Country Pursuits Eire in association with Fly tying with Robbie Berry brings all things fishing and hunting or country side pursuits. Join me on my adventures with all aspects of country pursuits in fly fishing / fishing and hunting. I’ll demonstrate fly tying with regular fly tying videos. Using my skills learned from years of practicing taxidermy I also demonstrate how to preserve animal and bird skins, useful for flying as well as identifying key feathers to be used for fly tying.
My dad picked me up a turkey wing on the side of the road, and I plan on doing this with salt instead of borax. Very straightforward tutorial! Amazing!
Hi I was given wing which was salted. I was told just to remove the salt from them. It was suggested that i you tube it to see how i remove the salt. Can i just wash off the salt and dry the feathers gently with a hair dryer. Would appreciate your opinion. Many thanks. Gerry
This fly saved the day for me today! I only caught 2 brown trout but both were on this fly. I was fishing a local creek here in Pennsylvania and didnt see any hatches all day. I noticed a few splashy rises every now and again so I figured they were eating emergers or escaping nymphs. I tried all of the usual patterns local to this creek and nothing was working. I tied a few of these CDC emergers after finding your channel last week . Well I tied one on in size 16 and it worked great. I caught 2 and missed a few more . Then the water temp started to rise and the fish turned off so I let them be. I have also tied the Olive F fly and the CDC Sedge and cant wait to try them out as well. I really like how the CDC looks and moves on the water. Now that you have shown us how to harvest CDC from a duck, I may just have to harvest a duck this upcoming hunting season! Thanks for the videos. Tight lines!
@@rickkirby5554 thanks for the positive feedback. I am absolutely delighted to hear that the cdc emerger worked for you, I love to hear feedback on my flies. The olive f-fly is a serious little fly, it’s the only fly I mainly use. It represents the various stages of the BWO from emerging to adult. The beauty of this fly is that it imitates many other species, this is why it’s so effective. Tight lines
Hello, first of all, let me thank your for this excellent video. Recently I bought wings of jackdaw and grouse sold by Veniard. I found that both birds horribly smelled. I didn't see any borax on the skin so I didn't know what chemical they had used and if it had been done properly. Can I ask you for a piece of advice how such a bird can be treated? I was thinking of washing the wings and use borax to let it dry. I just don't know if it is better to use detergent, washing powder or soap. Do you see this approach OK? Besides that, let me ask you about health risks of using unknown road kills. Does borax helps also to disinfect the feathers? Surely we do not use any glows when fly tying. Do you see any heath risk of using unknown roadkills for fly tying? Thank you very much.
Hi, that’s surprising to hear of from materials from veniards as their materials are good quality. There’s lots of different ways to preserve bird skins or animal skins. The two main methods are using borax similar to the way I and taxidermist do it, then there is the natural method where the wings are left in a dry place for months and left to dry naturally. Im not sure how veniards do it, I can only assume that veniards do it naturally and then treats them to bug proof them. Veniards treat their feathers so There would be no need to further treat them. Just store them correctly. If you find road kill, examine it. If the specimen is in good condition and is fresh then yes it can be preserved. There is always a health risk when handling birds / animals. Always wear latex gloves, birds can carry avain influenza or bird flu. It’s good practice to wear latex gloves for protection to prevent zoonosis. When preserving it’s always important to wash or soak the skin in hot near boiling water for a couple of minutes, this will aid in treating the feathers and killing any nasty bugs that may be on the feathers or skin. Borax does not disinfect the skins of feathers. Borax instead is used to dry and preserve the skin, it pulls the water or moisture out of the skin and will also kill any insects as it is a natural insecticide. It drys in to the skin and renders the skin toxic to insects that would usually feed on the feathers and skin
@@robbieb20 Thank so much for the answer. The smell must come from some chemical because even the mole skin I bought from Veniard smell identically. If we treat the bird, does it minimize the risk of zoonosis? I have no idea how long bacteria and viruses can survive but the feathers are used for a long time. Surely, I would care about helthty risks when handling with a fresh animal but how about working with the feathers when tying flies? Will the feather be safe afterwards? Actually there is a similar problem with materials bought in a standard fly shop.
Tyanks for this .A very nice quick and simple tie , which I'm sure works just as well as some of the fancier versions I have seen ,including deerhair underwing , fox squirrel thorax and all sorts of tinsel.
Thanks John, I find this fly super effective on rivers, it’s a personal favourite and my go to fly. Tie it in sizes from 16 down to 20, i have tied this fly for customers and they can’t seem to get enough of them. It imitates a wide range of different fly patterns including BWO.
Thanks, if I’m soaking the feathers to treat them I use boiling water, laundry powder detergent and 2 or 3 heaped dessert spoons of borax and let them soak for abot an hour or so. If I have a skin that I skinned out and want to wash it before preserving it, I get a bucket of hot water and add dish washing soap and I give the feathers or skin a soak for about 10 minutes moving the feathers around in the water to clean them, then dry with a hair dryer. Check out my videos on treating feathers
Yeah I subscribed so I don’t miss out. Seems I’m finally getting some answers. Always wondered about grouse wings and how to cut the hackle from chickens and so on.
I found a dead duck on the side of the motorway and took it home to take some feathers off. Unfortunately, I didn't discover your video until after my poor attempt! Thanks to you, I will be better prepared next time!
Now I understand why quality CDC feathers are commercially expensive...thanks for sharing your harvesting/storage knowledge and experience...appreciate it
Hey Robbie great video on treating feathers. I have a question and think you may be able to help me. I have a large selection of fly tying materials. Unfortunately, carpet beetles got into our house. I was going to clean all my fly tying materials and was thinking of using your method. Would your treatment kill carpet beetles eggs? Would it affect the colour of materials and wash out some of the dye? Richie
Hi Richie, I’m afraid this is not something I have ever experienced, sorry to hear all your materials have been infested. the treatment would leech out the colour of dyed feathers and fur if left soaking for too long, the key is to continuously check any dyed materials, I think you may need a more harder treatment, for carpet Beatles as this insect isn’t something that is commonly found on live wild animals or birds, they are always and introduced infestation. I would suggest a concentrated mix of borax and hot water ideally over 40, 45 degrees Celsius,and soak any feathers or fur, get a good can of insecticide like I have in the video, there are some good sprays for carpet Beatles. Periodically I spray all my materials and seal them away again. How do you store your materials, i store all my materials in zip lock bags. I ensure that when I am finished they get sealed away immediately. I never leave my materials out or exposed. And for good practice I never mix harvested feathers & fur with material I buy even though I do thoroughly treat every thing, I store them separately
Hi there, just wanted to say I’ve been loving your videos. I’m finding them very informative and easy to follow. Please keep up the great work. Happy tying, Mac.
Hello. I have watched part 1 and about to watch part 2 because it was so helpful. Did you gut the bird prior to freezing it? Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Hi Kim, no there’s no need to gut the bird. I freeze the bird whole and when it come time to work on the bird I will thaw it out and skin the bird carefully
You said at start of first video that the bird had been previously frozen can same be done to a fresh bird or does freezing ease the process thanks great video very informative will defo be trying thank you for sharing ur knowledge
Salt can be used yes, same as borax ensure the skin is covered thoroughly. If you can get some alum and mix with the salt, that makes a really good preservative
A hunter friend gave me a number of ducks that have had the breast meat removed. The carcasses are somewhat dirty with blood etc. Should I wash the feathers before or after I remove them from the body?
So I'm going to be working on those pheasants tomorrow and I'm rewatching your videos. I Have a couple of questions,. What would happen if you didn't sew up the holes that might happen during the skinning process when preserving with borax? What kind of needle and thread do you use for sewing up the holes? Also how do you clean out the borax once the bird is ready? Thanks for the help. I really appreciate it. Kind Regards, Alex
When preserving a full skin I like to sew the holes so that the skin is holds together properly when finished, if there is small holes in the skin then it’s optional wether you sew them or not, being a taxidermist I was always thought to sew holes especially in a mounted bird. Some people wouldn’t be as thorough as me and just preserve and dry the skin holes and all. I like to have perfection in the finished materials so I sew all holes. When it comes to Cleaning the borax, I gently tap the dried skin on a table and shake out any excess borax, I then take a hoover on low suction and run it over the skin and through the feathers, it never fully removes the borax but gets enough of it out of the birds. You could wash the skin a second time once it’s preserved and then thorough dry it
Yes, there’s no reason why not, you would just need to ensure that they are covered in plenty of borax, when I preserve wings I will usually stack a couple of pairs on top of each other when processing bulk amounts,
Hi, Alex from NY here. thanks for these videos. I just received a couple of pheasants and the info here is priceless. Thanks. I'll let you know how it ends up
I read you say to just vacuum the borax away. I have actually been washing my dried skins with Dawn dish detergent after dried. then I hand and dry them again, dry with hair dryer after 1-2 days. Sounds like I might be able to skip that step? I've been doing roosters & will try and follow some steps I saw in your videos on the next batch. Turkeys should be ready in the next few weeks. Usually they are boiled then plucked & feathers discarded.
Turkey season, searched RU-vid & no one has done how to Harvest Turkey Feathers for fly tying. Your videos on harvesting have been outstanding, would you be able to do one on Turkey and maybe Goose?
I would love to do some videos on turkeys and geese, problem I have is getting them. Where I live they are not easy come by, only way of getting them is to buy them from a farmer. I certainly will try in time
Small fur animals like rabbits, squirrels could be treated the same way. Once you have soaked the fur the dry thoroughly and preserve using borax. Bigger fur animals like fox need more to use different methods and chemicals to preserve. Small patches of fur could be salted using a mix of salt and alum
Your first step appears to be the freezer? Every feather no matter where I got it from gets six weeks in the Freezer. I once had an infestation of Carpet Beetles many years ago and I came up with a feather treatment protocol. Thanks for sharing your method!
I harvested feathers today for the first time and immediately put them in some water with borax. So they’re in a bucket. Can I dry them best as possible today and freeze them if they’re still damp later?
Do you have a video that shows flies you tied with pheasant feathers? (I’ve just finished skinning a pheasant following your instructional video. Now for the flies!)
@@isabolognese yea of course, all birds are skinned following the same process as in the video, just be more careful with a partridge as the skin is a good bit more delicate
W O W ,,, VERY NICELY DONE ✅,,,, THANK YOU FOR YOUR KINDNESS AND DEDICATION THAT YOU BRING TO THOUSANDS OF US…. SUPER 👍 CREATIVITY AND STEP BY STEP INSTRUCTIONS,,, GREAT CHANNEL, TXS AGAIN,, BE SAFE,.,,,
