Turkey feather question

All about flies Fly Tying
1

A friend of mine hunts turkeys and I was wanting some of the feathers for tying muddlers and other flies (what others I don’t know yet) but I am not sure which feathers to ask him to save for me. Since the members of this board are so knowledgable, helpfull and some of the best looking people to grace the net, I thought I would look here for advise.

  1. What feathers do I ask for? Specific parts of the wing, tail, etc? Just whatever he can get me?
  2. What else uses turkey? Besides T-giving diner.
2

I use turkey tails to tie the equivalent of a pheasant tail nymph but darker… sizes usually are 14 and 16 but bigger and smaller would be good, too. I also use turkey tail to tie SHWAPFs.

3

swen,
The primary wing feathers should be saved for the biots. You can use the natural biots for a gray body and they can be dyed to whatever color you want.
Steve

“If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went”-Will Rogers

4

Get the tail feathers, wing feathers, and some body feathers.

Use the tail and wing feathers like pheasant tail.

I use the body feathers for midge patterns.

If you can get some easter egg dye you can use that to dye the feather 5 or 6 colors depending on the dye kit you get.

Rick

5

All of them.

6

In addition to the other feathers mentioned remember that marabou comes from turkeys. Especially the feathers just behind the legs and underneath the wings.

If you try to dye them darker you will have sucess, but since they start out brown, don’t expect to get vibrant colors. The good news is that the chocalate brown is a very useful color.

Ed

7

As I fit all of the criteria swen mentions to qualify to answer this post, I say,

“gimee a drumstick please!”
“Got stuffin?”

8

Thanks all. I got answers, info, and jokes. I love this place.

9

As mentioned by LowBudget, there are marabou feathers. A friend of mine in Texas gave me a hide that contained naturally “mottled” brown marabou feathers. I don’t know if this is common in wild turkeys or not, but it makes a nice presentation in a fly. I have never seen this in commercially available marabou.

10

This morning on “Flytying the Anglers Art” Leroy Hyatt used a slip of turkey breast feather for the back on a waterboatman. He did so because he said they are naturally shiny and irridescent. It was a nice looking fly.

11

Lee, if you are fortunate enough to get that tying series locally, you might want to tape it as well. It isn’t seen in most places…
PBS was showing it a while back, we have the commercial videos, just great.

LadyFisher, Publisher of
FAOL