Possibly, but only if they have some interesting license or "Heron" is defined as some other bird, or maybe they are raised abroad as a commercial bird. Otherwise, heck no!
Now I'm curious, I wonder how they are able to do this. I think I'll email them.
I just noticed that they are a Canadian company, maybe Canada has different laws about feathers. But it would be interesting to see what the rules are about shipping them to the states.
Just went to the website above, and this topic is covered at the bottom of the left border on the page. These are features from birds in the heron family, and the specific bird is not on any protected list.
their site still leaves us guessing which member of the heron family.
a clue: they dye over the natural chocolate color
so its not from a white bird.
herons are in the family: Family: ARDEIDAE
in the order: Order: PELECANIFORMES
Of course they could be playing fast and loose with taxonomy and its really from Pelicaniformes order rather than specifically Ardeidae family, or some other bird with a common name of "heron".
Here are the Ardeidae listed under MBTA.
Family ARDEIDAE Botaurus lentiginosus, American Bittern Ixobrychus sinensis, Yellow Bittern Ixobrychus exilis, Least Bittern Ixobrychus eurhythmus, Schrenck's Bittern Ixobrychus flavicollis, Black Bittern Ardea herodias, Great Blue Heron Ardea cinerea, Gray Heron Ardea alba, Great Egret Mesophoyx intermedia, Intermediate Egret Egretta eulophotes, Chinese Egret Egretta garzetta, Little Egret Egretta sacra, Pacific Reef-Egret Egretta gularis, Western Reef-Heron Egretta thula, Snowy Egret Egretta caerulea, Little Blue Heron Egretta tricolor, Tricolored Heron Egretta rufescens, Reddish Egret Bubulcus ibis, Cattle Egret Ardeola bacchus, Chinese Pond-Heron Butorides virescens, Green Heron Nycticorax nycticorax, Black-crowned Night-Heron Nyctanassa violacea, Yellow-crowned Night-Heron Gorsachius goisagi, Japanese Night-Heron Gorsachius melanolophus, Malayan Night-Heron
This appears to cover all the north american species.
Ya gotta be careful with those heron feathers. I see guys using them for demonstration fly tying in Albany and they are do so at their own risk. It doesn't matter where you bought them, it is illegal in the US to have them in your possession.
You don't really need to use heron feathers for a spey pattern. Hell, just find yourself a spey chicken... their feathers are legal.
Ya gotta be careful with those heron feathers. I see guys using them for demonstration fly tying in Albany and they are do so at their own risk. It doesn't matter where you bought them, it is illegal in the US to have them in your possession.
You don't really need to use heron feathers for a spey pattern. Hell, just find yourself a spey chicken... their feathers are legal.
The species covered by CITES are listed in three Appendices, according to the degree of protection they need.
Appendix I includes species threatened with extinction. Trade in specimens of these species is permitted only in exceptional circumstances.
Appendix II includes species not necessarily threatened with extinction, but in which trade must be controlled in order to avoid utilization incompatible with their survival.
Appendix III contains species that are protected in at least one country, which has asked other CITES Parties for assistance in controlling the trade.
Good info here below. I don't have heron. I use Whiting Spey Hackle and Coque Tail Feathers. I didn't mean to suggest for you to buy white heron although I've been told it's ok by good sources. <-----However, treat that as hearsay!!!!
Ira, the reply should be interesting, if you get one.
I don't see the white heron as identified as protected by law but I don't think I'd mess around with any heron feathers.
A couple of us found a road kill blue heron and we called the US Fish and Wildlife and asked about using the feathers from the dead bird for fly tying and they told us absolutely not. Other than moving it off the road, don't even touch it.
Same thing happened with me but with a Trumpeter Swan (Dang those things are big). I told the WDFW about it but by the time someone made it out the thing was gone.
I agree, I think avoiding these types of feathers is the best bet altogether.
I think there is no "white heron" as a separate species.
Great egrets, ardea alba, look like a heron only white. They may be commonly called white herons.
great egrets are protected under MTBA and CITES, I believe.
I read there is a white variant of the great blue heron, in florida only.
j
Ok, I just read a response to my email from the owner of the company. It all looks very legit, although the name of the actual bird was not mentioned. I sent a follow up email to find out the name of the bird. Please read below. I personally appreciated the effort and tone of the email and I'm now looking at some of their other materials (I don't really tie spey type flies, you all know I'm nympher right?)
The speycock was a chicken commonly grown in the valley of the River Spey in Scotland. The speycock's feather was widely used in early spey patterns but was gradually supplanted in most cases by the heron hackle. The speycock itself was, over time, gradually replaced by the more common breeds of chicken which were apparently easier and cheaper to grow, and seems to have become extinct. The speycock feather resulted in a shorter hackle with a greater tendency for the fibers to clump together. I suppose the closest one can come to a substitute for speycock would be schlappen. Stripping one side of the feather reduces some of the bulk and, oddly enough, folding the fibers back and slathering them with saliva actually seems to reduce their tendency to clump back together.
The "official" (at least according to Mikel Frodin) patterns for a number of classic salmon flies such as Culdrain, Dallas, Glen Grant, the Riach (Reeach) series and the Green King and Purple King still call for speycock's hackle.
Thanks for the information. I have been following the Canadian Tube Fly Company and the spey hackle for several weeks. I was able to buy some legal polar bear and a nice jungle cock cape several weeks back and was looking for some spey hackle and ran across this company. They have an assortment of twenty feathers for about fifty bucks. Seems expensive at the outset but considering the polar bear and the jungle cock, the outlay is very reasonable if one wants to up the type and quality of the flies he ties.
I've used polar bear hair (which was supposed to be "legal" because it was cut from a rug) and to tell you the truth, I don't think it works any better than the synthetic tying materials available without the "legal or not" question. I think it is desirable only because it is illegal in the US... kind'a like cuban cigars.
The same holds true for blue heron feathers. They really don't work any better at catching fish than do the substitute feathers.
This is the golden age of flytying and we have materials nowadays that didn't exist when the original patterns were tied. I see no point in messing around with tying materials that are not legal to own in the US just because the original pattern recipes indicated that was the stuff to use.
When the original patterns were tied, for all we know, the creators of the patterns would have used synthetics to create the pattern if they were available at the time. But they weren't so they used what they had.
I asked a number of fish what they think and they all pretty much said they could care less if the pattern is tied with the illegal materials or not.
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Related Threads
?
?
?
?
?
Washington Fly Fishing Forum
1.8M posts
21.3K members
Since 2000
A forum community dedicated to fishers, anglers and enthusiasts in the Washington area. Come join the discussion about safety, gear, boats, tackle, reviews, accessories, classifieds, and more!