Your skills with the pen/paper are equally as good, great actually!
Do you have a drawing or a demo on how you treated the squirrel tails, mounted them to the dart? I am a falconer and my Hawk kills 40-50 of those a year for me. Mostly the Grey Cat Squirrel like you've shown here (unless that's Fox but it looks like Cat to me) and one of the cool color phases we have here in MI is an all Black one. Would make some really nice looking darts. Are the Sq. tailed darts slowed than the Milkweed fluff (heavier mass possibly?)....would Cattail down )the tops) work?
Amyway, great thread and thanks for sharing.
Below is a sketch for how I process the squirrel tails. It is easier to do if the tail (bones, meat etc.) is attached to the body still. To remove the tail I pinch the tail base right in front of the skin. With my other hand on the squirrel body I pull the body away from my pinched fingers. The goal is to make the tail skin come off like a sock. No rips no tears. If using your fingers does not work you might try using a a pair of sticks and use them like your daughter's hair berets. Van Dykes sells a tail skinner that works wonders if you do enough of them. Sometimes a tail will tear at the vertebral joint. This makes getting a firm grip on the tail bone tough. Such times require vise grips or a vise. I love modern devices. The squirrels I have access to are grey squirrels
Sciurus carolinensis and fox squirrels
Sciurus niger. I know there is a lot of variation in fox squirrels across the US in way of color and patterns. Here in SE MO I would rather skin six greys than one fox squirrel. Especially if I wanted the hide in nice shape. they can be tougher and harder to skin. But that also means the hide will hold up better. I plan to make a squirrel row hide string some day and a fox squirrel is my resource of choice. I am not familiar with a grey cat squirrel but local names are fun all over the US.
If you need anything else please let me know. I am happy to share.
As for cattail down. I have dinked with this for other projects and consider the fluff too short to fletch a BG dart. I also have never heard of any native tribes using it for that purpose. With that said I never tried it. I would enjoy knowing that someone made it work. Besides is gets all over as you deal with it. Not exactly an indoor friendly product. The other fluffs scatter too but nearly so bad.
The milkweed dart is a lot like a cat with it fur on. Kind fluffy. Get em wet and you see how little cat there is under all that fur. My point is they look bulkier than they really are. I have not noticed any speed differences in darts based on fletch but then again I have not paid attention. One day I will have to find a chronograph and see about that. That inspires me! good thinking.
best of luck and post some of those black tail darts if you craft some. That sounds like a
cool product.
