Chuck Young

Most feather boas consist of feathers with a web tip. You can strip fibers off them. But that is about it.

Bobbins are useful for many materials: thread, floss, lead wire, ss wire for dubbing brushes (otherwise is unspools and makes a mess). They give you better control, nicer wings and heads, and save a lot of broken threads.

If you want to get into dubbing, synthetic wings, dubbing brush streamers or the like, I highly recommend Fly Tyer's Dungeon. They make all their own stuff and aim to provide quality materials at the best price. When you try to put together a $50 order, it takes a lot of line items (28 or so). Packs are larger than other sources also. They are always coming out with something new. They also put out a lot of instructional videos. If you choose to dye your own materials, read the book referenced above. Pool peroxide can be used to bleach materials before dying. But it must be handled properly as it is very caustic at that concentration (27%). An excellent source for acid dyes is Dharma Supply. They blend their own colors, have a larger range of colors, and more reasonable prices. Quality genetic hackle will set you back a pretty penny. But there is no substitute for good feathers for dry flies or streamers. A thin, flexible shaft is much easier to work with and performs much better. For many flies, game birds like partridge, pheasant, duck, goose, and turkey will create many patterns. Bucktail, deer hair, beaver pelts, rabbit, squirrel, skunk, woodchuck are readily available as well. I highly recommend mothballs for natural materials. If you have an old dresser, put a few in a sandwich bag in a couple of drawers.

2010 reducer, Transparent base, Airbrush restorer. Wicked: Det White, Det black, Det sepia, Det Moss green, Pearl gold, pearl silver Createx: Pearl blue, Pearl white, Iridescent Red, IR yellow, IR green, Transparent brite yellow, T Red oxide, T Dark Brown, Flo yellow, Flo Sunburst, Flo Violet, (flo white) Folkart: color shift red, green, and violet, titanium. The Wicked detail colors can be made transparent by adding T base and reducer. White then pearls make an excellent base. Transparent, iridescent, and Flo can be layered to achieve many colors. IR and color shift make excellent highlights. T bright yellow turns silver to gold. This list cuts out a lot of duplication, yet covers almost all your color wheel. Hope this helps.

Like Sonny said, Createx makes a "transparent base". It is actually a pigment free paint, so it is 100% compatible. It appears milky white in the bottle but dries crystal clear. This can be added to opaque (or any other Createx paint) to make it more transparent. It does not thin the paint, so viscosity is not affected. Use a reducer with the mixture for the right consistency. It is cheap and has many other uses. I also use it over foiled baits or epoxy to make a nice base for paint to stick to.

There is a razor saw / miter box combination specially made for Balsa and basswood. It is fast and clean, and I like working from a square cut.

I have some cedar to carve for some toothy critters, but have yet to try it. I have a basswood tree in my front yard and it puts out about 10 new shoots out of the base every year. This gives me plenty of knot free wood to carve. I love it!. it is so much more consistent than balsa, a bit denser, a bit tougher, and it sands great. But Raven is right about cedar. It is so much more durable.

W lure has a similar blank available in smaller quantities (WM600). I am not crazy about the insert style lure blanks. But they do swim well.

Any paint with a pearl, metallic or color-shift pigment has a greater chance of clogging. I reduce mine quite a bit an spray it at low pressure. You really don't need a lot of it to make a big difference - at least the way I use it. The size of the powder pigment may not be fine enough in that brand. I have had no problems with the folkart. Pearls tend to clump sooner than other paints (like transparent, opaque, detail). Don't thin your paints in advance then store them - esp pearls. They do weird thing in the bottle. One thing you may try is a little retarder mixed in with the paint.

Sometimes inaction is the trigger - like when a Muskie hits it on the pause. I have seen prey freeze when faced with a predator. Some fish attack a school, stunning or wounding prey. This might be another case where inaction triggers a strike.

I use Folkart colorshift paints all the time. They make three colors, Green / gold; Blue / violet; and Red / violet. I had my doubts about them at first, but the pigments are very fine and spray well once reduced. A little goes a long way - so apply it with a fine head. I have about 6 patterns that center on one or more of these. But they are also very useful for highlights. I use them on smelt, shiners, blue back herring, etc. I feel these shifting colors create confusion in predators, using up some of their discretionary brain power. "Eat it quick - before it does that again and I lose it!"

That looks AWESOME!

For every new blank that I buy, peghook tag. On it is recorded: weight, length of body, OAL, hook options, eye size, depth. When I pull off a blank to paint it, that info is right there. You can check different blank suppliers to see what size they recommend. If you are searching for great eyes at a great price, contact "Ed and Lisa's eyes".

I just posted pics of some completed foiled saltwater lures. http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/21365-men-atl-f14-2jpg/ http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/21364-bbh-f14-6jpg/ http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/21363-mack-f14-pr1jpg/ http://www.tackleunderground.com/community/gallery/image/21362-mack-sil-bl2jpg/