Buck Tail?

[a23fish]

While rummaging around in a long forgotten but recently rediscovered basement bin, I not only found a rudimentary tying vise, bobbin, and a few spools of thread. However, I also found about 8 packs of buck tail, mostly natural or brownish, but a couple dyed red or blue. These were obviously intended for tying bass fishing jigs but i wondered if any of that hair can be used for tying trout flies. Has anyone used this before, and if so, for what?

Pack rat that I am, I don't want to just trash it.

 

[hooker-of-men]

Clousers or deceivers are standard uses. Probably tons of streamer variations if you dig a little.

I imagine lots of folks will disagree strongly, but, when short on materials, I've tied comparaduns with natural or white bucktail as the wings and tails. It's "wrong", but they float and they've caught fish.

 

[JerryC]

Look up "Thunder Creek" streamers they're mainly tied with buck tail. A simpler style would be a bucktail streamer. You also might find it as a buck tail teaser. Add eyes and you have a more realistic bait fish pattern. I use buck tail for fly jigs. They're tied on 1/32 oz or 1/20 oz jigs. They might work for trout.
Some small Clousers

Fly jigs 1/20 oz

 

[JeffK]

55 years ago or so when I first started tying bucktail streamers were a staple in everyone's box - sort of like the wooley bugger today. Two classics that have survived are the Mickey Finn and Black Nosed Dace. Occasionally the Ken Lockwood streamer is seen. However, the most common in my memory are simple two color bucktails with a tinsel body. Popular combos were black/ yellow, red/white, natural/white.

Can't go wrong with Clousers or Thunder Creek streamers. Tie them sparse - photo above a great example. Many bucktail streamers are tied too full to get the best action.

 

[WWKimba]

Another simple and flexible pattern is the Brooks Blond series of ties. This pattern actually was the inspiration for some other effective patterns INCLUDING the aforementioned Clouser's.

Kim

 

[Solitariolupo]

It works great for tying some big flies for Muskie

 

[salmo]

You can also use for tails on large caddis, stone flies, simulators or Humpies. See this link -

 

[WWKimba]

You can also use for tails on large caddis, stone flies, simulators or Humpies. See this link -

Be careful, deer (body) HAIR and bucktail (deer TAIL hair) are 2 very different materials from the same animal. Most deer hair (from the body) is hollow and therefor will aid in floating your fly. Bucktail, on the other hand, is solid hair material. As a rule of thumb, the closer the tip of the bucktail is completely solid where the hair taken from about 1/3 the way up from the base will have some hollowness to it.

Why is this important to know? Well, if you are tying a typical bucktail streamer pattern you'll want the SOLID hairs because these do NOT flair. If you use either base bucktail hairs or any body hairs they WILL flare and negatively affect the fly's performance. To test this simply tie some bucktail on a hook then tie some body hair with the same thread pressure and compare the two.

Hope this helps.

Kim

 

[salmo]

Be careful, deer (body) HAIR and bucktail (deer TAIL hair) are 2 very different materials from the same animal. Most deer hair (from the body) is hollow and therefor will aid in floating your fly. Bucktail, on the other hand, is solid hair material. As a rule of thumb, the closer the tip of the bucktail is completely solid where the hair taken from about 1/3 the way up from the base will have some hollowness to it.

Why is this important to know? Well, if you are tying a typical bucktail streamer pattern you'll want the SOLID hairs because these do NOT flair. If you use either base bucktail hairs or any body hairs they WILL flare and negatively affect the fly's performance. To test this simply tie some bucktail on a hook then tie some body hair with the same thread pressure and compare the two.

Hope this helps.

Kim

You are absolutely correct. Sorry for the bad information.

 

[Kyle]

for me, i use them for clousers. not much for anything else. i would assume more saltwater guys use them for many patterns.

 

[Shimedog]

55 years ago or so when I first started tying bucktail streamers were a staple in everyone's box - sort of like the wooley bugger today. Two classics that have survived are the Mickey Finn and Black Nosed Dace. Occasionally the Ken Lockwood streamer is seen. However, the most common in my memory are simple two color bucktails with a tinsel body. Popular combos were black/ yellow, red/white, natural/white.

Can't go wrong with Clousers or Thunder Creek streamers. Tie them sparse - photo above a great example. Many bucktail streamers are tied too full to get the best action.

Let me ask you an adjacent question. Any tips for situation/strategy on using either Mickey Finns or Black Nosed Daces. I have used both a good bit but never turned up any luck.

 

[WWKimba]

You are absolutely correct. Sorry for the bad information.

You were OK. They just asked the wrong question for your answer.

Kim

 

[PennKev]

However, I also found about 8 packs of buck tail, mostly natural or brownish, but a couple dyed red or blue. These were obviously intended for tying bass fishing jigs but i wondered if any of that hair can be used for tying trout flies. Has anyone used this before, and if so, for what?

FWIW, Brown and white (both natural colors) make probably the best color combo for clousers and are all you need to make the original Thunder Creek.

 

[PennKev]

Let me ask you an adjacent question. Any tips for situation/strategy on using either Mickey Finns or Black Nosed Daces. I have used both a good bit but never turned up any luck.

BND's outperform MF's by a wide margin for me. I almost always fish them with a couple no. 2 split shot on the tippet just in front of the fly. I seldom just swing them, I usually cast up stream and work them back with short twitches. Pretty much my go-to retrieve for streamers these days. I fish them in sizes 8 and 6 mostly. The BND's are my go-to streamer for small streams in NW PA, particularly in clear water conditions.

 

[dc410]

Early in my flyfishing career I started by catching a ton of native PA Brook trout on Mickey Finn streamers. I used to tie them on size 12 and 14 hooks, however I always preferred using calftail instead of bucktail for my small Mickeys. I just found it a bit easier material to work with on the smaller hooks. The Mickey Finn was one of the streamer flies represented in Kim’s first fly swap (The Gilligan swap) here on PAFF. If you haven’t participated in any of Kim’s swaps yet you should check out any upcoming swaps and consider being a part of them. It’s a great way to improve your tying skills and check out some other great patterns.

 

[WWKimba]

FWIW, Brown and white (both natural colors) make probably the best color combo for clousers and are all you need to make the original Thunder Creek.

Throw in some black bucktail, or even better (and more OLD School) black bear hair, Black bear was originally used instead of black-dyed bucktail because 1) a good and true black dye was not common and 2) black bear fur was a commonly available material back then. Another bonus -black bear underfur is a nice chocolate brown color and is quite plentiful on most skins. Simply save it in a ziplock for double duty out of one material! The black hair makes a good midline (such as on the Black Nose Dace or very top of the streamer color in many patterns.

Kim

 

[JeffK]

Funny, I usually have more luck with Mickey Finns than Black Nosed Dace.

Tons of ways to fish streamers. Sometimes I like to add split shot to go deeper; sometimes not. My strategy assumes that most minnow eating fish are tight to cover in an ambush place - under a tree, behind a downed log or rock, just below a drop off etc. Up against the bank is normally good. Streamer fishing to me is mostly run and gun. Usually a trout will take a streamer right away or avoid it. So I just walk along the stream hitting the hot spots. Even if the fish just follow rather than hit streamer fishing can be a good way to scout a stream.

Also, if the nymph or dry bite goes off sometimes I pitch streamers to see if I can get some action. Not a sure bet, but some days it has saved the day.

The one thing I will say about the BND is that I believe streamers with a lateral line catch more fish. More likely to use krystal flash in dark or light shades, but black bear hair is good stuff.

 

[WWKimba]

You can look for a 3-color bucktail. These are natural, un-dyed tails. On many bucktails there is an area at the center of the top of the tail where is very dark/black in color.

Kim

 

[shakey]

I like using Bucktails for trout.
Mickey Finn
Red & White
Black nosed dace
Royal coachman bucktail
Black ghost bucktail

And generic Bucktails , wherein you put one color bucktail on the bottom of a hook and another color on top.

You can also do a hair wing version of nearly any winged wet.

 

[Steeltrap]

Well....if I get lucky I'll have a new bucktail piece to tie with.....depends upon the next several days!!