The first tube fly was made in 1932

European anglers and, in particular, anglers in Scandinavia benefit significantly from the properties of the tube fly and have, through the last 50 years, worked progressively with the design of tube fly. But who made the first tube fly?

In his book The Angler And The Thread Line, the British author and angler Mr Alexander Wanless, from 1932, put forward his idea of the sliding fly (the first tube fly) from his series of flies called the: Thread Line Salmon Series..  Mr Wanless made the sliding fly and the other flies to be used with the lightweight spinning gear he used in his fishing for salmon. Read more about Alexander Wanless and the first tube fly

The tube fly solved big problems.

Until the birth of the tube fly, salmon anglers were left to use massive single hook flies for their early fishing. Giants of size 6/0 – 12/0 were not uncommon and must have been terrible

to cast, let alone horrible to be hit in the neck while casting.

Huge 11/0 Garry Dog made for early season fishing. This one is from Fly tying company Redparth on Tweed 1940s

One of the biggest problems with big single hooks was that anglers would lose most of the fish to problems with leverage. Read about the difficulties of leverage