Fly Tying Feathers

Fly tying feathers. Feathers of all kinds including dry fly hackle, saddle hackle, peacock feathers, rhea intruder feathers, marabou, chicken feathers, soft hackle, Whiting Farms, mallard, CDC feathers, duck feathers, coq de leon, pheasant tails, golden pheasant, and schlappen from Hareline, Wapsi, Natures Spirit and many more!

Since the dawn of fly tying, feathers have been used on hooks to mimic insects and other offerings for fly fishing. Feathers provide a natural movement to a streamer, allow a dry fly to float nice and high and others can be wrapped around the shank to add color. While chicken hackle is most often and widely used, there are other feathers that play a major role in crafting flies.

Below is a breakdown of the most commonly used feathers for fly tying.

Chicken Feathers: Chicken feathers are mostly used as dry fly hackle, wet fly hackle, or schlappen. Neck hackle is more popular than saddle hackle as a wide range of hook sizes accommodated from one neck (or cape). Saddle hackle has a longer, more streamline taper that is usually best good in the 12-16 hook size ranges. Saddles offer more “usable” feather as they are long and consistent. Whiting Farms leads the industry in fly tying chicken feathers. Schlappen is a tail feather that has long soft barbs and is mostly used on wet flies and streamer patterns. Brahma Hen or hen saddles are the perfect feather for hackles on soft hackle flies and many nymph patterns. Check out the Whiting Farms Bugger Packs for all your woolly Bugger hackling needs.

Duck Feathers: Duck offers both wet and dry fly products. CDC is very common as parachute posts and wings on dry flies as the CDC repels water. Mallard flank is used on wet flies, wings on dry flies, collars on steelhead flies, and more. Woodduck feathers have many uses that include on both wet and dry fly patterns.

Peacock Feathers: Massively popular on a verity of flies. Peacock herl is typically wrapped around the hook shank to build bodies or thorax areas on nymphs. Peacock swords are the tails on the popular Zug Bug. Other peacock products are; Blue peacock feathers, peacock eye sticks and stripped peacock quills used for Euro Nymph bodies.

Turkey Feathers: Turkey wings and tail feathers are the most used on the bird. Mostly used in trout flies such as the Hears Ear and for wing cases. Turkey biots are commonly used for wrapped bodies on nymphs and dry flies. Either turkey or goose biots can be used as tails on flies like the Copper John and Prince Nymph. Turkey flats are often used for winging dry flies such as the popular Thorax -style of dry flies.

Pheasant Feathers: Pheasant tails are used widely across the industry for trout flies and come in a selection of colors. While golden pheasant is popular in the steelhead and Atlantic salmon category. While the pheasant tail is probably the most common pheasant feather used in fly tying, the pheasant flank feathers and rump feathers are commonly used as long, wispy hackle on patterns like the Carey Special or even Spey hackle on small Spey flies.