Fishing fly tieing feathers .

[ross]

Just read an interesting article in Field & Stream about raising / breeding special bred roosters mainly for top of the line fly hackles . Very interesting read . Google up . Another specialty use for special bred chickens .

[windwalkingwolf]

I saw some videos on this awhile ago, Richard found them and thought it might be a way to make a little xtra money off extra roosters. It's a little too labour intensive for me, but I was deeply impressed by the breeders I saw, especially Whiting. A true labour of love for these guys, and I'd love to have a setup like that nearby. I dream of learning from specialty breeders like those!

[kenya]

Wow nice story! The changes just by selection are amazing to see before and after examples. We all know it can be done but few of us would use taxidermy.
I had a barred rock rooster, bantam die and a friend of my husbands who's big into fly fishing took the carcus for the mantel to make fishing ties. He said they were worth a lot of money.

[BobG]

Dr Whiting is an artist and king of the hackle breeders fantastic capes . I fiddled around with some barred rocks Cassidy line for about 10 yrs got the saddle feathers to around 10 to 11 inches no where near what is available today . The Howard family from Alberta had great hackle birds but they sold out to Americans a couple of years ago