"Wolfgang" wrote in message
...

"Daniel-San" wrote in message
m...

"Wolfgang" wrote in message
It would help to know what result your looking for and what you are
getting.

Wolfgang


Yep, s'pose that would be helpful info. Kinda hard to diagnose problems
without symptoms.

Anyway, I was tying up a buncha hare's ear nymphs and thought to add a
soft
hackle to a few. I'm tying it in by the barb (after stripping one side
and
flaring), and then wrapping. I'm getting a result that looks like I
tried
to
remove each barbule and tie it in individually. A lumpy, horrible
hackle.
Does not lay on the shank, has "ridges" in it, and generally looks like
crap.

Am I using the wrong part of the feather? I wondered this and clipped
about
half a feather and tied in as above. Results were better in terms of the
way
the hackle laid on the hook, but now the barbules are far too short.

"Soft hackle" is a pretty indistinct term. There are a number of ways to
apply body feathers to achieve various effects in soft hackle patterns.
Probably the most common, if that's what you're after (and I think
so.....but I'm still not certain), is to have the base ends of the bards
tied in at or near the hook eye, flaring back at a fairly shallow angle
with the tips pointing back toward the bend, and evenly distributed around
the hook shank. Since body feathers have many small barbules and
micro-barbules whose function is to hold the barbs together, they do not
separate cleanly and individually like good dry fly hackle......they tend
to
clump together in more or less random numbers. I assume this is what you
mean by looking "lumpy". If so, this is normal.....it's what it is
supposed
to look like.

As for technique, there are a number of ways to manipulate the feather and
still achieve pretty much the same effect. Neither stripping nor clipping
is necessary. I hold the feather by the tip with hackle pliers, trying to
get just enough to be able to tie in with. I then stroke all of the barbs
toward the butt end of the feather. At this point, all the barbs not held
by the pliers have separated into clumps, the center lines of which point
roughly perpendicular to the shaft of the feather. Holding the feather on
top of the hook shank with the tip end toward the eye and the butt end
toward the bend (making sure that the concave side....the side closest to
the bird's body in situ.....is down, thus forming a hill shape) and tie in
just behind the eye with three or four wraps. I then take from one to
three
turns with the feather and again tie off with a couple turns of thread.
Then, after stroking the barbs toward the back and holding them in place
against the hook shank, I take a few more turns against the tied in butt
ends of the barbs.....as many as it takes to keep them lying at the
desired
angle.

Looking back at your description just now, another interpretation of it
occurred to me. Is it possible that the lumps and ridges you refer to are
the result of holding the barbs against the hook shank and then wrapping
back over them? If so, you've gone too far. In the last step I described
above, the thread should be pushing the tied in ends of the barbs
back......it should not extend far enough back to cover them.

Wolfgang



Thanks! -- that worked perfectly.

Well, as perfectly as I'm capable of, anyway.

Much appreciated.

Dan