Dressing Treble Hooks With Bucktail

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Does anybody else here on BassResource dress their treble hooks, on crankbaits and stickbaits, with bucktail?

 

Also do people dress jigs for grubs or single hooks for rigging wacky worms and other plastics?

 

Feel free to elaborate, as the first snow is hitting Chicago right now so I see a lot of hook dressing and other lure modifications in my near future while waiting for next season.

[Snakehead Whisperer]

I do this mostly for topwaters and jerkbaits, but typically I will use plume feathers and fly tying flash of some sort. I do use bucktail for jigs, however. A fly tying vice makes short work of this, but you can easily build your own too. 

[OkobojiEagle]

I like to use a little bucktail with a few strands of flash-a-bou over and neck hackle tips over that.  I prefer my dressing to be much shorter than commonly seen.

 

 

oe

[smalljaw67]

I will tie the hackle and flash on treble hooks for X-Raps and Zell Pops for myself but I have a couple friends who trout fish and I do their spinners for them. One guy in particular likes bucktail on his Mepps spinners so he buys the Aglia undressed by the dozen and I tie bucktail on them with a little Krystal flash, he tell me the bucktail gives a better minnow profile than the squirrel tail that Mepps uses. BTW the hook isn't removable on a Mepps spinner making them a pain in the neck to tie them.

[ING]

Guys, what do you think about odor of bucktails ? Deer's bucktails have very strong smell. Same the  rubberskirts. Even latex on Mepps flying "C". Could it repel the fish? I've tried to eliminate this odors but failed. So, there are pluses and minuses. What is prevail?

[Catch 22]

I tie jigs from size 1/32 oz to 3 oz. Some of them can be done by hand but  as mentioned a vise is very handy. You need not spend much more than $20 to get a basic  unit.

I use lots  of flashabou  of different colors ,even black on black jigs.I like some flash on certain top water  rear hooks.

 

I never noticed deertail odor because I always wash them in warm soapy water, rinse and borax the skin side heavily and air dry them.

 

Skunk tails hang in  a tree til they quit raging,usually  4 to 6 weeks.

Sometime nothing is safe. Several times I had tails hanging about 7 feet high and some night critter considered it  to be edible

 

C22

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Well I never wash any of the bucktail that I tie onto my lures, and I have caught multiple bass on them this past year. I mainly tied bucktails on crankbaits and stickbaits last year but plan to expand that this off season.

 

 And ING, I'm pretty sure you are a worried about something that would take care of itself after a couple casts and retrieves.

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Also, Im pretty sure that sight trumps smell in the mind of a bass

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Wow, almost 500 views with very few answers, I guess there are not that many people out there that dress their own treble hooks or single hooks with bucktail and flashaboo.

[Bassun]

I tie off a few dozen trebles with marabou, some with flash and use them on jerks and some topwater baits.  I've never used bucktail though, unless I'm tying... well bucktails lol.

 

As for dressing a jig head for grubs, nope --- I just dress it with the grub But, having said that, those hula-grubs would basically be the same thing, so I suspect there could be a use for it.  I may play with that idea on the table some.

[dopey]

If you don't like dealing with the bucktail you can use cross-cut zonker strips cut from and fur or even craft fur.  You can make them thin or dense depending on how you wrap them.  

[ING]

Well I never wash any of the bucktail that I tie onto my lures, and I have caught multiple bass on them this past year. I mainly tied bucktails on crankbaits and stickbaits last year but plan to expand that this off season.

 

 And ING, I'm pretty sure you are a worried about something that would take care of itself after a couple casts and retrieves.

Unfortunately it doesn't "take care of itself after a couple" or even hundreds casts. Especially rubber smell.

I've successfully used some of Mepps flying "C" for couple seasons and they are smelly like first day. Even I am feeling that smell what about fish which could feel one molecule of substance on dekaliters of water. Another question: how fish is reacting on particular smell. May be we are too precocious when washing lures and hands by Lemon Joy?(That BTW has own odor). I've watched fisherman that smoking one cigarette after other and handled lures by smelly hands but it did not prevented them from successful fishing.   

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Rubber Smell?

 

This is a forum post about dressing treble hooks with BUCKTAIL

 

Also, the further tangent you go out into is incomprehensible and useless for this conversation.

All of your questions on the "rubber smell" on whatever you are referring to can be found through further online research, not on a forum post about dressing treble hooks with BUCKTAIL

[ING]

Rubber Smell?

 

This is a forum post about dressing treble hooks with BUCKTAIL

 

Also, the further tangent you go out into is incomprehensible and useless for this conversation.

All of your questions on the "rubber smell" on whatever you are referring to can be found through further online research, not on a forum post about dressing treble hooks with BUCKTAIL

As I've told in the post #5 deer's BUCKTAIL has very strong smell. And washing is helping not so much; only adding odor of washing staff. I'm suspecting that  you are fly fishing guy and has no idea that in the saltwater for salmon and striped bass fisherman using also rubber skirts on the trebles and call them BUCKTAIL. Of course, it is not classical bucktail but it is tail and name was transferred.

[Will Wetline]

I dress jigs with bucktail for cold water smallies. I buy the bucktail from Barlow's or another supplier and it doesn't have an odor.

 

Here's a video I found helpful for handling the bucktail:

 

 

and here's an article I wrote for BR last winter:

 

http://www.bassresource.com/bass-fishing-forums/topic/135465-bucktail-jigs-for-smallmouth-bass/

[Big Fish Small Pond]

ING, have you tried any fish attractants sprayed right onto the bucktail. I have a garlic firsh attractant spray that is heavily overpowering that you may want to look into in order to cover that smell that you speak of.

And I know how to do it already, I am just asking if others here do it as well.

[ING]

ING, have you tried any fish attractants sprayed right onto the bucktail. I have a garlic firsh attractant spray that is heavily overpowering that you may want to look into in order to cover that smell that you speak of.

And I know how to do it already, I am just asking if others here do it as well.

I've tried garlic super jell. It is working perfectly for salmon trout but useless(at least in my experience) for salmon and striped bass. 

Do not mix humans and fishes senses. Human is sniffing lure with garlic attractant and tells: "It is garlic smell only". Fish has much more sophisticated smell lab.

It is telling: "Yes it is a lot of garlic here but, it is smelling also by car oil, tobacco,  perfume from morning shaving, lemon joy, old Sheppard... etc...." 

Some odors are OK for some fish, some - not. Salmon is verrry precocious. Largemouth bass looks like careless.

There are a lot of another factors that influence on biting. Hungry fish in the school has not too much time for analyzing.

Fish with full stomach is not in feeding frenzy and not in hurry. It could follow lure for long distance, mouth the bait and spit it out many times. During the spawning fish is very aggressive and attacking intruders inspite of smell, size etc... 

So, I mean that it is difficult to define what has stimulated fish to bite.

[Big Fish Small Pond]

Or you could always just wash your hands, and I do not saltwater fish regularly while the only salmon I will start fishing more are in Lake Michigan