Breadcrusts I've seen in the past had a body made from a split grouse tail feather with the feather barbs trimmed short. Gave a real spikey look to the body, very caddis like. I tried that. What a pain in my tookus. You have to split the stem, soak it for like, 20 years to soften up the white pithy...

...an Adams soft hackle. Gorgeous.

Mr. Norm... what is your mission on the forum.... I realize you can tie beautiful flies, but what do you do with all of them? 1. mission? - to show other tyers different fly patterns that they may never have seen before and just might want to tie 2. what do i do with all of them - some i fish (when...

Cookshill is being difficult; does anybody have another source for high quality Starling that they could share with me? Thanks. What do you mean about Cookshill being "difficult"? I just checked Steve's website and there's no notation that starling skins or wings are in short supply. Did ...

Everything stated so far, and a couple more. Any of Oliver Kite's books. 'Summer on the Test' -John Waller hills. Not a how-to, but a wonderful record of British chalk stream fishing at the turn of the 20th. 'Trout Hunting' -Bob Wyatt Ed Engel has some good ideas floating around. Rick Hafele, too. '...

Beautiful, Norm. I've got a bunch of raffia just gathering dust; I may have to revisit it now...

...such a great pattern, beautifully tied; it has so much more inherent dignity than a Griffith's Gnat.

That's a great idea, Ray; I never would have thought of that. It certainly sounds better than my method, which is to glue a small piece of emery cloth on one of the jaws.

Syl's Midge! I'd forgotten about that pattern; Nemes was the perfect voice for the renaissance of the soft hackle.

Scraggly? I think not. This is the pattern that the Bread Crust has always aspired to be; the Bread Crust grew up tattooed trailer trash, while Norm's Scraggly is kin to John Houseman and Hah-vahd.