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Practical Tips On The Use of Snow Runner
Snow Runner is a great new natural hair with excellent qualities for fly tying. It has just the right amount of stiffness to maintain good volume in the water under most applications, and does not have a tendency to collapse like softer furs such as fox, llama, Icelandic sheep, or feathers such as marabou. Paradoxical, when in the water the Snow Runner hair will slightly absorb water, unlike most synthetics, this makes the material neutral buoyant and greatly increases the movement of the hair. It can be tied very sparingly which makes for great casting flies. It comes in long lengths so that it is also a good material for very big patterns, like Musky or big saltwater baitfish patterns like the one below tied on a 6/0 hook.
Unlike artificial fibres it does not tangle and knot when it has been chewed on by toothy fish. It is a very tough hair, much tougher than buck tail for example, and will last through the abuse of many predator fish. It has a nice semi-translucency to it and takes dyes well for vibrant colours.
Snow Runner comes from a fairly rare domestic farm animal and there is significant variations in the fur between individual skins. We hand-pick the best suitable skins for fly tying, but even with that the choice of a specific variation depends on the type of pattern you are going to tie. In this article I will go over some practical use tips for tying with Snow Runner.
You will receive Snow Runner as a patch of hide, approximately between 3×4″ and 4×5″, depending of the volume of hair on the individual piece of hide. The hides are roughly brushed out before we package them. As soon as you unpack your piece of Snow Runner take the time do give it a thorough brushing with a metal brush, like the ones used for combing dogs.
You will remove some of the under-fur when you do this. This under-fur makes a very good dubbing so keep it. Roll it into a ball and cut it to short lengths with a scissor. You can add angel hair to add some glitter and throw it all in a coffee bean grinder. Now you have some very nice seal-like dubbing. After you have brushed out your piece of Snow Runner, iron it. The best way is to use a “wool” setting on the iron and use a damp cloth over the fur or use the steam function on the iron if it has it. Proceed to iron it out, straightening the hair as you go. You will now have a patch of beautiful straight Snow Runner hair that will remain like this (video here). Now we are ready to tie with it. For a general wing on patterns with a hair wing style, like the one tied by Mike Walsh, for Atlantic Salmon, below, I do the following;
I clip of a bunch of hair, grip it close to the base with my index finger and thumb of one hand and gently pull on the tag end at the base of the hair. This will remove the very short under-fur (you can again keep this for your dubbing). Next I change my grip on the hair and move it to approximately the middle of the hair. I now gently pull on the tips of the hairs and pull the longest hairs out. I put these hairs on my knee or desk. I repeat this step, continuing to pull the longest hairs out of the bunch of hair, each time carefully laying them on top of the hairs I pulled out previously, with the tips aligned. I repeat this about 6 times or so, until I have only softer guard hair in my hand. I add this also to the hair that I have aligned. What I have done is re-aligned, or stacked, all the tips of the hair and created an even mix of stiffer guard hair and softer, shorter, guard hair. By doing this I now have a wing that is denser, fuller, and much nicer to tie with than just tying in the bunch of hair that is not stacked. It also is much more economical since you do not waste any of the shorter hair. It sounds like a lot of work when you read it like this but in reality it only takes a minute and the result is well worth the effort. Short, soft hair wings can be tied with the shorter guard hair fibres.
For Intruder style collars you have a few options. You can make a brush, which is what I prefer and I will go over this in the next paragraph. Or you can distribute a bunch of hair around a shank or tube, against a dubbing ball or, better yet, a brass bead. For the bunch of hair that you use you can choose to do the same method as I described in the previous paragraph, or if you want a very sparse, leggy, appearance you can mainly use the longer guard hair (and keep the shorter ones for hair wings). Simply take a stack of hair and spin it around the shank, distribute it evenly and work you thread back agains the bead to make the hair stand out at a 90 degree angle. If you want a collar that holds up in faster currents than first tie in an under-collar of Nutria guard hair. This is much stiffer than the Snow Runner and is an excellent support for all kinds of soft collar and wing materials. You can read more on this technique here.
Another way to use Snow Runner is to make a brush with it. This is a great way to get the hair to stand out at 90 degrees to the shank or tube. Creating a tear drop shaped body is very easy this way. It only takes a few wraps and you will have a beautiful translucent body that retains volume and has very good movement. You can add some glitter to your taste. Below are some examples of flies tied with Snow Runner brushes.
Snow Runner brushes in a variety of colours.
Two or three turns of a Snow Runner brush will create a great tear drop shaped body.
Making a brush from Snow Runner is not easy. The materials are fairly long for a brush and soft and slippery. However, with some practise you can create beautiful brushes that are a pleasure to tie with. For those that find the idea of making your own brushes a bit daunting we are producing Snow Runner brushes.
With Snow Runner it is also possible to create bait fish patterns that are cut to shape. Usually this is done with brushes that are made of synthetic fibres. However, synthetic fibres tend to get mangled and tangled badly after you catch a toothy fish. Snow Runner does not do this, and is much more durable. Here is an example of a squid body that is shaped from a Snow Runner brush.
Give Snow Runner a try. We are very excited about this new material and the possibilities it creates for the innovative fly tier.
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