Ever use Scotchguard on CDC Flies?

[joseywales]

I read an interesting article, regarding the use of Scotchguard on CDC flies. By treating the fly several times, prioer to use, the fly basically becaome waterproof. Each time the fly is sprayed, you wait until the application has evaporated, then hit it again. 3 times is a charm.

From the Tullygram article:
"The CDC feathers become matted together when you apply them. Several suppliers eventually produced what they called CDC oil. If it really was CDC oil it would have been a natural liquid fat harvested from the preen glands of a lot of ducks. I suspect that it wasn’t. The oil produced by the preen gland seems to be a simple low molecular weight fat and therefore liquid. As a
result almost any similar animal fat would work as well. The most reasonable way to apply this to a fly is to take a toothpick or similar object with a small amount of fat and brush it onto the CDC, thereby roughly simulating the process that the duck uses." ...Of course CDC is supposed to contain the natural oil, so it shouldn’t be necessary to add waterproofing. Don’t count on it, especially if the feather has been dyed. The dying process has likely removed the oil../i] Rick Bell

 

[mcwillja]

I use frog fanny and or tiemco dry magic for cdc. I can't imagine anything else being any better.

 

[joseywales]

Frogs Fanny works fine, but I'm not a fan of how it's applied, and especially refilling it. I'm leaning towards a liguid floatant.

I have a bottle of Orvis Parafloat (circa 2000?), which I'm betting is a version of Ray Bergman's white gas and paraffin floatant. It works very well, but that fact that it's so damn easy to just dip in the bottle and blow it off is really what I like. Lighter fluid and red mucillin has also been very effective as a liquid floatant.

I'm also going to look at Dry Magic, as I read great things about that.

 

[mcwillja]

josey I bought a quart of foamed silica (same as fanny) and I use a small funnel to transfer to small bottle. It is a pain but once you get the hang of it, it is very cheap to do it this way.

I also sometimes apply the Dry Magic first then coat with frogs butt...makes a killer combo floatant.