![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.jackgartside.com\/images\/flysteps\/sh_streamer.jpg\")
I think if Jack were still alive he would be making a lot of tying videos. It was something we talked about and I wish we’d done more of it. I was reminded of this today when I was talking on the phone with a tyer from Wisconsin, describing one of Jack’s signature patterns, the Soft Hackle Streamer. It’s a fly that is at once very simple and amazingly effective. It can and has caught just about everything, from bonefish to catfish to tarpon to carp.<\/p>\n
In the course of our conversation I was describing the blood marabou you need to tie the pattern\u00a0 correctly. The tyer hadn’t heard of blood marabou and it took me a little to explain how it differs from standard quill. When I got off the phone I wondered if anyone had made a video of its tying steps. So I did a quick internet search. And the answer was yes. Several.<\/p>\n
Now one of the great things about the Soft Hackle Streamer is how adaptable to change it is. So not surprisingly, of the videos I found, no two tied it exactly the same. And none of them tied it quite in the way Jack did<\/a> (granting that Jack himself tied it in a variety of styles).<\/p>\n The video below, from Joe Cornwall of Ohio, is very good (no comment on the opening music, tho\u00a0 \ud83d\ude09 ). If you’ve never tied the fly before, it’s well worth a watch, as is one by Jim Misiura. Joe does a good job emphasizing some of the things critical to understanding the pattern: its ‘breathability”; the importance of using blood marabou; the method of winding the marabou as hackle; and the importance of combing out the fly (Jack used a fly or eyelash comb rather than a tooth brush).<\/p>\n There also are a few differences worth noting between how Jack tied the fly and how Joe ties it:<\/p>\n\n