Park Shrimp Conehead

Ross Macdonald remembers the birth of his modern classic.

- Ross Macdonald

I REALISED A few weeks ago that it has been ten years since the Parky first hit the headlines. I can hardly believe where the time has gone, but I am pleased it has become an established favourite.

As I have often mentioned in this column, many patterns are created without deep thought – rather they are the result of having fun at the vice and trying new things, which in my case was usually to impress my dad.

Looking back, it’s tempting to ascribe the Parky’s success to my foresight but in truth I got lucky when I discovered Arctic runner. I think its mobility makes a big difference to the fly. The challenge was to use a soft hair in a Scottish-style long-tailed fly without it wrapping around the hook. After some trial and error, the answer was to tie in layers and the result was a tapered and highly mobile tail.