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3. Sparkle Dun vs Compara-dun

Hey! Didn't anyone read Spence's post above?! :)

Can anyone tell me the difference between these two flies other than the use of an Antron/Zlon/synthetic trailing shuck on the Sparkle Dun to a traditional hair or fiber tail on the Compara-dun?

I think the original was the "Haystack" -with deer hair tail. I also THINK it was an Adirondack NY pattern -possibly Fran Betters??

Sparkle Dun Emerger

Hook: TMC 100

Thread: 6/0 danville, to compliment

Tail: zylon

Body: beaver fur

Wing: coastal deer or yearling elk hair

Notes: This pattern derives from Harry Darbee’s Haystack and the much later so-called “Comparadun” of Al Caucci and Bob Nastassi, Authors of the popular “Hatches”. Same function as the Hackle-Stacker, but for the larger sizes. Post the hair up by wrapping thread in between hair pulled back in small bunches 3 times before damming up front to prevent the wing from slanting forward during use.

The original Comparadun design was an early favorite non-traditional imitative dry fly for “matching the hatch”. It supplanted the No Hackle because it was easier to tie properly and it retained its visibility while floating much better on the rougher waters I usually fished like the Truckee. It was wildly successful, providing tremendous sport in the Truckee and Yuba drainages. Not much later, I dropped it completely until it was revived many years later by the Z-lon tail, making it a very good emerger or stillborn pattern. Why did I drop the Comparadun? Because as I made my first forays to the gentler waters of the Intermountain region between Shasta and Lassen, it proved very disappointing. It fell even further out of favor after being exposed to Bob Quigley’s magnificent parachute patterns. Even sparse traditional Catskill style dries usually outfished it!

One episode in particular is firmly etched in my mind even though it occurred 25 years ago when my best friend waxed my tail on Hat Creek. It was a beautiful late Spring day that always preceded wonderful hatches of size 16 Sulfurs once the sun left the water. I was armed with perfectly matching Comparaduns that had dun elk wings and pale creamy yellowish bodies highlighted with orange. As predicted, the hatch came off on queue when the sun kissed us goodbye as it dipped over the ridge. Our favorite stretch to fish this hatch was the water around the Hwy. 299 Bridge because the Browns there really focused on the duns and there were no competing hatches to distract them. Our other favorite water below Hat 2 through the Carbon Bridge stretch was always a little more complicated because the hatches were more diverse (especially those pesky caddis) and the fish were also more into the nymphs. It’s bad enough to have to pick from a bunch of dun imitations so it made no sense to worry about Hare’s Ear’s, Beaver A.P.’s and a variety of caddis pupa/adults if we didn’t have to. Spoiled? Yes, but keep in mind this stretch of Hat Creek in those years was lightly fished and chock full of big browns. Believe it or not, many weekday evenings we had this whole stretch to ourselves! Our theory then (which still holds up to this day) was that the prime nursery for these bugs was upstream from the bridge and they liked to float quit awhile before becoming airborne. Based on screening samples and observance, it was determined this particular hatch covered substantially more distance as a dun than as a hatching nymph. If you do the math, this means more duns on the surface than nymphs in the drift at any one location. The spread gets progressively larger as the hatching duns overlap themselves the further below the best hatching habitat you go until at the bottom edge of the hatch (where we were), all there are is duns! This is a lesson to keep in mind if you fish during hatches where the species is known to hatch quickly and yet seems to be spending a lot of time drying off before taking flight. It’s no coincidence in these circumstances that the further you work down a riffle or run, the more fish you’ll find receptive to the dry fly. An example of this is the March Brown that hatches on the lower Yuba or the canyon waters of the Rogue.

But I digress... Back to the story, I gave a few of these “sure killers” to him and assured they would be the medicine. With a nod of approval he tied one on as I turned to work my way upstream a ways so as to have enough water to work back (we had learned a few seasons earlier that casting upstream was futile here). Being stubborn, I worked that fly through refusal after countless refusal because of a few small fish that bolstered my confidence. “This fly is too perfect. It has to be my presentation!”, I thought. What was really going on was my pride as a "skilled hatchmaster” was trumping my pride as a "skilled presentationist”. With time running out and barely enough light to make a fly change, I finally turned to the tried and true Lt. Hendrickson in desperation. This is a Catskill pattern we had successfully used for years before the introduction of the modern “super imitators”. There was a nice fish working about six feet out about forty feet below me that I had been working over with the comparadun off and on for the last twenty minutes. That means I followed my usual routine of making presentations until I sensed I was disturbing him and then switched to another fish for awhile until he settled back into rhythm. Anyway, with the Hendrickson knotted on, I worked out line and let it go. A quick mend to set up the drift and... "Shoot! Too far outside. O.K., let it swing in to the bank… Don’t line him! Slowly strip it back… Good, now let’s try it again. Geez, there’s not much light left. There, that’s where I want it, now just a little mend. O.K., looks good, now feed, feed... Perfect... Come on, you misbegotten son of a carp, take it, take it... Yeah!"

What a way to end an evening of frustration. A selective 16 inch Brown is always a great elixir to message the ego. As I trudged back downstream in the advancing darkness, I could make out my buddy's silhouette as he landed a fish at least as big as mine. Before I could open my mouth he exclaimed, “Wow, you sure tie a a helluva fly. That’s at least the tenth fish and it still floats! The fish have been big enough that I’ve had to retie it on a couple of times and it still looks good!” “It’s the elk hair wing!”, I proudly replied, failing to suppress my pleasure that the Comparadun made me look smart at least in his eyes. “Elk hair? Nah… I knew I was getting good drifts so after the first half dozen refusals or so, I went back to one of your Lt. Hendersons or whatever you call ‘em.… That other fly of yours doesn’t work worth a damn!”

Looking back, I now believe the reason we liked this stretch of water so much was the probable reason for the Comparadun’s failure. Those fish were into pristine duns floating lightly on the water well downstream from the throes of their emergence. The Comparadun by comparison (pardon the pun) floated flush and heavy, looking too much like an emerger for their liking. Over the years, the hair wing proved far too coarse for such delicate conditions and selective fish.


Size Thread Tail Body Wing

1. Sulfur 14 cream brown sulfur dun elk
2. Drunella 8 - 14 yellow olive/brown *olive/green dk. dun
3. Drunella #2 8 - 14 olive olive/brown **olive dk. dun
3. Callibaetis 14 gray dun gray deer
4. March Brown 12 brown brown brown deer
5. PMD 14 cream brown PMD dun
6. Olive 14 olive olive/brown olive dun


* Ribbed w/ yellow super floss (spandex)
** Ribbed w/ brown super floss

There is also the controversy whether a taller wing, a prominent feature on a comparadun is a strike "trigger" Mike Lawson, in his study of a fishes window of view does not think it can be. A fish would not rise, in his opinion, because it sees the prominent wing first.

You've got me re-reading Lawson's SpringCreek book. I forget so much of the wealth of info in that fine book. Marinaro was Lawson's idol. He re-read Marinaro's books many times, and marveled at the insight Marinaro had at a time when few books on Spring Creek fishing were available. But Lawson differs with Marinaro on the wing being the trigger that comes into the fish's window first, because Lawson states that on flat water the mirror is the key to the rise. The fish sees the indentation in the surface from the legs, and body parts that extend below the surface..they see the bug approaching in reflection, and rise due to this rather than the wing in the mirror. Depth of the fish is a big factor on the size of the window, and what the fish sees. Thanks for gettin me ejucated!