Marabou substitute - I think I may have found it!

[Malcolm]

I've been looking for a marabou substitute for years. I use marabou a lot and just love it's mobility but the flies don't last long and after a while even if they do not catch a fish they become thin and wispy. I bought a selection pack of winging materials from Foxy Tails and amongst the Arctic Fox, cashmere etc I came across a material called Tanuki Finn Racoon Pelt. So I tied up some medium size pike flies and this afternoon gave one of them a good long swim. It's very mobile and extremely fine and the good news is that it is much much more sturdy than marabou - a couple of jacks that would have shredded marabou still left me with a usable fly - not undamaged but in a much better state - the other thing is that it absorbs water unlike some other fibres so sinks well. I think the Arctic fox would also be reasonable but I'll try that out during the week.

It seems quite expensive but a little goes a long way - so whereas a single lure takes a lot of marabou a square inch of pelt will probably tie a dozen good sized lures. I used a mixture of guard hair and underfur but even the guard hairs are soft.

http://www.foxy-tails.co.uk/category-6/TFR101.html

they also do an offcut selection pack.

[Wildfisher]

Sounds good malcolm. Our Kiwi guide pal John swears by Arctic fox and no longer uses marabou

[Traditionalist]

I have used Arctic Fox for marabou type flies for a long time.  I also use it quite a lot on other streamers instead of bucktail, squirrel, etc.  Far more mobile, and a great deal more robust than marabou. It is of course a bit more expensive.

[Malcolm]

Well that's the Arctic Fox trial done. Not quite as mobile and doesn't soak up the water as well as the the Tanuki Finn Racoon Pelt. Still very good though. Cashmere tomorrow if the wee bit of loch that's unfrozen is still unfrozen tomorrow. But I think the cashmere might require some sort of material underneath the wing.

[Traditionalist]

Well that's the Arctic Fox trial done. Not quite as mobile and doesn't soak up the water as well as the the Tanuki Finn Racoon Pelt. Still very good though. Cashmere tomorrow if the wee bit of loch that's unfrozen is still unfrozen tomorrow. But I think the cashmere might require some sort of material underneath the wing.

Cashmere and other wools ( like Arctic sheep etc)  don't work very well, they tend to get all snaggled up.  This is even worse in salt water for some reason. I stopped using it.

[Malcolm]

That was my suspicion and why I thought it would need something like Nutria Hair underneath. Cashmere does feel great but it it's very lank.

[Traditionalist]

One of those things that look fine on the bench but just don't deliver in practice.  An underwing might help a bit but it wont stop the stuff snaggling. The Icelandic sheep is really bad for this, even with underwings. it wont combine with other stuff ( as part of a wing for instance) either, it just snaggles everything up in a short time once wet. Once it has tangled up you can't even comb it out. This is obviously due to the hair surface structure.