Horsetail Quill Bodies

[William Anderson]

If I had taken a bit more care I could have tied prettier bodies, but these were the best of the sets. The horsetail should have been a really easy hair to tie neatly as a quill, but I seemed to have a couple gaps in each one. Not that it matters, you just like to look your best on picture day. At least wear a clean shirt, etc.

This is the lightest hair over brown 14/0, mole thorax and grouse hackle. Daiichi 1550


This is the more amber toned hair, same thread, mole and grouse. Daiichi 1550


And the two tied as an alternating quill body on a Daiichi 1180 dry fly hook.


w

[willowhead]

Very, Very, VERY nice.

[hankaye]

Dub-ya, Howdy;

That bottom one knocked it clear outta the Park...

Beautiful fly.

The other 2 are great in their own rights.

hank

[michaelgmcgraw]

Even with the slight bobble in the rear of the body I choose the middle one. It feels like a fish catcher.

[tie2fish]

I'll vouch for William's timing on his use of horsehair ... he mentioned to me trying it out almost two weeks ago. In any event, it appears to be a useful material in the construction of fly bodies, as the pix of both William's and CB's patterns prove. I'm sure it was much more widely used in the days of yore when it was available just about anywhere. As a matter of fact, I seem to recall a thread on this forum in the not-too-distant past about using it, and suggestions from members about where it can be obtained, including the bows used to play stringed instruments, etc.
Both these dressings and the photographs are excellent, William, and I'm not surprised that you encountered some minor difficuilties in getting this material to align just so; I tried wrapping a quill type body using a whisker from our black cat, and was both shocked and disappointed when I viewed the uneven result in a macro photo. Perhaps there's some combination of physical properties that causes it to not easily "nest" with itself? Regardless, it has a nice translucent quality to it, and the colors create very realistic looking "bugs".

[CreationBear]

Great minds, indeed: very spiffy. A question: my assumption would be that Super Glue etc. as an adhesive/coating would be a no-go the way it is for hair wings, but do you think SHAN would serve any purpose?

[William Anderson]

I've put a bit of SHHAN under peacock quills, but I didn't make an effort to adhere these fibers down. The bodies are bulletproof, so they didn't need the help. Keeping the wraps perfect would have been nice and with some practice (more practice) I'm sure it would be simple enough. Superglue would probably do it. A flat floss underbody would be interesting and might help as well. But that's an extra material in the recipe, and you know how I feel about that. Besides, I'm in a "irregular body" phase I guess. Wait til you see what I come up with for the swap. Irregular even for a flymph.

[CreationBear]

Wait til you see what I come up with for the swap. Irregular even for a flymph.

What, no objets d'art? All to the good, in my mind--whenever is Nature tidy? Most everything that ventures into my high-gradient streams ends up lookinh rode-hard-and-put-up-wet...the fishermen not the least.

[William Anderson]

Wait til you see what I come up with for the swap. Irregular even for a flymph.

What, no objets d'art? All to the good, in my mind--whenever is Nature tidy? Most everything that ventures into my high-gradient streams ends up lookinh rode-hard-and-put-up-wet...the fishermen not the least.

Since when does irregular preclude art or tidyness?

[letumgo]

Lovely flies, William. I got to play with some horese hair a while back, thanks to our friend REE. I remember learning the same lessons. I found that the hair moves around a bit as it tries to follow the underlying wraps. After playing around with it, I found I got the best results by keeping a firm (slightly rearward) tension, while making the wraps. Those tiny spaces ain't nothing to worry about in a fishing fly. If your photography wasn't so damn good, they wouldn't even be visible.