From Marc:

Happy New Year!

I learned to fish like the kids in the great movie "A River Runs Through It": Nearly 35 years ago - when I was a seven year old boy - my grandfather took me fishing for the first time . In France where we lived. I was allowed to catch little baitfish. Some years later - and with stronger arms - I caught my first trout and I remember it like yesterday. - The rod was 4 meters long, made out of Bamboo and the bait was a natural may-fly (Ephemera danica, imago) which had to be handled as carefully as a snow-flake. My first experiences of fly-fishing used an old split-cane rod of my grandfather and an even older line which had to be greased every five or ten casts! This was not a very efficient way to catch fish, but I learned a lot! In Switzerland, where I moved in 1978, I had my first contact with a cdc-fly. It was at a dinner among fishermen when my friend Bruno - who had poor eyesight - asked me to tie him a visible fly which floated nicely. Because I was very proud of that request and did not want to lose face I began a study of local cdc-flies. Those patterns used cdc-hackles, no wings and classical bodies made of silk or other materials. Worried, not wanting to copy those local flies, I developed a new concept of also tying the body with a cdc-feather: This product a perfect conical body, which floated even in riffles and rapids. Bruno and later many more fishermen in Europe, were very pleased with the simple but efficient new way to tie a fly. I have been a professional fly-tier since 1990 and today more and more anglers are convinced that those tiny and inconspicuous feathers are the best a fly fisherman can have wrapped around a hook: They are good for dry-flies, for emergers, for nymphs, for streamers and even for salmon flies or saltwater-patterns. I love them and think you will too!