Polar Hair Dubbing?

[Eight Thumbs]

In a previous post, I mentioned that I had purchased a life-time supply of polar fiber in virtually ever color known to man. I recently tied up four dozen Clousers in four or five different color combinations. I found the Polar Fiber very easy to work with and I liked the looks of the finished flies.

My question is this. I took some of the sweepings of Polar Fiber and gave them a spin in the old coffee (dubbing) grinder. The result was a highly appealing dubbing which blended colors well and looked very easy to use. Does anyone use Polar Fiber left overs for dubbing? If so, do you find it suitable for dry flies and wet flies? With the huge number of colors available, this waste product dubbing looks very promising. As always, thanks in advance for any input. 8T

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You had better learn to be a happy camper. You only get one try at this campground and it's a real short camping season.

[lee sieckmann]

John Waite, Serious Fisherman Products, markets polar bear dubbing along with polar bear. Its relatively expensive and what he puts out looks to me to be a product comparable to seal dubbing and used in similar applications.

[Eight Thumbs]

Lee,

Thanks for the response to my question about polar fiber dubbing. It didn't seem to draw much attention from other readers. I am not sure that we are discussing the same material. The dubbing that I made was from polar fiber which is actually a glorified fake fur. No real polar bear hair involved. If the stuff that you mentioned is from a real polar bear, I'll bet it was expensive. Polar fiber is relatively cheap and if you can make your own dubbing from it, much cheaper than those $2 dubbing packs with 1/1,000,000th oz. in each. 8T

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You had better learn to be a happy camper. You only get one try at this campground and it's a real short camping season.

[Warmouth]

Polar Fiber (or Polar Fibre depending on the packing) is one of my favorite materials.
I use it for sinking flies mostly, but I have tied a few dries with it.
It dubs very well.
Wooly Boogers
Clousers
various streamers
Dragon and damselfly nymphs

those are my mainstays with the material.
Now if only it came in more colors.

Warmouth

[Eight Thumbs]

Hi Warmouth,

You're right, it is "Fibre." Never even noticed until you pointed it out. Unfortunately, spelling has never been one of my strong points.

Up until I tied all those Clousers (Clousre's ?), I had considered Polar Fibre only as a wing material. With the combing and cutting of the wings, I had so much scrap material that I just popped it in the coffee grinder for a couple of short bursts and got the best looking dubbing I have seen. In effect free dubbing. I couldn't believe how well the colors blended. Glad to hear that someone else has discovered the "other" use for Polar Fibre. Great Stuff. Thanks for your comments. 8T

[This message has been edited by Eight Thumbs (edited 26 March 2005).]

[Warmouth]

Actually, I have the packaging spelled both ways. Maybe it's a rare typo on one of them. I should've sold it on eBay.

Warmouth

[Philly]

Not a rare typo. Two different distributors.
The original was marketed as Polar Fibre and is still out there. I'm not sure what happen, but a second is now out under the name of Polar Fiber. Both come out of South Africa.
I use mainly white, coloring it with permanent markers, but I did save some of the white for dubbing but don't have much use for white dubbing. I'll have to dig around and see if I've got any other colors. If I do I just might turn them all into dubbing.