The long time subscriber may quickly notice a few of the articles in this issue have appeared once before. There were not many submissions for this issue. Rather than publishing a Salmon Flyer with only one article, I decided to augment the issue with some articles from issues that were published several years ago. While you might be familiar with these, perhaps a review of these timeless pieces on salmon fly wings by Wayne Luallen and Tom Juracek will provide some "new" insights into the techniques these two exceptional fly dressers use.

Perhaps, one has mastered these techniques or perhaps not. I can't help but remember a few years back reading about Jack Nicklaus in his book Golf My Way. Jack Nicklaus at the beginning of each season would take a lesson from his long time coach and mentor. He stated that each season he needed a "tune up" before the tour started, because during the off-season he would inevitably pick up a bad habit or two. And if it wasn't for the help of his mentor and coach he would not have identified problems with his swing and corrected them. Granted, mastering the techniques to dress salmon flies is not quite the same thing as mastering a golf swing--it is interesting to note, that perhaps, one of the greatest persons to ever play golf always needed to take a lesson at the beginning of the season. Essentially, Nicklaus felt that he was never good enough and needed to improve by going back to the basics. So with that premise in mind, perhaps these classics from previous issues might pique one's interest by providing a second look at methods for winging salmon flies that could enhance the beauty of the flies one now dresses.

Tom Juracek was not only very generous in allowing the Salmon Flyer to reprint his article on "A Cure for Sparse Wings"; but provided a segment from his website on Wings.

Overall, you will see that this issue is filled with information on winging a salmon fly. While, this issue focuses primarily on built wings and mixed wings, the upcoming Summer issue will focus on Dee, Spey, and full-feather wings. So hopefully, there is a subscriber or two that can share their skills with us on these wing styles.

On the subject of websites, there are several websites where one can access some very useful information on salmon flies and fly tying in general. As I stated earlier, Tom Juracek provided a segment from his website for this issue. Tom has some very useful information on salmon flies. Just about every aspect of dressing a fly can be found on Tom's website. In addition, here are three other website addresses where one can access information on salmon flies.

Wes Newman has a nice site that covers a wide variety of flies.

Michel Fontan has a very informative website that provides some very useful information on books and materials for salmon flies, along with other tips and techniques.

Steve Schweitzer also has a very nice site that provides a wealth of information on fly tying. For those that have an interest in steelhead patterns, Steve has a segment on using CDC for steelhead patterns that was provided by Marvin Nolte.

These are just a few of the websites out there in cyberspace for those folks that have access to the internet. For those folks that do not have access to these websites or others that are just as informative, I hope that I will be able to provide segments from these sites in the Salmon Flyer from time-to-time for everyone's enjoyment and benefit. I hope you will find this issue of the Salmon Flyer beneficial. I wish to thank all those that have contributed to its success.