The first time I took a fly pattern to a manufacturer was back in 1980, and since then I’ve submitted many, many more. For me it was a relatively easy process because there were very few people submitting new patterns at that time; now, as an established fly designer (and a shop owner for more than 30 years) it’s even less of a chore.

On arrival for my first visit to Belize’s Turneffe Atoll, I stepped off the boat a little dazed, partially from a long day of travel from the West Coast, and partly from the six or so Belikin beers I’d consumed en route. After fishing my laptop out of the drink (a result of those aforementioned Belikins), I shamefacedly shambled toward the main lodge where I was greeted by a short, trim gringo with a soft voice and even quieter demeanor—Craig Hayes, Turneffe Flats’ proprietor.

Most sporting art, especially angling art, has a practical purpose or function. Painters, photographers and printmakers try to capture a moment in time and preserve memories. Sculptors recreate objects cherished by anglers, be they fish or fly. Rod makers, net makers, boat builders and fly tiers create the tools with which we pursue our passion.

The cree cape is a vibrant tweed, splashed with tints of red, white and black. Finding the origin of the term “cree” is nearly as difficult as finding a quality cree. Apparently, the truncated word was, at times, applied to creel. Creel (or crele), a label given to a rare Old English game fowl, is a bicolor hackle with white and red bars. Today we call the creel color a ginger grizzly. Evidently, through time the cree became a tricolor, a creel with black bars. Cree is a coloration, rather than a breed of bird. A simple description has worked in fly-tying: A cree is a tricolored hackle, with red and black on a white ground.

As a fly guy, one thing has always stood out to me—what freshwater fly fishers consider to be a large fly in comparison to gear guys who are setting big-fish records by throwing eight- to 12-inch swimbaits. It’s common knowledge that predatory fishes, given the opportunity, eat the biggest thing they can get their maws around. Why, I wondered, don’t more fly fishers take advantage of the big-fly/big-fish equation?

We all know that downstream presentations and feeding slack are necessary when fishing dry flies over snotty trout, those fish poking their noses out to sip small mayflies, caddis or midges on the smooth flats of such heavily-pestered waters as the Missouri in Montana, the Hiwassee in Tennessee, the Delaware in New York or Pennsylvania, and on and on, almost everywhere. If you fish such situations with upstream casts you show your line and leader to trout before they ever have a chance to examine your fly. You know what they do then. That’s why you take your position at an angle upstream from them, and make your casts downstream to them, laying excess slack line on the water and feeding it into the drift as needed to keep the fly floating freely, ahead of the spooky line and leader.