Duck Feathers?

[BowJunkie]

Anyone ever used Duck Feathers on your arrow shafts ? ? ? ?
Got a place close by with a lot of duck feathers, may use them instead of buying turkey feathers.
Any thoughts?

[JackCrafty]

Yep, I've used them.  They are not as stiff or durable as turkey feathers, though.  But heck, free is free.  Gather a bunch and try them.

[BowJunkie]

Well the reason I ask,, is turkey feathers aren't cheap and I'm all about being cost effective 
So my thoughts were to make some new Hunting arrows, strap some  125 grn MA-3 broadheads and some Duck feathers
on to some POC's and see how the work out.

[Pat B]

Take 3 whole duck feathers and lay them around the shaft with the shiny side in(the outside of the feather facing the shaft). Now wrap the forward end and the rear end and you have a tangential 3 fletch. You can add some helical as you tie them. I use this type of fletching using smaller turkey and goose feathers and they fly very well.

[BowJunkie]

Pat do you have a picture to post of an example?
Thanks
Johnny

[SEMO_HUNTER]

I tried goose feathers once and like Jack said I found them not as stiff or durable as turkey feathers. I got the same results with goose as I did young turkey feathers, they whistled or sizzled all the way to the target. Not sure about duck but I imagine they are about the same or even worse in the noise department? Only one way to find out, take em for a test flight cause what have ya got to lose except a little time.

[Pat B]

Here you go, Johnny. The arrow on the right is fletched with goose feathers in a tangential 3 fletch style. It will be in my hunting quiver when I go to Colorado in September. It is a very quiet arrow and flies like a dart...


This is a sequence of how to lay it out...

[bowtarist]

Nice fletching Pat.  Here is one I did with secondary chicken feathers.  I think secondary feathers are great, there's a lot more of them, they just take practice, but so do all the others too.  Secondary feathers rule...wellmaybe not, but they work great and are easier to get if you raise poultry or know someone who does.  You can fletch with lots of feathers, just keep 'em consistent.

[BowJunkie]

Interesting Concept Pat, I will make up a few and see how they fly.
Thank you for taking the time to post pics.
I always get excellent feed back from you Pat.
Thank you so much
Johnny in Texas

[Pat B]

  The nice thing about this style is you can use most ant found feathers to do it. Even if you have to use more than 3.
This is an arrow that James Parker gave me. It has the same fletching style using goose feathers...

[crooketarrow]

  In june when geese molt I've got ponds that I check each year. I always pick up a few. I use to know a lady that had white ducks that saved me all the wing feathers. I'll use them after I get some.

[TRACY]

I've kept all my duck and goose wings for this purpose and fletch them with deer sinew. Larger duck species like mallards and black ducks work well. Any flight issues have been attributed to operator error on my part when fletching. I tried molted goose feathers once, but they were pretty well worn but worked.

Tracy

[hillbilly61]

Pat... I forgot all about that type after I started getting alrready made fletches. Was that you that did the artical in PA magazine? I'm going to have to go and make a few of them Heck. If tou're going to shoot them to take an elk, they can't be all bad

[aznboi3644]

I collect duck and goose feathers from lakes and ponds.  Heres a few i did with some mallards.  I don't put the shiny side in.  They are too pretty to hide.  I use two or three whole feathers.  Sometimes I'll even split them and make mini fletches.  The arrows fly just fine with no wobble in flight even with three inch duck fletching.

[JW_Halverson]

The more closely matched in spine the arrows are to your bow the less important the fletching becomes. 

Pat, thanks for posting the how-to on the three whole fletchs.  I like the look of those!  I'm going to try to make up some of those with the wonderful metallic blue secondaries from mallard ducks!