Angling aficionados and authors Chouinard, Mathews, and Mazzo come together again, this time to reveal the many wonders of the pheasant tail fly. In Simple Fly Fishing (Patagonia; 2014, 2018), they made the case for replacing unnecessary gear with knowledge and technique. Now, after years of additional experience, they offer the next step: the feather that can be used to tie flies from nymphs and dry flies to emergers, soft hackles, and beetles. Pheasant Tail Simplicity, conceived as an advanced follow-up to Simple Fly Fishing, explores the techniques required to tie and present these flies to trout and anadromous and saltwater species. More than just a guide, it challenges the norm that thousands of fly patterns are necessary to catch fish successfully.
Review by ITL-writer, David Lambroughton
Yvon Chouinard was kind enough to send me his new book, “Pheasant Tail Simplicity” that he coauthored with Craig Mathews and Mauro Mazzo and I liked it from page 1. It instantly reminded me of a book I use to check out in my Sunnyvale High School Library in California 50+ years ago, “The Art of Tying the Wet Fly and Fishing the Flymph” by Pete Hidy” which helped me get my feet wet in fly fishing and fly tying.
So when Y.C. mentioned this old book on page 26, it was a full circle moment for me. Both books help to simplify our approach to fly fishing and keeps our fly boxes loaded more with common sense and simple fly patterns and puts more onus on our approach, techniques and observations on the water instead of lugging a zillion flies around.
So who is this book for? It would be a nice gift for any angler and especially for that fishing buddy that arrives way too many fly boxes and wastes his time changing his flies way too often which always reminds me of that old politically incorrect saying, “It’s not the arrow but the Indian.” Another positive aspect of buying this book published by Patagonia is that all the profits go to environmental and conservation projects.
How cool is that…thumbs up!
