Reverse-hackle Wings
TED LEESON AND JIM SCHOLLMEYER

Single Post | Divided Fiber | Feather Tip | Arc | Reverse Half-Hackle | Reverse Hackle

This unusual style, also called "Wonder Wings," appears to have originated in Europe and found its way to this country about 50 or 60 years ago. Noted tier Chauncy Lively was an early advocate of this winging technique, and more recently, Al Beatty has championed the design and incorporated it into some of his own patterns. Even so, most American tiers seem to be unacquainted with the style, which is unfortunate since this wing offers a number of advantages.

Reverse-hackle wings yield a conspicuous, well-shaped silhouette and nicely suggest the patterns of venation found in real mayfly wings. Because the wings are affixed by the barb tips--not by the stem--they flex during casting to help minimize tippet twist and mount with little bulk. The style is quite versatile and can be used on patterns dressed with standard collar hackles, parachute hackles, or thorax hackles. The wings are suitable to a wide range of hook sizes and are simpler to tie than their appearance may suggest. As a general rule, these wings are moderately durable--not as sturdy as feather-tip wings, but tougher than reverse half-hackle wings.

A variety of feathers can be used to dress this wing style, including body plumage from game birds and waterfowl which produce strikingly marked wings, and recently we've even seen tiers using CDC feathers to make reverse-hackle wings on small flies. But most tiers prefer a type of feather that many of us in fact regard as almost waste material--the big, broad hackles from the butt end of a rooster cape or saddle. Regardless of feather type, the tying method is the same.

PHOTO #22: Select a matched pair of feathers (rooster saddle shown here) and clip off the stems to remove the fluffy barbs at the base, as shown on the feather at the right. To ensure that you have enough excess material to mount the feathers, the barb length should be at least 1 1/2 times the overall hook length, as shown above.

PHOTO #23: Place the feathers front-to-front, that is, shiny sides together and the butts aligned. (Only one feather is used here to show more clearly the forming and proportion of the wing.)

Preen the lowermost barbs downward so that the feather stem incorporated into the wing is about 3/4 the length of the hook shank, as shown. The wings themselves are one shank-length in height. Al Beatty recommends this proportion to give a full, densely veined, more durable wing.

Note in the photo that the left fingers are pinching the barbs at the mounting point, which is well below the feather stem. The feathers are secured by the barb tips, not the stem.

PHOTO #24: Mount both wings at the same time. The easiest method is to use a pinch wrap of the type used in affixing quill wings. The object here (as it is with quill) is to mount the material so that the barbs are stacked vertically atop one another rather than splayed to the sides of the shank. A clean mount of this type will produce a well-shaped wing.

PHOTO #25: Grasp the feather tips and raise the wings upright. Build a bump of thread at the front base of the wings to hold them vertical. If a greater angle between the two wings is desired, simply take a crisscross wrap or two between the feathers. If you're dressing a fly with a parachute hackle, do not yet clip the excess feather tips. These long tips provide a convenient "handle" to steady the wings during parachute hackling.

PHOTO #26: When the fly is finished, clip the excess feather tips from the wings, as shown at the upper left. Save the feather tips as the barbs may be sufficiently long to dress a second fly.

Pictured here as well are finished flies dressed with reverse-hackle wings. At the upper right is a standard Adams; note the relatively slender wing profile produced by the web-free grizzly hackles used here. At the lower left is a parachute Callibaetis; the very webby mallard flank used here yields a broader wing silhouette. At the lower right is a thorax-style PMD winged with hen saddle.

Ted Leeson and Jim Schollmeyer are authors of The Fly Tier's Benchside Reference to Techniques and Dressing Styles (Frank Amato Publications). Leeson lives in Corvallis, Oregon; Schollmeyer lives in Salem, Oregon.

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