The Renegade

While fly fishing is often called the ultimate accessory sport, and we do carry a lot of ‘stuff’, it has now become an upgrade sport. Every year we are bombarded with advertising for the ‘latest and greatest’. Rods, reels, lines, gadgets… we have been conditioned that new is better — you improve by upgrading.

Now I’m not averse to new things, and fly tying is not immune. There are always new patterns and new materials to try out. But this endless stream of ‘new’ does eventually drown out the ‘old’.

Fly patterns are particularly susceptible to this. The attraction of new patterns leads old ones to be forgotten over time. Even though they were still successful patterns, the allure that a new one might just be better wins out.

One of these lost patterns is a fore-and-aft style fly, with two hackles — one front, one back. The Renegade was created in the late 1920’s by Taylor Williams, a fly shop owner and guide in the Sun Valley area of Idaho. Rather than a specific representation, the Renegade is an attractor style fly, a generalist pattern that ticks enough boxes to appeal to the trout’s opportunistic nature.

Initially it was caddis hatches that gained it a following. The white hackle giving excellent visibility in low light, while the double hackle allowed the fly to be skated across fast water, eliciting slashing takes from cutthroat trout. It reportedly became a favourite of Ernest Hemingway, a close friend of Williams.

As its popularity spread across the western United States it found success as a midge cluster on lakes and a generalist searching pattern on the streams, first as a dry, then later a successful wet pattern.

A small Renegade is perfect for calm days on the lakes. Covering everything from midge hatches to small beetles, and even the small floating snails that appear as the water begins to warm.

Begin the Renegade by wrapping your thread down the hook shank. At the rear of the shank, tie in some gold tinsel. Form a neat tag by wrapping four or five turns down the hook bend, then wrap back up and tie off. If your tinsel is silver on one side and gold on the other, tie it in with the silver side facing out towards you. As you begin to wrap, the tinsel will flip over leaving the gold side facing outwards.

Select a brown hackle and tie it in at the rear of the shank. Wrap forward, with four touching turns, then secure and trim any excess. Size is a personal preference; many recipes call for smaller than the front hackle while others call for larger. If you skate flies down-and-across, a larger hackle at the rear balances the fly on the water better. I generally aim for similar size hackles. If you are concerned about the hackle obscuring the hook point you can trim a small V out of the hackle after wrapping.

The body of the fly is peacock herl. You can, as many recipes suggest, tie in a single good quality herl and wrap it forward like a mini hackle. This produces a lovely even body that looks amazing, particularly in photos, but is too fragile for my liking. A few visits to the streamside vegetation, or a nick from the trout’s teeth, and the whole body unravels.

While you can reinforce the herl by adding a rib, it will crush some of the hackle barbs, detracting from the overall look. I prefer to tie all my peacock bodies using a dubbing loop. This produces a strong, even body with the herl reinforced from within by the tying thread. Even if the herl is broken it does not unravel.

Begin the body by forming a loop of thread in front of the rear hackle. Select three peacock herls and tie them in by their tips at the same point. Then carefully, without pulling on the herls, hold the bottom of the thread loop and the herls together and twist.

As you begin to twist it will look quite messy, but as the twist tightens the herl will even up, forming a neat peacock herl rope. Wrap this rope forward in close turns up the hook shank forming the body. Tie off securely 3 or 4 mm short of the hook eye and trim any excess.

Select a white or cream hackle for the front and tie in where the body ends. Wrap the hackle forward to just behind the hook eye, then secure and trim away any excess. Form a small head with your tying thread, then a neat whip finish to end.

At 100 years old, the Renegade is almost old enough to be new again. Certainly worthy of a few spots in your fly box for the next time you are on the water wondering what to tie on.

As with all great patterns there are numerous variations. Using softer hen hackles allow it to be fished wet. Adding red floss to the centre of the peacock herl gives you a Royal Renegade, just as successful as its namesake on the small streams. Or perhaps a Double Renegade, with a white hackle in the middle and brown at either end, for something a little larger during heavy midge hatches.

There is even a Reversed Renegade, with the brown and white hackles swapped. Not sure this makes a great deal of difference to the pattern, but it is a perfect example that the appeal of the latest and greatest has been around forever… Reversing the hackles makes all the difference! I’ll take a dozen.

HOOK: Tiemco TMC900BL #14

Thread: Semperfli nanosilk 50D, Black

Tag: Veevus Holo-Tinsel T03, small

Rear hackle: Brown

Body: Peacock herl

Front hackle: White or Cream

TYING STEPS

the renegade

1. Wrap thread base and tie in tinsel.

2. Secure rear brown hackle.

3. Wrap hackle forward and tie off.

4. Form dubbing loop and tie in herl.

5. Twist loop and herl together.

6. Wrap herl rope forward to form body.

7. Tie in front white hackle.

8. Wrap hackle and whip finish.