
"Well," I said--"do you have some? who tied it?"
Tom frowned, then smiled and said: "Fran tied it. A while back a customer came into the shop with a few of Fran's flies and I took some pictures."
We went over the fly together--everything about it is Frannish: hairy, sloppy, and perfectly proportioned. The profile was nice and low--much better than the stimulators I usually tied for the Ausable--. We couldn't figure out the hair--woodchuck? You won't find a little 2" square piece of fly shop woodchuck with the right hair--you'd need a full skin--with golden tan tips instead of white. If it is woodchuck.
But damn--what a nice tie, and Fran never wrote about it in any of his books. It was one of his patterns he took with him to the grave--.
Wintertime tying project number 16.
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