This is an experimental tail I made for my best friend for her birthday (but the pictures are actually me modeling it.) I started with a yarn base (I believe alpaca yarn, but it was just some tidbits I had laying about) then needlefelted the fur on layer by layer. When I had finished layering on the fur I "scissor-sculpted" (read: gave it a hair-cut) so that the fur was relatively a similar length to tiger-fur.

From tip-to-base of the wool roving the tail is 16" (about down to my knee, but I'm a shorty so probably shorter on taller individuals), but it has a simple loop to put it through a belt, so it's 18" total.

Since this is a gift, it is not for sale, but if you're interested in pricing: I used two bags of white roving ($8), and one half-bag of black ($2). It took me three hours total to needlefelt and scissor-sculpt, (3 hrs.x$10), so a project of this nature would be right in the neighborhood of $40, depending on the complexity of the character. (So, for instance, a one-or-two colored character will always cost less than a five, six, or rain-bow colored character with complex markings because it will use less supplies and consume less time.)

As an experiment, this isn't too bad. I used all leftover materials from other projects, didn't end up using too much, and it didn't take much time, either. Next time I'm definitely going to double or triple the layers of wool roving I use to give it a more even "texture", but I think this technique would work a lot better for things like lemurs.

My next experiment will be to use the rest of the white roving I have leftover and to try dyeing it with Kool-Aid, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be doing a red fox.