Late to the Party

[Random Casts]

Ok so I have had a love hate relationship with CDC over the years. I love the way it floats, I hate the way it sinks after it gets slimed by a fish. No matter what you do, how you clean and dry it it just doesn’t float the same.

I have switched to snowshoe hare for flies in the 12-14-16 range. Works great! Hackle works for smaller flies but with my arthritic hands it’s just to difficult to tie with. I must be missing something since CDC feathers seam to be the answer.

Last night while in bed and cruising the web I thought I’d visit Marc Pettijean’s tutorial on tying with CDC. After half falling asleep through the video, right in the last five seconds I heard him say “and lastly I apply a drop of CDC oil to the fly to protect it from the fish slime and to keep it floating for many more fish”. Wait what…!

Now I’m sure you guys have already figured this out years ago and this topic has probably been beaten to death on this Forum. But this is news to me.

Apparently in order to dye CDC feathers, the preening oil has to be removed in order for the dye to take. Similarly the natural colored feathers are cleaned in order to market them and in that process some if not all of the oils are removed.

Eureka I have my answer!

Off to the Web store for CDC oil.

Cheers,
Richard

[Norm Frechette]

ive read were the feather structure traps tiny air bubbles to help it float, not oils

https://globalflyfisher.com/tie-better/tying-with-cdc

[Random Casts]

Hi Norm,

The very first sentence in your link says it all I think.

Cheers,
Richard

[Norm Frechette]

okay

i read further down in the article "understanding cdc"