the lead wrap. Squeeze with a pliers to flatten horizontally so as to conserve as much hook gap as possible. Many tyers keep a pliers with the jaw serrations filed away for this purpose.

A wet fly that persists in staying on or near the surface is aggravating. lt may sometimes take fish but, in the same situation, one designed to float is normally more effective.

While we are on the subject of sinking flies, here is something about casting them. Learn to shoot line and practice until it becomes second nature. You shouldn't have to false cast to extend line.

Once the fly is wet you must be able to present it without drying the fly or leader. You should be able to cast upstream from where you think the fishes lie is and have it start to sink immediately.

Jerking or tugging to get it under will spook any but the most naive trout. False casting drys both the fly and the leader. it became fashionable along with dry fly fishing. Its purpose was to air dry the fly. it is a good example of our tendency to copy and follow techniques without realizing why they were developed and then having to relearn things that were once taken for granted.

A lot of fly fishing know-how has been lost in the last fifty or sixty years since fishing dry became the "in" thing. Now that nymphing has made fishing wet respectable again much has to be rediscovered.

For instance, when most fly fishing was with sunken lures, hooks with offset bends were popular. Fish don't have hands so they use their lips like we would our thumb and fingers to grasp and inspect something they think might be edible. if the fish decides it isn't, it ejects it, usually with considerable force like we would throw away a wormy apple.

That's why, when fishing nymphs or wet flies it is so important to watch the line and set the hook at even the slightest pause or draw. If we wait until we feel a tap or tick, it is usually too late. We are feeling the fish rejecting the fly.

To see how it works, take two wet flies, put one in the vise and pull towards you on the eye end enough to off-set the point slightly.

Tie a short length of leader to both. Now test first one, then the other by holding them between your thumb and forefinger. See how they turn on their side when you grasp them? The same thing happens when a fish closes its lips on them.

Now pull the leaders just enough to start them moving between your s fingers. The one with the straight bend wiII slide freely, but the off-set one wiII start to dig into a thumb or finger.

Fish usually take an underwater fly as it is going away from them. Often they follow it some distance before tasting it. One of the most effective movements you can give a wet fly or nymph is to make it start towards the ~g surface. At any of these times when you try to set the hook it is pulling away from the fish and pretty apt to pull right out of the fish's mouth.

Off-setting the bend slightly will prevent this. when dry fly fishing, however, off-set points are a disadvantage. Then, the fly is almost always ra taken as the fish is going away and the hook is pulled deeper, usually into the iis corner of the jaw. Dry fly hooks are made of light wire and more inclined to break or bend than regular weight hooks and off-setting the bend increases this to tendency. Don't off-set dry fly hooks.

There are certain rules of thumb regarding length of tails, bodies, wings and hackle that serve as a guide to tyers everywhere. They aren't engraved in ay stone, but adhering to them approximately will make for better performing, s more pleasing-to-the-eye flies.

if a wet fly has a tail, make it the same length as the body. The body should be three-quarters the length of the hook shank. The hackles should be just long enough to touch the hook point. This makes it easy to select a feather by fanning it around the hook where the hackle wil I be tied. The wings should or extend slightly past the hook bend.

Try to keep both silhouette and coloration as close as possible to that of the insect you are imitating. Keep in mind that it can be viewed very closely by the fish.

All winged wet flies are constructed in this sequence; first the tail is tied on, ! of then the body is wrapped, next the hackle is added, either by being wound or tied in a bunch under the throat. The wings are tied on last just in front of the hackle. Leave plenty of room to finish the head.

Quill section wings are still standard for wet flies. They give all beginners vet and some experienced tyers fits. The secret is to be sure the tying thread is half hitched around the hook precisely where you want the wings tied on. Then, holding the wing sections tightly between thumb and finger on edge on the me hook shank directly over where the thread is half-hitched, make a loop over the wings and pull straight down bringing the thread down between the ball of your thumb and finger without relaxing your grip on the wing at all.

Do this again. Open your fingers and inspect your work. if satisfactory, close your fingers and make a half-hitch, pulling it tight in the same manner. Cement this winding, trim the wing butts, make a head and tie off.

Quill section wings are made from sections cut from matched flight feathers, usually duck. That is, one section is cut from a feather from the right wing and one from the left.

They can be tied divided or closed. The closed have the concave sides together and the divided the convex sides. The closed are fast water flies. The divided are lake or slow water flies.

Divided are apt to spin in a current but impart a little action on the retrieve in slow water.

Dry fly taiIs are hook length, bodies are one-half shank length and hackle should have fibers approximately one and one-half times the width of the hook gap.

Sequence of tying is tail first, then wing, then body and then hackle.

Hackle tips have become standard for dry fly winging. They are much easier to work with than quill sections. They can be slid back and forth and adjusted before the tightening. Quill sections cannot.

Dry fly hackle should be shiny and stiff. it should be wound on a bias, both ahead and back of the wings, to give an X appearance. This supports the fly best on the water and doesn't shut off the fish's view of the fly. it also lets the fly dry better when false cast.

A few more words about hooks. They are available in turned down, turned up and "ball", or regular eye hooks. Turned down and turned up eye hooks are stiII used because it's easier to whip a neat head on them. They have no other benefits.

They originated back when flies were "snelled". That is a length of gut was lashed to an eyeless hook on top of the shank and extended out ahead of hook.

The fly body was dressed over the gut and it projected out ten or twelve inches with a loop in the end. The leader was tied to this loop. When the gut rotted, which it soon did, the fly had to be discarded.

Some genius came up with the idea of making hooks with an eye and letting the snell extend out through this. The eye was tilted so the gut could project in a straight line. The idea was that when the gut rotted away the fly could still be attached to the leader. it didn't have to be discarded.

It was a great many years before it occurred to somebody that they didn't need the snell anyway. That's why we have turned up.or turned down eye hooks.

An article on the basics of nymph construction and a little about fishing them will follow.