Here are some pictures of Tuna Feathers that I have been building to make Daisy Chains with. I have broken it down in steps, with descriptions of each.
Step 1.
I use a fly tying vise with a HMH Tube Tool in the jaws, and place a short piece of synthetic tube with a 1/2 egg sinker in front on the tube mandrel.
Step 2.
I use a Gel CA glue to glue the back of the tube to the 1/2 egg sinker. It takes about 5 minutes for this to dry enough to continue.
Step 3.
I tie fly tying thread on to the rear portion of the tube. I leave a little space at the back so I can easily find the back of the tube once the feather is complete.
Step 4.
I take a small bundle of purple holographic Flashabou and tie it on the bottom of the tube. I spread the flash across the bottom, so it comes pretty close to covering the entire bottom 1/2 of the tube.
Step 5.
I repeat the process with black holographic Flashabou on the top of the tube. In this picture you can see how I have spread the flash all around the tube so it covers it pretty evenly. I do this by taking two light turns of thread around the material when I first tie it on, then take my index finger and manually spread the flash around the hook.
Step 6.
Next I select 4 saddle hackle and clean the hackle butts up so there is no fuzz and I have bare hackle stems to tie in. I stack the feathers together, so that their natural curve faces outwards, and then tie in the 4 hackles to the facing side of the tube. The thread torque will move them around some, which is desirable to help spread the hackles around the tube. I use a total of 6 bunches of 4 hackles to completely surround the hook, so the thread torque helps to fill in the spaces all the way around the tube.
Step 7.
I take another set of 4 hackles and tie them in on the bottom of the tube. The vice is a rotary vice, so I invert the jaws to make it easier to tie in the hackles on each side. I then take another set of 4 hackles, and tie them in on the oposite side of the tube, so I have 12 purple saddle hackles on the bottom 1/2 of the tube.
Step 8.
Now I repeat the process of tying in 3 clumps of 4 saddle hackles on the side, top, and oposite side of the tube, so that the top 1/2 of the tube is covered with 12 black saddle hackles.
Step 9.
Now I turn the tube over so that the purple side is facing up and take another clump of purple Flashabou and tie it in on the top and sides of the purple saddle hackles. I use two light thread wraps to hold the material down, and then spread it around the tube to cover the bottom 1/2. Then I use 6-8 tight thread wraps to lock it into place
Step 10.
I turn the tube over again, and repeat the last step and tie in a clump of Black Holographic Flashabou on the top of the black saddle hackles.
Step 11.
I take 5 minute epoxy and mix up a small batch to coat the tube/lead connection, and to cover over the bases of the fly tying thread.
Step 12.
I coat the area where the tube and lead meat, as well as the tying thread. This is to give the connection more strength, and to keep the fly tying thread from unraveling. When I tied the thread off, I used several whip finishes, but the epoxy just gives that extra piece of mind that everything will hold together. I spin the vice slowly until the epoxy sets up enough to where it no longer wants to run. It usually takes about 3-4 minutes to get it to set up.
Step 13.
This is the cured head, ready to be inserted into the hootchie skirts. Once the epoxy sets-up, its usually best to let it cure for a 1/2 hour or so before you try to insert it into a hootchie.
Step 14.
I take two colors of hootchies to double up the skirt. For this feather I am using Mustad Passion which is a combination Purple/Black/Blue/and Green with a Gold Star Purple hootchie over the outside.
Step 15.
I add a drop of dish soap to the inside of the Passion Hootchie to make it easier to insert the 1/2 ounce lead head.
Step 16.
I insert the lead head/feather combo into the hootchie. I make sure and match the black hackle side witht the black stripe on the hootchie. It usually takes a little bit of effort to get it into the hootchie. I also make sure that the tube is straight and inline with the nose of the hootchie.
Step 17.
I then put the purple hootchie over the passion hootchie for a fuller feather/hootchie combo. I am now ready to glue on prismatic eyes. These eyes are called Withcraft eyes, and they are 1/4" size. I have tried using epoxy on the eyes, but the epoxy peels off the plastic really easy. I have found that the gel CA glue works excellent to get them to bind.
Step 18.
I place a pretty good dab of CA glue on the eye
Step 19.
I place the eye carefully over the white section of the hootchie eye, leaving the red gill mark plainly visible. I hold the eye in place for around 30 seconds under some pressure. This helps spread the CA glue all the way to the edges of the eye. While I'm sure that some of the eye's will pop off over hard fishing this summer, they seem to be pretty sturdy so far.
The Completed Homemade Tuna Feather, ready for rigging into a daisy chain.
Just a note that the pictures show the purple feathers as a blueish color. They are actually a true deep purple, it just doesn't get picked up that way by the digital film.
Fish-a-Holic
Homemade Tuna Feathers
Linear Mode
