Posted By: kaboboom
Tying Green (for the environment) - 12/17/15 06:33 PM
Folks,
I am starting to become more conscious of building flies I'm not ashamed to be left in a fish, or a stream bed. Synthetic materials have been the rage of fly tying for the last several decades, and for good reasons with respect to catching fish. Nymphing is now more about getting the fly down fast, and Lead has been the material of choice for this until recently. While Tungsten can replaced Lead split-shot, this creates another "body" on the line, and that promotes snags and tangles. Sure, I can cast with split-shot, but I prefer to weight flies at the vice.
So I'd like to suggest/request from this forum to consider the question of whether some tying materials should be excluded for environmental reasons in the same regard that some people resist converting to fluorocarbon because of its inability to degrade over time.
Flies themselves are such small items. It may seem silly to impose such restrictions based on their tiny mass alone with so many other accepted offenses to our environment outside of our control. But maybe there is a principle to be upheld here, and maybe toxicity and/or biodegradability should become a criteria for the fly tying industry and its practitioners. We have always been a resourceful lot...should we not be concerned about the natural resources we visit to apply ourselves in this endeavor as well? Food for thought, at least for me.
I am starting to become more conscious of building flies I'm not ashamed to be left in a fish, or a stream bed. Synthetic materials have been the rage of fly tying for the last several decades, and for good reasons with respect to catching fish. Nymphing is now more about getting the fly down fast, and Lead has been the material of choice for this until recently. While Tungsten can replaced Lead split-shot, this creates another "body" on the line, and that promotes snags and tangles. Sure, I can cast with split-shot, but I prefer to weight flies at the vice.
So I'd like to suggest/request from this forum to consider the question of whether some tying materials should be excluded for environmental reasons in the same regard that some people resist converting to fluorocarbon because of its inability to degrade over time.
Flies themselves are such small items. It may seem silly to impose such restrictions based on their tiny mass alone with so many other accepted offenses to our environment outside of our control. But maybe there is a principle to be upheld here, and maybe toxicity and/or biodegradability should become a criteria for the fly tying industry and its practitioners. We have always been a resourceful lot...should we not be concerned about the natural resources we visit to apply ourselves in this endeavor as well? Food for thought, at least for me.