Deer hair

[strutnstuff 0]

Having a hard time tieing with deer hair. Hair always wants to spin around hook shank even with loose wraps & pull bobbin straight down to tighten. Any suggestions?

[ScienceGuy141 0]

I have this difficulty sometimes too, even after working with it for awhile. Couple things....First, if you aren't using it already, gel spun thread helps allow you to use a lot of thread tension to really secure the hair. Second, you could put a small dab of super glue on the shank right before you place your hair. Also, after you pull the thread down to flare the hair, advance your thread forward through the hair for a few additional thread wraps before building a small thread dam in front of your bundle of hair. If you're tying a bug where you want the deer hair to be quite dense, packing the hair can also help. 

 

I have a hunch sometimes my issue is trying to flare too large a bundle of deer hair at a time and it prevents me from getting all the hair truly tight to the hook shank. Guys like Andreas Andersson don't seem to have an issue with relatively sizable bundles though. Bruce, on this site, would be who I would defer to for all deer hair technique. 

[niveker 0]

A few things that I do to keep the hair from spinning:

 - wrap thread or dubbing on the shank in the area that you are going to tie in the deer hair

and/or

 -  one loose wrap around the clump of hair only before taking one or two loose wraps around the shank, with your fingers pinch the clump nice and tight on top of  shank when tightening, then a wrap or two around the shank only, beneath the deer hair, and back to the wrapping whole kit and kaboodle.  The firm pinch wraps and then going under the clump of hair I think is the key.  

[ScienceGuy141 0]

Thanks, niveker! I'll give that a go

[johnnyquahog 0]

It may be the type of hair you are using for the application or it might be one of many things.  You will get more productive responses if you are more specific as to the patterns you are tying.  Elk hair caddis, comparadun, humpy, muddler minnow, bombers and on and on use different techniques.  Just a hunch but don’t underestimate the importance of the second hand to hold material in place until it is secured and don’t underestimate the importance of thread management.  You’ve come to the right place.

[strutnstuff 0]

Using hair from the tail on jigs for walleye. Two different colors that I use on each jig tied to hook shank. Tieing on each side of hook & keeps wanting to spin.

[MuskyFlyGuy 0]

I would suggest posting a couple of pictures with an explanation of the problem. There are many brilliant tiers on the site, who can shorten your learning curve. 
Tom

[Philly 0]

2 hours ago, strutnstuff said:

Using hair from the tail on jigs for walleye. Two different colors that I use on each jig tied to hook shank. Tieing on each side of hook & keeps wanting to spin.

That's a totally different ball game.  You're trying to tie jigs like this.

My first thought is you're using too much hair.  One of the things I've noticed on other boards and often jigs sold in sporting good stores is they're often overdressed.   What I do is take a small bunch of hair and make three or four wraps of thread.  Not to tight.  You can manipulate the butt end and spread them around the shank to cover half the shank.  Once the hair is in place I finish the wrap and put a bit of super glue on the thread to lock the hair in place.  Repeat the process on the bottom of the shank.  If there are spaces you can always fill them with small clumps of hair.  Once both are in place build up your wrap.   I use UV resin to cover the wrap.   You need some tension as your wrapping.  Depending on what your trying to imitate.  I use more tension if I want the hair to spread out, less if I'm tying a bait fish imitation.   These are all intended for either walleye or smallmouth for my trip to Ontario in late August.  They're tied on 1/4 oz jigs.  I tie similar patterns on 1/32 and 1/20 oz jigs to use with my fly rod.

The black one is trying to imitate a crayfish(more tension).  The pink one a bait fish(less tension).

Here's a few more

 

[Capt Bob LeMay 0]

Lots of different ways to work spinning hair.   I found for my purposes that using deer belly hair solved most of my troubles…. Of course as a saltwater tyer,  I get to improvise all the time… Dyed over white belly hair comes in very bright colors as well…

[Poopdeck 0]

Agree with Philly, you’re trying to tie in to much hair at one time. I usually tie in 3 or 4 small clumps depending on the size of the jig.start with a good thread base on the jig collar.  I will also allow for some turn of the hair by starting each clump back some to allow the thread to pull the hair into place.

[Sandan 0]

I learned this "trick" from Charlie Craven. Instead of pulling straight down on the thread, pull it across the bottom of the hook directly towards you. Pulling down will pull the hair down and around the hook shank. Pulling it towards you will allow the thread tension to tighten around the hair and since you're pulling across the bottom of the shank not pull the hair down. The two loose wraps just gather the hair prior to pulling across. [edit] answered before I saw this was in reference to tying jigs. I'd still say isolate the thread tension from the hair.[/edit]

[ScienceGuy141 0]

Ah! My issues are while spinning deer hair. Good call to have OP give more details as my assumption they were spinning deer hair was wrong! When tying in bucktail, you can also work the thread through the butt ends as you cinch it down. I'll try to find a video demonstrating that. 

[Bruce Derington 0]

All responses are right on.  laying down wraps b4 tying in hair is a good start