“I’m a sucker for soft hackles. I love synthetics, but there’s something about partridge and grouse hackles that is so mystifying. They breathe life on a hook unlike most anything else. They are visceral. No matter how advanced synthetic materials evolve, they will never have the pulse that soft hackles do.”  Soft Hackles

I get around the net researching fly fishing, tying, anything related to a beginner in pursuit of basic skills and inspiration. I have come to recognize the mediocre, the good and the consistently great…the stuff that is so damn good, yet done with casual ease and finesse.

Go to Roughfisher.com….it went off in a different direction, yet it has tied it all together. Excellent work. I love his patterns…the same, yet exceptionally different. I defy you to find more enthusiasm and innovation than at Jean Paul Lipton’s site.  I have highlighted others, the big ones and the not so big’s that are good for sure. Lipton does most of his work in his own back yard…not 4,000 miles/$4,000 away. Roughfisher is solid, blue steel, with the deceptive edge.