Been playing around with mink and rabbit strips for the last few months, admittedly I haven’t used them that extensively except for Farmoor and Draycote.

The rabbit strips have worked much better for me than the mink this year but previous years it has been the mink that normally triumphs.

Now I don’t tie my zonkers big (rabbit), I normally only leave 1ish cm over the bend of the hook. Unlike the mink, it has longer, softer fur which protrudes considerably further than the skin. Mink doesn’t, mink has a shorter fur but is more dense, which keeps it’s shape very well.

I prefer using minkies when fishing slow as opposed to zonkers, as the mink keeps its shape, little movement is needed to ‘Work’ the fly whereas the rabbit fur seems to ‘Die’ when fished slow. The faster the zonkers are fishes the more movement is put into the rabbit strip and seems to fish better.

Maybe its the winder weather we’ve been having this year that has helped aid the catch rate of the Zonkers. Still can’t beat Minkie boobies though!