Dubbn, Yes, it was fun, and, for me, instructive. Thank you for your good-humored skepticism. At this point, you have brought me around closer to your view. What you say about the flies in MASTERS ON THE NYMPH being crude by today's standards is true. I have thought about the increase in the rate of...

Dubbn, I know, the compression of the video makes it hard to see the details. That is why I want to order the hi-res DVD. So, your reading is a good as mine. And I haven't viewed the whole thing yet. What I thought I was seeing in this segment, and what the narration indicated, was that the inside o...

Oh, I believe in shiny tinsel. I just want to believe in the bubbles. I have been interested in it since LaFontaine touted the bubble as a trigger, but was not able to produce alot of photographic evidence. He claimed to have spent 100's of hours filming under water, but I guess that stage of the C...

I did find some photographic proof of why rabbit fur is so good for capturing bubbles.

Dubbn, Photos would be great. I'm going to keep looking. Gary LaFontaine was the one who made me believe in bubbles, just by his credibility as an underwater eye-witness and biologist, even without photos. I don't have Caddisflies here so I can't quote LaFontaine directly. This is what Dave Hughes w...

Hank, That's what my wife said. She is a landscape painter, and knows that the best reds and oranges are made from cadmium, a dangerous heavy metal. I don't know anything about dyes, but if the old Hot Orange used cadmium, then you are probably right. It may have been outlawed, like asbestos, and le...

Otherwise, the only other thing I can think of is that you might include some darker, coarser fibers in your dubbing mix--Aaron ("skunkaroo" here) I think uses a pinch of claret seal to mimic the venation that appears in the naturals. That would also help if you're worried about hiding to...

Dubbn, Love you images. Your question is good. I have passed it on to Rick Hafele, asking how sure he is about the bubbles, and in which insects. He did tell me on Friday that after Pete Hidy started writing about the bubbles in 1973, (the first person to do so, as far as Rick and Dave Hughes know) ...

Donald, Thanks. You're funny. He actually did leave behind an incredible amount of tinsel, so he obviously thought it was important to stock up on it. Just didn't live long enough to use it up. Yes, I had noticed the segmentation in photographs too. It is nice that for an imitation like this, the ti...

RnF, that's usually the reason for color shifts in bright colors, especially when they've been exposed to sunlight. However, the bright one, on the wooden spool, is probably over 40 years old. The one that looks faded is the new one on the white plastic spool. I may have to inquire directly to Pears...