Are they useful in tying flies and jigs?

My buddy has about 6 different species of chickens, some of them have very interesting color arrangements. I was trying to see if I could use them for homemade lures but have no experience with the matter.

Depends very much upon the qualities of the feathers. Some will be useful and others, well, best thing would be to get someone to have a look.

I have pretty free reign to take any feathers I'd want, so I could definitely ween out some of the lesser quality feathers. He doesn't have any of the typical white chickens, they all have distinct colors/patterns. Ill snap a picture next time I'm over there.

Brett:

Chicken feathers, also known as hackle, are some of the primary materials in lots of flies. There is a wide range of quality, color and size of hackle. Much of what is sold in fly shops comes from long years of breeding to get just the right genetics to produce hackle with particular characteristics.

A good primer on hackle is an article by Liz Conrad of Conranch Hackle Farm. Her article can be found at:

www.Conranch.com/hackle_article.html

If you get chicken feathers from a friend, be sure to wash them first. Then dry them out. I would either microwave the feathers to kill eggs, or I would put them in a container with moth balls, or cedar. I would put each kind into zip lock bags before putting them in a container, with locking lid. You can dye the feathers if they are white to whatever color you want. (or you could color them with a permanent marker)

P.S. read up on how long to microwave the feathers....you do not want to overcook them, or you will ruin the feathers. 30 seconds to a minute will probably do good enough, depending on how many you do at once.

kelkay; I just microwave them for 10-15 seconds; that kills all the lice and stuff. I store them in seperate plastic bags so one won't contaminate the others, but I then store the entire feather bags in a plastic sterilite box, which I fumigate with a couple of moth balls, which keeps out the moths and ants(ants can find them if stored in Ft Knox!!!)-p-

Thanks for the advice guys! That article was really helpful. Im gonna try to start collecting them this week!

When one of the birds is harvested or otherwise dies, take the whole skin and salt the flesh side.
There will be a host of useful feathers; if nothing else, the fluffy stuff�chickabou�around the rump is dynamite. You may well get some natural, varied colour feathers you simply could not buy in a shop. You don't have to buy an $80 cape to get useful material.

Tying will cause you to look at chickens in a whole different, more appreciative light.

Please show us what you come up with.

The six chickens in my back yard are getting nervous. And since they are not laying too well, they should be!

That's too funny! Lol

I've seen most of those already, but still need some info about specifically using the feathers - which sort etc.Think of all the chicken feathers from poultry processing plants in the U.S. I been thinking about a temporary barrier that is better then floating booms myself. Somthing that can handle waves up to 6 feet or so.