Hare's Mask

RCFetter

RCFetter

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I bought a hare's mask for tying and have some questions.

The mask hair is too short for making a tail. Is there another hare product used for the tail?

Is the hare's mask used only for dubbing or to add to the packaged hare's dubbing?





 
Shouldn't be too short - what size hooks are you tying on?
 
Rc, when you cut the fur from the mask make sure you get the scissors down tight to the hide. The hair between the ears and on the cheeks should be plenty long enough for tails on larger size hr's. The hair between the eyes tend to run shorter on some masks than others.
 
On bigger hooks your not going to have any waste to trim most of the time, but as pointed out above, masks vary. I'll often use pheasant tail or a bunch of grouse fibers pulled off a well marked body feather for tailing on big sizes.
For the dubbing the body, I think its best to use a base of rabbit dubbing and blend in the small spikey hairs off the ears only. If you don't have any rabbit dubbing, try to clip a few clumps from the mask and pull out the long guard hairs. The remaining underfur can then be used as the base and mixed with the ear fibers. You will find the guard hairs on the face too long to dub (that's why the fly is not called a GRH Mask). Of course the problem doing it this way is that you are using up your tailing material.
Mike.
 
Thanks for the response. I'm using size 12 and 14 bead head hooks. Also, I just started tying 2 months ago and I'm not very good with tail material shorter than marabou or pheasant tail.

I made two or three attempts with the hair from the mask and gave up. Maybe I'm not cutting it close enough to the hide but the hair sure is short. I'll try it again when I get home on Tues, but maybe it's not a good quality mask.

 
Thanks for the advise Mike. My response was posted before I read your post.

I'm still interested in learning about different qualities of hare's mask and rabbit hair. For example, Performance Flies has
"Full European Hare Skins (Le Lievre)" for $12.95. What is special about that? I mean the description only mentions dubbing not tails.

Plus, JStockard is selling UV2 Rabbit Strips and Crosscut Strips. What are they used for?
 
its real hare same as I sell in packages.. hare here in the states is usually rabbit (bugs, domestic, cottontail) not real hare. there's a big difference in rabbit and hare. most tiers buy rabbit labeled as hare's ear.
rabbit strips are used for zonker type flies and cross cut is used for wrapping around shank. aka: a collar in front it lays back nicely.
 
Here is another video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5sSxNmGgaE
 
RCFetter wrote:
I'm still interested in learning about different qualities of hare's mask and rabbit hair. For example, Performance Flies has
"Full European Hare Skins (Le Lievre)" for $12.95. What is special about that? I mean the description only mentions dubbing not tails.
Click to expand...

I don't know that product, but based on the description it is the full skin, i.e. body fur, and therefore could be good for dubbing. For rabbit, I use the hareline packs. They are cheap, you can get many colors, and a pack lasts a long time. So if you have natural, olive, and tan rabbit dubbing plus one natural hare's mask, you can blend to achieve many different effects.
Mike.
 
I like to use up the hair around the cheeks and other areas for tailing then i like to trim the hair off the ears and other parts to make my own dubbing mix. I came up with an awesome blend that i really like, but also have another bag of normal hares ear dubbing. I always save the underfur from my tailings whether i use it on that fly or another.
 
I know that it's traditional to use the longer guard hair's for the tail on a hare's ear nymph, but I generally just use pheasant tail, Coq de Leon, or moose body hair. I find them easier to work with, and also I usually cut the hair off of my hare's mask is advance to make my hare's ear dubbing and just keep it in a plastic bag all mixed up already.
 
Since you mention it, it may very well be an issue with getting accustomed to smaller materials. What I do, and what may help you, is to bisect the mask. I find this helps me trim the hair closest to the skin.

You don't need a long tail on a HE nymph. If the mask is indeed hare (e.g., jack rabbit), it should provide hair that is plenty long enough for a #12 nymph.
 
Thanks for all the advise. I haven't tried another hare's ear yet but I'll post how it works out once I get a chance.

Question on using pheasant tail for hare's ear nymph: The tail on a pheasant tail nymph is thin and the tail on a hare's ear is bushy. When using pt for a tail on hare's ear, do you make it bushier than on pt nymph?
 
use hen hackle for the tail, its cheap. can make it thin or bushy..
 
Thanks Sandfly. I already have saddle hackle in brown and olive.

The fibers from the saddle hackle measure about 1.25" I took EricK's advise and split the mask into 2 pieces and it's easier to cut and the hair from the mask is also about 1.25" and I can work with that.

Do you think the hair from a European hare's (not rabbit) mask would be longer than 1.25" ?

The mask that I bought is from Orvis and the label says "hare's mask w/ears natural - Chile.





 
The tail only needs to be as long as the hook gap, so 1.25" is plenty. I've never measured my hare's mask, buti doubt it is longer.
Here is a nice video showing the use of pheasant tail, but hen hackle should be about the same: http://youtu.be/fDGmD8Zlcqw
 
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