Parachute Adams

Parachute Adams

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Tying Instructions

1. Secure the TMC 100 or any light wire 1X Dry fly hook to the vise. Debarb the hook by pressing down on the barb with your hemostats. The Parachute Adams can be tied with either Black or Gray thread. I am using 6/0 Danville for a size 16 but will use 8/0 for sizes 18 and smaller. Attach the thread behind the eye and lay a thread base to the bend of the hook. This thread base will help keep the material from shifting on the shank.

2. Select two tailing hackles, one a grizzly and the other a brown. Tailing hackles, also known as Spade hackles, come from the edges of your cape. The fibers are stiffer and glassy. Massage the fibers back along the quill stem to ascertain length and clip those you want for the tail. You want about 15-20 fibers for the tailing material.

3. Match up the tailing tips the best you can. I like to use a small hair stacker to even the tips. The tail should be about the same length as the shank.

4. Secure the fibers to the top of the hook shank with thread wraps.

5. Cut a 1″ strand of Polypropylene floating yarn. Using about a quarter of the strand, this should be about the number of fibers you need for a wingpost. Attach the fibers at the 60-70% position of the shank. This would be a position that is midway between the eye and the point of the hook.

6. Apply some cross wraps that will separate the fiber bundles like a spinner wing. This will give the post a good base support off the shank.

7. Bring the fibers together and create a wingpost base with thread wraps. I find that rotating the wingpost towards me allows for better thread control for my wrapping. You can use your other hand to hold the wing material to help stiffen the post for wrapping. Take a couple of wraps around the shank to secure the post wraps.

8. Bring the fly upright on the vise again. You can apply a few more wraps to support the base. The base support should be about 1mm tall, just tall enough to handle 6-8 turns of hackle.

9. Prepare two hackles, one a Grizzly and the other a Brown sized for the hook. The base fibers are cut near the quill creating some nubs that assist in securing the hackle to the wingpost.

10. Secure the the first hackle to the hook shank below the wingpost with the glossy side of the hackle facing the wingpost material. Secure the hackle quill to the wingpost up to the top of the threaded base.

11. Attach the second hackle in the same manner as the first with both hackles secured in the same position alongside the wingpost. You will be wrapping both hackles simultaneously so you need a stout wingpost base.

12.Now is a good time to apply some dubbing to the abdomen. Bring the thread close to the tail tie-in position and apply the Superfine dubbing to the thread.

13. Wrap the dubbing forward to the base of the wingpost creating a tapered abdomen.

14.Next, wrap a small thorax with some criss cross wraps around the wingpost and a couple of wraps in front of the wingpost. Leave a space behind the eye of the hook to secure the hackle once you completed the wrapping.

15. You can wrap the hackles either one at a time or together as long as you have control over their placement around the hook shank. I am wrapping the two hackles together starting the wraps near the top of the wingpost base and wrapping successive wraps underneath the previous one.
About 3 turns is all you need for a fully dressed parachute hackle. This is provide adequate floatation for the pattern. On the last turn bring the hackles over the eye of the hook with the quills against the shank.

16 .I like to turn the fly in the vise with the bottom of the fly facing me. The hackles are secured to the side of the shank just behind the eye. Apply two wraps to secure the hackles and trim off the hackle tag ends. Bring your fly upright in the vise again and lift the hackles in front of the eye wrapping the thread to create a head and secure the tag ends of the hackles. I apply a few half hitches to secure the thread and then use a Whip Finish.

17. A little head cement to the head offers additional support against unraveled thread. Trim off any errant fibers and you are ready to go. Some will trim the wing into a Mayfly wing silhouette. Note the proportions of the fly. The wingpost is trimmed to about the same length as the hook shank and the tail. The parachute hackle fibers just reach the base of the tail and are firmly wrapped at the bottom of the wingpost.

Materials to Order Material, click the link
Hook	Tiemco 100 #12-20
Thread	Danville Black or Gray 6/0
Body	Adams Gray Superfine
Tail	Grizzly and Brown Spade Hackle Fibers
Wingpost	White Polypropylene Floating Yarn
Hackle	Grizzly and Brown Hackle

Parachute Adams

The Parachute Adams does so well on it’s own that often it can be considered upon it’s own merits rather than just a variation of the original Adams fly designed by Leonard Halladay in 1922. One problem with the Adams is that it is difficult to see with the grizzly and brown hackles. The use of a parachute helps in sighting the fly but also in lowering its into the surface film.

Helen Todd

The Parachute technique is generally attributed to a young Scottish fly tier by the name of Helen Todd. She came up with the idea of wrapping horizontally after reading an American Fly Fishing Magazine that described tying the hackle “divided and spent”. A horizontal wrapping of the hackle would achieve the same effect. She used stiff pig bristles for the wing post. However, her employer Alexander Martin, designed a hook with a metal post to wrap the hackle horizontally and patented the hook in 1931. Martin owned a tackle shop in Glasgow that was established in 1778.

Gyrofly

At the same time, William Avery Brush of Detroit, Michigan also filed a patent for the same type of metal post hook but his patent was not approved until three years later. Brush licensed the hook design to A.C. Mills, a tackle company that Ray Bergman tied flies for and the Parachute Adams was one of the original parachute flies that was referred to as a “Gyrofly” in the 1930’s by A.C. Mills of New York. In Bergman’s book “Trout” (1938) he described the parachute technique with the Ginger Quill Gyro. Unfortunately, both hooks were too heavy, did not float well, and fell out of favor.

Hackle Quill Wing Post

At the same time, Helen Todd continued to use hackle quills for the wing post. On the Parachute Adams, a Grizzly Hackle was used as the wing post and the Grizzly and Brown hackle was wrapped around it. It took another forty years when Swisher and Richards published their book, “Selective Trout” and suggested using Deer or Calf Hair as a wing post in 1971 that the Parachute technique became popular.

Other Wing Post materials

Today, many use Floating Polypropylene yarn, Antron, Calf Tail, Turkey Flats for the wing post. Andre Puyans of Walnut Creek, CA introduced a loop wing style to the fly using Mallard Flank which gave the fly a better mayfly silhouette. The ParaWulff Adams is an adaptation of the Para Wulff pattern designed by Jack Dennis. Adding split Wulff style wings to the Adams, making this fly is even more visible on the water! It is a great imitation for callibaetis. The split tail gives the fly a more realistic profile and the flashy mylar rib adds a lifelike segmenting that fish can’t pass up.

Female Parachute Adams

Hook	Tiemco 100 #12-20
Thread	Danville Black or Gray 6/0
Body	Adams Gray Superfine
Egg Sack	Pale Yellow Superfine
Tail	Grizzly and Brown Spade Hackle Fibers
Wingpost	White Turkey Flat
Hackle	Grizzly and Brown Hackle

Parachute Adams, Loopwing

Hook	Tiemco 100 #12-20
Thread	Danville Black or Gray 6/0
Body	Adams Gray Superfine
Tail	Grizzly and Brown Hackle Fibers
Wingpost	6-8 Mallard Flank Fibers
Hackle	Grizzly and Brown Hackle

ParaWulff Adams

Hook	Tiemco 100sp-bl #12-18
Thread	Veevus 14/0 Dark Gray
Body	Adams Gray Superfine
Ribbing	Pearl Krystal Flash
Tail	Dun Microfibbettssplit
Wingpost	White Calf Body Hairsplit
Hackle	Brown dyed Grizzly Hackle