I don't want to open a book here but how do you apply feathers? If someone will point me in some direction I don't mind trial and error. Usually more error but I think that's why I like doing this stuff. Thanks

The RodMaker issue that covered that ran out long ago. But you can do a search here on this board and uncover most of the basics.

Russ Gooding of Golden Witch retained the author's rights to the original article and sometimes will provide reprints I believe.

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yeah, I e-mailed russ and he sent me a copy

Quickly, the method I use is approx 50/50 distilled water/Color Preserver. I apply to area, take tweezers and lay the feather down, position with tweezers and then take a drop of the above mentioned mix and place on the feather, it will disperse and penetrate the feather. Then carefully wick, or remove any excess CP, let dry. When doing multiple feathers (especially if there is overlap) be careful as they slide easily. I usually apply first layer or feather and let dry, then do next layer etc...... Hope this helped. Experiment with the solution, you really want as much water content as possible, but still enough CP to make it "stick". This prevents any unwanted milkyness. Be sure and let everything dry (24hours) then just be careful when applying first coat of finish as to not knock anything loose with brush or spatula. I usually drizzle the finish onto this area and let it fully saturate and rotate to level. Hope this helped.
Elrod (Jon)

Steve,

It's not that hard to do.

First, remove the 'web' from any feathers you want to use. Some, like Jungle Cock, are usually sold with it gone. On others, like grouse or pheasant, they either come on the skin or with the web still attached.

Tear the web loose (don't cut it, pull it off with your fingers). Strip any other unwanted fibres (you can pull off as many as you need to in order to 'size' the feather).

Use the bare 'stem' to hold the feather. Using color preserver, full strength, coat the underside (the side going onto the blank) of the feather. Still holding the stem, place it where you want it on the blank. Using more color preserver, brush the feather into place, making sure to brush ONLY from the bare stem to the tip of the feather. This causes the feather to 'close' (align all the fibres next to each other). You can use your brush to shape the feather properly, and you can even move it a bit to get it lined up exactly where you want. Once the feather is in the exact location you want, carefully nip the bare stem with fine scissors (I use fly tying scissors). Place the next feather. I've never found any need to wait for the first one to dry, you just need to be careful to not misalign the first feather while placing the next.

You can overlap each sucessive feather, which looks real nice. You need to determine which one should go on top, etc., especially if you aren't just running a few along one axis. I've found that if you want to make more than one overlaping 'row', it looks best to do each side and then place the 'top' feather so it overlaps both side feathers....

Another thing I've done that looks real nice is to do a 'background' inlay with something like Peacock herl, then place a row of 'fancy' feathers (Lady Amhearst yellow head, the greenish feathers from the back of a ringneck, jungle cock, etc,) OVER the 'background'. The irredescence of the peacock is real pretty, but it's not too 'neat' . Using it as an 'undercoat' lets this show through while the pretty shaped feathers on top add the neat, clean lines of the typical 'feather shape'.

I've never persoanlly wanted to get into the intricate decorative thread wraps and such, but I really like the way the feather inlays look, and they are very easy to do.

Before doing it on a rod, though, you should buy some inexpensive feathers from the fly shop and play with it on something that it won't hurt to mess up. I 'practiced' on some glass rod, but you can get plastic rod, or wood dowels from the hardware store and paint them to the shades of the blanks you use.....

You'll be amazed at what you can make these feathers do, it just takes a bit of practice.

Buddy S.