Need substitute

[Betty Hiner]

Woo hoo! Good point!

And one can never have too many feathers about!!

[JeffHamm]

Hi,

I was in the University of Manchester's museum the other day with my daughter while waiting for Vanessa to finish a meeting. There was a section on birds, one of which was a Tawny Owl. I had a look, then tried to find a Brown Owl to get an idea of what the feathers look like. Didn't find one. I see in Donald's post that he lists Tawny Owl along side Brown Owl, so I assume that indicates the two are similar enough as to be no difference.

I wish I had paid more attention now, and if I get a chance to go back I will. However, what I do recall is that the colouration is reddish brown and white. Pheasant and woodcock are mottled reddish brown and black. I know I have some cheap brown capes where the feathers turn white near the base (where the long soft fibres are) and so these might be a closer match. A "red variant" (think grizzle, but the markings are red/brown rather than black) might work ok too.

These, of course, are just suggestions for the colour matching and don't get around the issue of fibre quality that Hans mentioned.

- Jeff

[mickporter]

Are we definatly talking 'Brown owl'? Or do we mean 'Barn Owl'?

A tawny owl is a brown mottled bird but a barn owl is much paler almost white.

[Betty Hiner]

Hey, Mick!

Many of the flies Pritt ties (The North-Country Flies) use "the darkest part of a Brown Owl's wing", or "hackled with a feather from a Brown Owl's wing".
Betty

[JeffHamm]

Hi Mick,

Definately Brown Owl from Pritt's flies. The Tawny Owl I saw in the museum was quite white in the chest, and the wings were darker. I didn't get a chance to pull the feathers back and get a good look as it was behind glass and the museum curators were starting to get concerned! Anyway, with the amount of white on the bird, I would suspect that the wing feathers would also have white, especially near the base, so even the darkest feathers may be more "dark red/brown with white flecks/motteling" rather than the dark red/brown and black of woodcock and/or golden pheasant wings. However, as I say, I didn't examine it all that closely (because I didn't realise the Tawny and Brown Owl are similar/identical in look).

Curiously, I'm reading "Once a flyfisher", which is the fishing diary of Laurence Catlow from the UK. It appears this cronicles his 1999 season, and he mentions catching a few fish on a "Brown Owl", which is Pritt's 5th listed pattern, described as such:

Brown Owl
Hook 1 (which would be a 14)
Wings: hackled with the reddish feather from the outside of a brown owl's wing
Body : orange silk
head: peacock herl

I've tied similar using woodcock, but that becomes Pritt's 3rd pattern (winter brown).

- Jeff

[wsbailey]

It appears that there is a brown sub species of tawny owl.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tawny_Owl

This article gives brown owl as a synonym of tawny owl.

http://www.birdcheck.co.uk/main/prev...iewpage345.htm

More pictures:

http://www.stevenround-birdphotograp...awny%20Owl.htm

Bill