TACTICAL 185 



about that sinking without drowning the fly. In fact, 

 anglers have been seeking something the converse of the 

 wet-fly oil tip — invented by Mr. C. A. M. Skues, till 1917 

 the Secretary of the Fly-Fishers' Club. There the gut was 

 paraffined down to the last link, or two links, to make it 

 float, while the fly, constructed to sink, and the last link 

 or two, drawn down by the fly, sank. Now, with a fly con- 

 structed to float, something is wanted to make the portion 

 of the cast nearest to the fly sink. Some have even sug- 

 gested that the whole of the gut should sink, on the ground 

 that floating guts cast a considerable and unnatural shadow 

 on sand or gravel bottoms, whereas the shadow cast by 

 sunken gut is so small as to be almost negligible. It is 

 probable that on weeds the shadow from floating gut is 

 much less noticeable. If, however, the fly is to float, it is 

 conceived that the current operating on a sunken line 

 would set up drag much sooner than it would if the line 

 were floating, at any rate, in the case of a cross-stream 

 cast. One ingenious theorist challenges that proposition, 

 suggesting that the deeper the cast sinks the slower moving 

 is the stratum of water in which it is suspended; ergo, in 

 a cross-stream cast the deeper the middle of the line is 

 sunk the more easily will the fly on the other side keep 

 pace with it. 



It is unnecessary, however, for the present purposes to 

 reach a positive conclusion in this question. The first 

 thing is to discover what agents will cause the gut to 

 sink without drowning the fly. Several alternative sugges- 

 tions have been made. The first was no doubt due to the 

 attempt to preserve gut in glycerine. This undoubtedly 

 will sink gut immediately after application, but it soon 

 washes off. Raw potato was another suggestion, but the 

 writer was not greatly impressed with the result of the 

 experiment. Doubtless there are many vegetable juices 



24 



