No, I 'm not talking about spreading excrement on a hook (although some feel it is about the equivalent of that). What I'm talking about today is False (cack) Hackling. I first read about false hackling in Paul Jorgensen's great book "Salmon Flies" ,
and I've practiced and used the technique ever since. What it amounts to is stripping fibers from a feather's rachis and tying them in a bundle to the hook shank (most often as a throat) to simulate a wrapped hackle. See the picture of the Popham salmon fly below, it has a false hackle of jay wing.
and I've practiced and used the technique ever since. What it amounts to is stripping fibers from a feather's rachis and tying them in a bundle to the hook shank (most often as a throat) to simulate a wrapped hackle. See the picture of the Popham salmon fly below, it has a false hackle of jay wing.
We can take this technique even one step further. Instead of the false hackle on just the underside of the hook, why not have the hackle all the way around the hook? This is what I have started doing on most of my spey flies. I've started using dyed pheasant tails (golden, amherst, silver, and even ringneck) and tying the fibers in as a false hackle all the way around the hookshank. Then I am following it with a wrap or two of teal, or just leaving it as is. With the pheasant tail, you get a nice long fiber length that simulates heron well (if dyed black) or you can get some great creative looking flies using the dyed amherst. The pheasant fibers also have some great movement in the water. Here's another picture of a cack hackled spey fly, "The Beauly Snow Fly" tied the way I've just described.
So, regardless of what some traditionalists might say, get some hackle fibers and get to cack hackling some flies!!
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