Duck Quill Wings

[Quacker 0]

I'm having some difficulty tying duck quill wings, I hope someone can give me a few ideas on solving my problem. When tying the wings on the top of the hook shank using a pinch wrap to compress the fibers I can't get the far wing to compress properly. The near side wing comes out looking fine but the far side wing continues to come out with several quills folded over causing the wing width to be narrower than the near side wing and also messes up the wing shape.

 

I would be grateful for any and all suggestions.

 

Can anyone tell me how I can get "bait fisherman" out of my profile, I don't know how it got there and now I can't get rid of it, embarrassing!

[flytire 0]

bait fisherman is there for EVERYBODY. there is most likely a number of posts before it changes. dont really know the number. its part of the forum software

 

the "like this" button is also disabled and will never be enabled. the reason why really doesnt make any sense

 

read this thread on wings

 

http://www.flytyingforum.com/index.php?showtopic=82062&hl=wings

[Quacker 0]

Thanks for the quick response, now I know I didn't screw something up and I can't do anything about it.

 

Jim H

[utyer 0]

I think that if you follow the links in the post linked above you will see that there are several things that you can do about your problem in setting wings. Of course a little crunch on the far side wing won't bother the fish too much, but if your really wanting to make these patterns for display, then you should read the Hatches article, and get the DVD from Don Bastion.

 

Any one can learn to set duck quill wings, once they learn the proper way to use the feather, and the proper way to set the feather. The simply pinch and loop isn't quite the way to do it. I know I went through about 50 or 60 sets of wings before I was at all happy with the way mine were coming out. I finally got it down, and even after instruction, it took practice. Lots of practice.

[phg 0]

I think folding on the far side is one of the most common problems, when learning to mount quill wings. Resist the urge to pinch tighter, that just makes things worse. It's the torque of the thread that's pulling the top of the quill slip over. You need to learn to pull the thread tight without torquing it too much (some torque is unavoidable). A bit of wax (NOT dubbing wax) sometimes helps.

 

Don Bastian's tutorial, on mounting quill slip wings, is one of the best, but mostly, it's just practice. I find that I usually have to mount the wings twice to get the set I want.

[Quacker 0]

Thanks for the info. Now I know I have a common problem and it will probably take me 100 or more tries to get it right. I hope I can find enough duck feathers, good thing duck season starts soon👍👍.

[utyer 0]

You can use Pheasant wing quills, Goose wing quills, and Turkey Secondary wing quills as well. Pheasant wings are quite small, but the goose and turkey are much larger than duck. Using larger quills you are able to use the softer part of the quill.

[Quacker 0]

Utyer,

Thanks for the options. The pattern I'm trying to tie is very specific on the materials calling for duck quill wings. I'm thinking that the soft part of the duck quill I'm using may be to short for a #12 dry fly. I may be using undersized flight feathers, what do you think?

[utyer 0]

That is just one thing that may cause you problems. I have never been one to be too much of a stickler for printed recipes. If it calls for a white duck quill wing, and I have goose, or even swan, that's what I will use. I bought and used died turkey feathers still have dozens. They are quite large, buy once you tie on the sections you need, there isn't much difference.

 

I was just suggesting that there are other quills that work in addition to duck. If your tying a specific pattern, that calls for duck quills, and you want to follow the list, then do that. As for practice, any matched set of quills should work.

[Gene L 0]

If you pull the thread straight downward, which isn't as easy as it sounds, it should crush the feather just fine. Get them much off either way and the wing will be skewed.

 

And there isn't much on a wing feather that is suitable for winging, for me at my clumsy level. If they're too thick near the bottom of the quill, I can't make them work.

[Quacker 0]

I wish I could use different quills but I'm tying this particular fly for scoring not fishing so I have to stick to the pattern material list. If I was fishing this thing I agree, I would use whatever I have available, good advise. Staying away from the thick ends of the quills is also good advise and something I found out the hard way.

 

Good news is I think I've figured it out. First don't try tying the quills down on the hook using the thick/bottom of the quills. Pinch the wings together on top of the hook and make one loop of thread over the top of the quills. Slowly pull straight down compressing the quills, stop when the wings start to lift off the hook eye. Continue to tie in the wings with touching tight wraps moving toward the hooks bend. Firmly hold the wings together and pull to the vertical move the thread to the front of the wing and with thread wraps wedge the wing in the vertical position. There may be other ways to do this but this seems to work for me pretty well.

 

Thanks for all your help and suggestions, would have been much more frustrating and time consuming with out it.

 

Jim H

Quacker

[Gene L 0]

Jim Misura has a great video on tying them here:

 

https://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play;_ylt=A2KLqIHAJCVWLnoAPFksnIlQ;_ylu=X3oDMTByZWc0dGJtBHNlYwNzcgRzbGsDdmlkBHZ0aWQDBGdwb3MDMQ--?p=Jim+Misura+Fly+Tying+Duck+Quill+Wings&vid=f1bec73bb7e39362fa15b63874a80f33&turl=http%3A%2F%2Ftse4.mm.bing.net%2Fth%3Fid%3DWN.yiyvModBl2nBFHA2LkKlvg%26pid%3D15.1%26h%3D205%26w%3D300%26c%3D7%26rs%3D1&rurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DWpP7dnA2ofk&tit=Beginner+Fly+Tying+Matching+Duck+Quills+for+Wings+with+Jim+Misiura&c=0&h=205&w=300&l=647&sigr=11bh303ah&sigt=122fbvgdj&sigi=12l4900du&age=1420789419&fr2=p%3As%2Cv%3Av&fr=yhs-mozilla-001&hsimp=yhs-001&hspart=mozilla&tt=b

[Quacker 0]

Watched it today. Thanks