Fibbet tail fibres

[brian]

I've been sitting tying a few flys up tonight, including some cdc olives which have fibbet tails, it is tricky to get them to sit correctly, but they do look good once they are in place. My question is though, do you think they necessary or is there a easier alternative that is just as good?

cheers

Brian. 

[haresear]

I think Fishtales uses paintbrush bristles (not the heavy duty ones, the artist's type). Sounds reasonable.
Last couple of seasons I've used olive or pearl Krystal flash and it seems to work ok too.

Alex

[haresear]

I'll get round to tying some duns and spinners fairly soon though.
Is the Krystal flash ok on these patterns and does gink take to it

It works for me Bri, even on hard fished waters . I don't think Gink will make much difference to its floating properties, which I imagine is all about surface tension and surface area rather than any intrinsic properties of the stuff itself. As for treating the fly, if you are Ginking the body, you may as well do the tail too.


Alex

[Fishtales]

I think Fishtales uses paintbrush bristles (not the heavy duty ones, the artist's type). Sounds reasonable.
Last couple of seasons I've used olive or pearl Krystal flash and it seems to work ok too.

Alex

It is draft excluder, Alex. The black brush type that goes on the bottom of doors.

[attachimg=1]

[haresear]

It is draft excluder, Alex. The black brush type that goes on the bottom of doors.

Thanks Sandy.

Alex

[haresear]

Alex , while i was buying some fly tying stuff for salmon fishing i came across really fine krystal flash , is this what you use or is it just the standard lure tail stuff.

I can't remember :?, but think it is the standard stuff Col. To be honest, I'm not sure if it is Veniards or a similar product. I'll have a look at the packaging tonight (if I still have it) when I get home and let you know.

Alex

[Fishtales]

I just remembered I have some old bristle shaving brushes that have some very nice fibres that would do tails although I haven't got round to trying them yet

[haresear]

while i was buying some fly tying stuff for salmon fishing i came across really fine krystal flash , is this what you use or is it just the standard lure tail stuff.

I just checked my sparkly stuff Col. It looks like standard thickness to me. Although I use Krystal Flash too, the stuff I've been using lately is actually Flashabou Accent, which is quite similar.

Alex 

[Clan Ford]

This wont surprise a lot of you but I also use sparkly tails on some of my dries but the place where I think I noticed most difference in my catch rate was when I started using them on spiders.  It seemsed to make a real difference

Norm 

[haresear]

This wont surprise a lot of you but I also use sparkly tails on some of my dries but the place where I think I noticed most difference in my catch rate was when I started using them on spiders.  It seemsed to make a real difference

Norm 

That's how I started too. I was looking for something unbreakable and not too stiff, so thought I'd try Krystalflash. At that time I only had the stuff in "pearl" for salmon flies, but thought I'd try it as it was. If it didn't work, I could easily dull it down with a permanent marker.
It did work 

I then tried it on dries and lo and behold, it worked on them too.

I now have the stuff in various colours and it is my standard tail material for dries and nymphs. I use black, pearl or copper mostly. It isn't a magic bullet, but it seems to do ok even on hard fished waters and is unbreakable but flexible, which is the original reason for me trying it.

I can see how the flashy stuff may be an attention grabber on nymphs, but on dries my underwater photos (lost, I think) show that it just presents a silhouette, just like other materials.

Alex