Spinning deer/elk hair

[Rory McMahon]

I attempted to tie a muddler minnow the other day, it took me along time to get the elk hair right. Most of the problem came from the elk hair spinning around the shank of the hook. As far as i could tell, there was no way to keep it from not spinning. Unless fo course you glue it. Is there another way to do it that doesn't require gluing?

[Nagasaurus]

I'm pretty new to spinning hair myself so I know what you are talking about when the entire clump of hair wants to roll around on the shank. So no expert advise here but thiis what I found works pretty well. It is a "1, 2, 3" method with the thread tension I read somewhere where you hold the hair on top of the shank for one wrap that is medium tension, another medium tension wrap (still holding the hair) and then on that third wrap give it full, hard tension while letting go and it should spin nicely.

It is also possible the clump of hair is a bit on the thick side and that will make it hard to flare properly so another thing to try is to not stack so much at one time.

[Jeremy Floyd]

I hold it with fingers and then do a couple loops over it and hold it while I pull it tight.

[Rory McMahon]

i take it you need strong thread for spinning deer hair, i was using 6/0 and i broke it once from too much tension.

[Willie Bodger]

Yes, strong thread is quite helpful, especially when you are learning. I used kevlar thread when I was learning.

[alpinetrout]

It's supposed to spin around the hook shank. That's why it's called "spinning deer hair". That's how you get nice even distribution of the hair all the way around.

[cabezon]

There are two ways (at least) for adding deer or elk hair for making muddler heads. In one, you want the hair to spin; this requires you to place the clump of hair in place, wrap the thread over the hair and as you slowly tighten the thread, let go of the hair. This should cause the hair to wrap or spin around the hook. It works better if there is no thread on the hook shank.

Another approach is to tie in clumps to a specific location; you might want to do this is you want a two-tone muddler with light hair on what will become the bottom of the head and dark hair on the top. In this case, you want to hold onto the hair clump while you tighten the thread; you don't want the hair to spin, at least not much. It helps to anticipate that the hair is going to move a bit no matter how tightly you hold it and place it appropriately before putting thread pressure on the hair clump. For this method, it is O.K., maybe even better, if there is thread already on the hook shank.

On bass bugs, I often combine the methods. I use the spinning approach for the overall body color and then spot in clumps of contrasting colors to create spots or whatever.

Steve

[Rory McMahon]

i guess that makes sense why its called spinning deer hair.

[Matt Burke]

Steve gave a pretty good explanation. I use two wraps of thread over my clump and then let go. Pulling the tread tight and continuing to wrap thread thru the spinning hair a couple more turns until tight or stops spinning. Then I use the hair packer. This will pack the clumps together very tight. I still haven't mastered spinning hair around obstacles like on skaters that have horns of bucktail such as the Wally Waker. Not very good at making them variegated either like stripes of yellow, brown, yellow, brown, etc. Takes practice and waisted deer hair.

[GVanKommer]

That was a great explanation. don't make it harder than it is. I did use kevlar thread at first, but now am back down to 8/0 for bass/trout and even 10/0 for smaller trout flies. I prefer not to bulk up. my sugg. is to start with smaller clumps of hair and practice many times on just a bare hookthen scrape it off with a razor blade.