Hi, this is my first post (new member). Can anyone please tell me if Pine Squirrel and Red Squirrel are one and the same? I am trying to locate a source for pine squirrel (fur or dubbing), since some patterns I want to try call specifically for pine squirrel.
Thanks, in advance, for your help.
According to Wikipedia, the American Red Squirrel is a species of Pine Squirrel, so it appears they are the same (unless you are talking about the European Squirrel): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_squirrel.
Welcome.
First of all welcome to FAOL,. new guys chop the wood, make the coffee and bring donuts. second is a source for what you seek
Eric
Welcome Aboard JimBob
I really don’t the answer( I always thought they were the same) I live in Maine, and recently received (red or pine) squirrel tails from a member on this site( HideHunter) and they are five times larger than any (red or pine) that I have ever gotten in Maine.
I’m sure someone will chime in on this topic, and clear it up for both of us lol lol
locally we call a pine squirrel a red squirrel and the bigger red colored squirrel that prefers hardwoods a fox squirrel. I think some people call this fox squirrel a red squirrel. The pine squirrel is closer in appearence to a chipmunk than a fox or grey squirrel.
… and welcome from Western Montana.
If you do go for pine squirrel, you might want to get a whole zonked skin from Wapsi or some other source. The zonkers are great for tying smaller, simple streamers, and there is usually plenty of unzonked skin to use for dubbing.
Some streamers using pine squirrel zonkers to consider are John Barr’s Slumpbuster, NightAngler’s Hibernator, or my PSC ( which is NightAngler’s streamer without the flash ).
Hope you enjoy your time on the Bulletin Board.
John
In properly improper terms, red squirrel and pine are the same. There is one other, the Douglas squirrel, on the west coast from BC to at least central CA, maybe farther, that is also a pine squirrel. They are the only two in the Genus IIRC and hard to tell apart. When I was in college many moons ago they had a few more species broken out, but they have been reassembled into two.
JimBob, if you care to abstain from chopping wood, making coffee, and bringing doughnuts, that ok.
Welcome aboard.
Ed
The red squirrels I am familiar with here in the east are small, slightly bigger than a chipmunk. The Pine squirrels skin that I got from Blue Ribbon Flies in West Yellowstone is larger than a gray squirrel.
I have made several of the Slumpbusters. I do not know what a NightAngler’s Hibernator is, and I looked it up. Do you have a pic with a recipe? I have both pine squirrel and red squirrel. The pine squirrel I have does not have as long of hair as the red squirrel does. I also have black, but it is dyed, so I do not know which squirrel variety it came from. Squirrel makes good flies in my opinion.
Kelly
… but here are some pics, for comparison.
The PSC, in sculpin olive.
The PSC, in brown.
The Hibernator, in olive and red and black and blue.
The Hibernator, in brown.
NightAngler had a way of winding polar chenile, I believe it was, with the pine squirrel as he wrapped it forward as a collar. He explained to me how he did it, but I couldn’t get the hang of it, so I just went back to using my PSC.
John
P.S. The fish pix are from the South Fork of the Snake in the late summer of '08.
Dear all,
Many Thanks for your help. Looks like this Bulletin Board and it’s members are going to be a great source for much useful info which I am sure to need in the future. I live in western NJ, about 2 miles from the PA border (Delaware River), and fish in both NJ and PA streams (I love the nearby limestoners in PA). My first love (after my wife & kids, of course) is fishing for wild, native brook trout in the freestone mountain streams, the kind I need to hike into, and are not stocked.
Best Regards,
JimBob
ps: Thanks form the awesome pics…
Hey Jimbob,
Welcome to the board. You will definitely enjoy it here. Lots of good info. Not sure if anyone told you were to locate pine squirrel. I orderer mine from Feathercraft http://www.feather-craft.com/ lots of great material there or Bob Mariotts also has them http://www.bobmarriotts.com/. Good luck.
Beaver
“in brown” – LOL – Isn’t that supposed to read “in a brown”?
JimBob,
You might also look into a former sponsor here, coffin creek furs (flytyingfurs.com). Full squirrel skins are $3.50 or so for #1s. I’ve ordered from them in the past, and they have good prices and are good to deal with.
Greg
P.S. Welcome to the site.
John those are really nice flies. The top pics of the PSC look just like a Slumpbuster without the cone to me. I loved the photos of the flies, and fish, thanks for sharing them.
Welcome to FAOL JimBob. In this part of the world, a pine squirrel and a red squirrel are the same animal. However, that is also the only squirrel we have up here , so they are frequently just called squirrel !
A Pine squirrel and a red squirrel are two different critters. What is known as a Pine squirrel is the Western squirrel. It’s about mid-way in size between a Grey squirrel and a Red squirrel. All of which are smaller than a Fox Squirrel. A red squirrel gets confused with the name pine squirrel, because that is the type of tree they hang out in…hemlocks, pine and cedars primarily. But they are much smaller, and almost “red fox red-orange”, and not much bigger than a western mountain chipmunk. The pine squirrel looks like a young grey squirrel with some orange flecking in it’s fur. Both the Red and the Pine have a flatter & much more sparse tail than the others, as does the chipmink…as opposed to the fox & grey bushy-tails.
… for the Slumpbuster from Charlie’s Fly Box:
“Hook: TMC 5262 #2-10 Thread: 3/0 Olive Monocord Cone: Brass or tungsten, sized to hook Weight: Lead wire, sized to hook Rib: Brassie Sized Ultra-Wire, color of your choice, (chartreuse used here) Body: Gold Mini-Flat Braid Wing: Dyed Pine Squirrel Zonker Strip, olive Collar: Dyed Pine Squirrel Strip wrapped like hackle.”
Here’s the recipe for the PSC:
Hook, thread, pine squirrel zonker.
I can’t say for sure, because I haven’t tied the Slumpbuster nor looked at the tying instructions in depth, but it appears from the pix I’ve seen of that fly that the collar is much shorter than on my PSC. The collar on the PSC starts at mid-shank. It looks like the collar on the Slumpbuster starts much closer to the eye of the hook and provides a much different profile.
Also, Charlie describes the Slumpbuster, in part: “The Slumpbuster is heavily weighted at the front end to create a fish attracting jigging action in the water…” and fishes it off a floating line with an erratic retrieve. I fish the PSC off a full sinking line with a short, steady strip so the fly swims along on an even plane like a healthy sculpin or baitfish, which is mostly what bigger trouts, and other fish, eat.
The key to tying the PSC, and its action in the water, is the very thin hide of the pine squirrel. I’ve looked at other squirrel hides, some quite a bit less expensive, and found the hide much thicker. I don’t think those hides would be as good for this kind of streamer.
John
Now - back to your regularly threaded discussion of squirrel types …