any input on bunny ties?

[Hawnjigs]

Agreed, hands on is necessary to get good rabbit. I mail order precuts from Hareline and have been disappointed with the variation in hide thickness & fur quality. Some batches still have residual salt in the hide that severely rusts out hooks on tied & stored jigs. Salty hide needs to be rinsed and dried several times, and unfortunately I don't know any safe method to detect salt. Also, some salty 1/4" white magnum strips I rinsed shrank to 1/8" when dried.

 

[smallmouth]

I'm finding my zonker tails deteriorate after usage and are not as durable as I would like. I use a discontinued yarn called "Fur Out" which has great action in the water and being synthetic lasts forever. Palmered rabbit strip with some left dangling for the tail is a quick and effective tie, but I have found that from one season to the next the strip will deterioate and break off under pressure. For durabilty I've been using the zonker strips for the body but a synthetic yarn tail is tied on first and then the rabbit strip is palmered up to the jighead.

Bernat "Fur Out" and Bernat "Disco Yarn" are my favourite yarns but have long been discontinued. A fly shop material called "Body Fur" is pretty close to Fur Out. You can still find funky yarns in the Dollar Store at times. I still love to use rabbit. Just wish the hide would be more durable.

God Bless,
Don

 

[hhawkins]

These are some bunnys that I tied up. I like using zonkers!

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[StumpHunter]

Welcome to JC smallmouth, glad to have you join in with us.

Nice bunny jigs Heather. Those orange ones are killer looking jigs , nice!