FLYMPH FORUM

So I was thinking I needed something for a fall caddis, kinda grayish looking. Wanting to use some fish getting natural material I decided on; black seal, red fox (u.s.) and the dark brown from the tail of an Aust possum. Threw those on the coffee grinder and added seal until I got what I was looking for. Tied one up using a dubbing loop and a barred dun hen, the darn thing looks pretty good.

I can picture it in my mind, and it looks really nice!

Now where do I get my hands on an Australian possum tail? I may need to introduce a sub.

Howdy All;

Thought possum tails was ne'ked sorta like a rat's...

hank

Bob, that sounds great. I've been fooling around with a number of 3 part blends lately, most including seal with hare mask or Aussie opossum and muskrat or mole. Muddies up the body with grades of courseness, but it's vet interesting in a spun loop on the block.

What is the opossum tail like?

hankaye wrote:Howdy All;

Thought possum tails was ne'ked sorta like a rat's...

hank

Hank that is your possum, not ours..... or more correctly the Australian version...... it is just over in Australia they are protected and you aint allowed to harm a hair on them there tails!
Here in NZ you cxan shoot or trap as many as you like when you like until you either get sick of it, gather enough, run out of night time or worse run out of .22lr ammo.

To give the critter it's full name it is an Australian Brushtailed Opossum. It does not "play dead", does carry its young on its back (after a nursing period in the marsoupial pouch) but there is only one young at a time (not several like the US version). The fur covers the tail except for the extreme underside and can be up to 2" long, usually black in colour and very hard to dye. It is similar to (worse than) Seal in properties, being quite stiff and springy.
These guys use their tail like a fifth foot and the skin on the bald underside it thick, tough and with texture. They wrap it around small branches whilst climbing and feeding as they will pluck leaves with their front feet, using them like hands to feed whilst maintaining their grip on the tree with the back feet and tail.

Mataura mayfly, Howdy;

Interesting, gonna have to look that up on Google or some
other search engine...
Thanks for that...

hank