August 2008 'Autumns on the Spey' 16 flies tied by 16 great tyers

Having recently set my sights on Local flies I have been looking to Charlie Dickson, Damian Welsh, Mike Boyer and Ari- Heikki Rintaniemi for inspiration and very much enjoying this new angle. Then I heard about a little known but well loved book called Autumns on the Spey by A E Knox prized for its plates and patterns of 16 Spey flies......... I put the word out and within two days I had my list of tyers... it was thrilling.

Quite a few I have worked with before l, I knew they were well up to the mark and already favourite tyers of mine .

I wanted a high level of expertise in these so askedScotsmen Philip Glendinning and Scotsman Davie McPhail and for the authentic real deal. John Shewey widely acknowledged worldwide as an authority on Speys and Henrik Strandgaard, who tyed the beauties in the FlyFishers Classic Library reprint and also an authority on this book.

Then there were tyers that I have been wanting to work with for a while, fellows who would provide a bit of gold dust, highly talented , respected and recommended tyers, Bud Guidry, Alberto Calzolari, Edward Muzeroll, Frank Swarner III, Dave Kline, David Burns and Bob Fransden , who had just sent a collection of Knox's Speys to Steve Thornton for his 3rd Volume of world Tyers.

Most important are characters who will provide what I think of as the soul and spirit that I want so much to retain from the original book. Jens Lund Adamsen, it was his post on the classic flytying forum that sold me on wanting to illustrate these lovely enigmatic flies.

These are my collaborators on this project a wide range of nationalities, experience and Notoriety!!!!!!

Its great to see the project evolving openly on the Internet, A gobal community of people interested in these flies.Check out the forums below if youre interested and post a comment too if you like.

http://www.classicflytying.com

http://speypages.com/speyclave

The charity :

casting for recovery.usa and casting for recovery uk

Charlie Dickson 'Culdrain'.... Beauty

The Glorious Summer of 2008 .......................is how we will remember this summer

Sebastian Letelier, a brilliant flytyer from Chile came to stay! and what fun its turned out to be.

I first heard of him through Jens Pilgaard two years ago at the Newark show, Jens recommended him as one of the best fly dressing talents around, I made contact pretty soon after that and when I heard that Sebastian was coming to Scotland I thought it was too good a chance to miss and lured him to stay with me and Andy with tales of the Spey, Deveron and Dee. It was easy!!! :-)))

So my honoured guest arrived . First of all organised a conclave to welcome him to Scotland, it was short notice but a possie of Tyers from Aberdeen arrived. Philip Glendinning, Mike Townend and Chris Western as well as local fishers ghillies and friends. Phillip brought some amazing... I'll say it again , amazing flies. Speys, great to see them dislayed so beautifully in 3d and the ones I had been looking for, patterns from The 'Autumns' book !!!! ...and some Dees... hmmmmmmm very interesting:-))))) Ian Collie brought his museum collection ( see the table display below) I was happy to be able to talk to loads of folk about my work and everyone wanted to talk to Sebastian. It was a beautiful sunny day on the Field of Dreams at Drummuir in whats turned out to be a glorious Summer.

We have been out and about Moray and Aberdeen showing Sebastian the Deveron, Dee, Donn ,of course the Spey and we met some brilliant folk along the river banks. Like Turriff fishing Asssociation waters, where we met brilliant Jim Lorimer and half the Association fishers, I took my 'Autumns on the Spey' with me but only read two pages for all the sites and chat at the riverbank. Sebastian took a trip to the Dee and came back with tales of the river and people met.Wherever Sebastian went he found people interested and out to help him all they could, He certainly has made lots of friends.

Sebastian has caught two grilse, everyone says theyre there but just not taking, the hot weather probably doesnt help, still I know he's really enjoying his time in Scotland and we have one chance left.......

Sebastian has been a big inspiration, given me lots of good ideas about future projects. So a big thank you Sebastian you can call this corner of Moray your second home and come again any time, I would be sad except know that we will all meet again soon at the BFFI in Stoke on Trent in November.