Ordered my first.....

[quivira kid]

Sickle jigs tonight. We'll see if they live up to the hype! Y'all got me curious. And since I was ordering, I got some new chenille colors too.

[moswampy]

QK if you need to get some heads you can drive about 30min from where you live East buy $20 worth of hooks and pour several hundred heads at my house. I have round head with/without barb and a horse head mold.

[quivira kid]

Swampy, I might have to take you up on that sometime! I've never even given thought to pouring my own heads.... Could be kinda fun to learn.

[skiptomylu]

Your gonna like the hooks, but know up front every once in a while their poor QC shows up. However the only hooks close to the sharpness of the Sickles are much higher cost. Like Gamakatsu is probably my favorite hook, but too expensive fore crappie jigs. With the sickles you get a very sharp hook and the gap between the point and the shank is as big as the next size larger in regular bend. SO a #4 Sickle is the same as a #2 regular bend. Also the straight part of the shank is shorter too to make room for the bends.

Problems, well sometime the eye is not closed and some times the barb may be on the side and even a couple that didn't have a point. Also there was a bad big batch that got out early last year of #4 that would break easy, too easy and even sometimes when just tying. Thank goodness they seemed to have taken care of that or just ran out of the bad batch that got the bad heat treat.

Skip

[PBUG2009]

thats about all i pour anymore...love the sharpness of them but my fingers dont...ive got from size 8 to size 2 sickles...

[fish_4_all]

They will stick you without breathing for sure, some of the sharper hooks out there. Have fun with them and make sure to hide the point of that hook in the vise or your fingers will be hamburger after tying 50 of them.

[hunter7711]

Out of a 1000 I've been getting probably 20 that are mis-made.

[quivira kid]

Went to the tackle shop this morning and got a pack of loose hackle. Gonna try some hackle tails for the first time! Now the question is this: how many feathers per tail? Three seems to look about right, but I don't know.

Zac

[PBUG2009]

i use the section at the end and cut V's with about 1/4 inch on the V's.....look at skips how to tie a jig on here..its the sticky on here...and you will get the idea real quick.....i did..and after time you perfect it...

[skiptomylu]

Went to the tackle shop this morning and got a pack of loose hackle. Gonna try some hackle tails for the first time! Now the question is this: how many feathers per tail? Three seems to look about right, but I don't know.

Zac

I tie my neck hackle tails different than most and some have taken my way as their way also. I like the looks and wanted mine to just be different. Most people use 2 hackle tips for their tails and I use just one, but I cut the rest of my feather into small V's. So I cut the tip length I want and then I cut the rest of the stem about every 1/4" until I get to the fuzzy stuff and stop. I use the one tip and 2 of the little V's I made to do the tail.

I did a little slid show for the guys here so if they wanted to do it my way they would know what I do. I also take one step a lot don't and that is when I buy my strung neck hackle I try to find 4"-6" long neck hackle and it cost about 2 times what the 3"-5" cost, but I like the wide webby feathers I get and they make for better little V's.

You can look at my site and see lots of side photos that show the tip and then you can see all the barbules sticking back along that tip and kind of looks like hair, but it's feathers and I think much like your less is more thing here I think I get more action and my customers seem to catch a lot of crappie. Have had several say they were able to catch over 300 on one jig.

Slide show link....
http://www.crappie.com/crappie/jig-t...tying-jig.html

Skip