why are dry fly hooks 'up'and wet ones 'down'?

In a word fashion!! and its as simple as that..Having said that down eyed hooks are easier to tie parachute hackled flies on..

Used to be that way 20 years ago and some people still believe it! All the trout fishers I know [and that's quite a lot] use downeyed hooks for all their flies.

Hope this helps,

Colin

Tradition, if you want to take the middle road use straight eyed hooks.

thanks,but all to do with tradition,seems more like a selling point for the manufacturers to me,if its only tradition.surely someone once said,"oh,i'll turn the eye up(or down)"why???

Could it be that the eye acts like the vane on a plug? Thus keeping the fly on top when you pull your line. Floatants were probably not so hot when tradition was invented.

Colin

Colin

Colin could be on the right lines here. I suppose a down eye would help to drag the wet fly beneath the surface and an up eye keep the line away from the dry fly to a certain extent. Never thought much about it before but its something to think about.