Fencerows: Feather Hunt

By John Luthens

Turkey feathers disappeared one by one, upturned wings and eye hackle on the shanks of hooks, tied into fishing fly creations while the winter flew.  Between shovels of snow, the last of my squirrel-tail stockpile was tied into streamers.  I should have been better prepared.  I should have hunted harder when the season was open.

I spent a fair sum of coin at the local fly shop to tide me over; tan rooster feathers, black marabou, some grey nymph dubbing that looked like it was collected from a dirty vacuum cleaner.  Tying your own flies may be rewarding, but it sure as heck isn’t any easier or cheaper than buying ‘em.

Eventually, it all ran dry.  I sat at my tying vise, drumming my fingers, waiting for inspiration and pouring through fly pattern books to see what I might create with the meager materials at hand.

The cat lounged on the couch in a late-winter fur coat that looked ripe for a shearing.   My snowshoes leaned in disarray in the corner.  The leather bindings might make fine worm imitations; maybe the buckles could be melted down on the stove for bead heads.

Patiently waiting for the open water of spring, cabin fever can bring you to a pinnacle of creative genius, but the drop on the other side is an icy slide to insanity.  Lucky for the cat, I caught myself just in time.  Instead of hacking them up, I strapped on the snowshoes to go see if Mother Nature may have left something lying around her house that I could tie on a hook instead.

I called in permission on a farmer’s parcel on the outskirts of town.  Acres of fields are surrounded by upland forest.  There’s a lowland swamp bottom where hawthorn trees fight for sunlight with tall canary grass.  Separating two fields is a towering windbreak of Norway pines.  It was the perfect place for a feather hunt.

Snowshoes keep a winter’s pace in check, step by lumbering step.  You notice the smaller things you may have missed by flying by in boots alone.

Thawing days and freezing nights had set the drifted fields like hardened epoxy.  Lonely corn stalks whisked over the top.  In the swamp the snow was measured in feet and deer trails broke knee deep in the heaviest stuff.  Melting snow ran beneath the shelter of the pines into sheets of ice, cones and needles suspended beneath the frozen surface. 

I scrounged my first victory on the edge of the pines, picking a handful of blue jay feathers from a scattered pile.  Hooked on a thorn bush a few yards away was a single owl’s feather.  If there had been a predator-prey collision, it was hard to say.  Enough feathers were left behind from the jay to tell there was one less flash of blue screeching through the needled branches.

Walking the heavy snow of the swamp, mourning doves shot from beneath the brush where they had been feasting on blackened hawthorn berries. They twittered and beat their wings into the air like miniature grouse.  One dove stayed behind and I stepped within scant feet of his tree perch.  He seemed to know I was on snowshoes and there was no chance of danger from beneath.

White breast feathers floated on the snow from the preening doves, but the combined tufts wouldn’t have built a wrapped fly body on a size 20 hook.  I searched hard in the underbrush and came up with one fresh wing feather.  The sight of that many doves in one place made the feather far better than anything I could have bought from the fly shop.

That night while the cat slept beneath my fly bench, I tied some respectable caddis fly imitations.  I swear the lazy feline snored sighs of relief as I worked.  The caddis all had blue jay feathers tied for the heads.

I don’t know what to call my finest creation, but it has a wrapped body and tail from an owl and upturned mourning dove wings.  I’m saving that one for a special occasion.

I know of a particular quiet and deep pool on a far northern river.  A sultry, humid night will be just about right.  Then there’s a fighting chance I may get away with my amateur forgery.  I firmly believe there’s at least one sulking brown trout in that pool who will appreciate the craftsmanship.

Feather in the wind.

A mourning dove perches just out of reach.

Putting together the dividends of a feather hunt.