Removing feathers from wings.

[Mike-Connor]

People ask questions in various place, and per e-mail. The answers, ( as far as I know them of course!), may be useful to others. Here is such an answer.

The question was,

Quote

Last time I tried to remove feathers from wings I just destroyed some of them. When you buy them the quills are undamaged. I have 2 turkey wings I want to remove the feathers from. How do you do it with out damage to the quills or barbs???

UNQUOTE

They are only relatively easy to remove on fresh wings, without any preparation.

On older wings, soak the wings in hand hot soapy water for ( at least) ten minutes. This loosens the quills. Most feathers will then come out easily.

Hold the wing flat on a solid surface and clamp it with your hand. Grasp the quill at the base of the feather with pointed nose pliers to remove it.

Once removed, rinse thoroughly and allow to dry. If the wing feather fibres have been disturbed by removal, simply agitating them in warm water will usually restore them, and then simply allow them to dry naturally.

Paired quills should be matched and packaged as soon as they are dry.

The SAME primary or secondary flight feather. from right and left, are usually pretty good matches. This gives you better and more uniform slip wings, and also avoids wastage, as you may need to take slips from various areas on unmatched pairs to get a good slip match! This can result in wasting half or more of each feather!!!

Also, slips taken from various parts of the feather have varying curves and elastic modulus, which can ( WILL!) result in unbalanced wings.

This can be very bad indeed on non paired feathers with graduated shades and markings. I don't suppose the fish actually care much, but some fly-dressers might! =)

Just as an added note, in order to avoid wasting such wing feathers, I often use the "remains" after making matched wing slips, for single or double rolled wings. Any of them may be used for bunch wings of course. ( Which is what they all eventually devolve into anyway, and then they catch more fish!!!).

The only other method which works reliably on dried out wings, is to bend the feather at the base until it is at a right angle to the wing, and cut it close to the base. This has to be done with care of course, but it works well enough.

There is no advantage in keeping the quill portion of the feather intact. The "Quill" is only the base of the feather, properly known as the Calamus;




For optimal results, and damage avoidance, start removing the undercoverts first with the wing held upper side down, and starting from the outside, ( primary side) of the wing ( Remove the feathers from the underside). This is to expose the bases of the primaries and secondaries, and avoid damage. Of course, you may wish to use the undercoverts for something as well. The "Satins" ( Greater undercoverts) on duck wings are very useful on a lot of flies.

This is a Mallard underwing;



These are the feather positions involved;



TL
MC