My new boat blind

I've used raffia and it works. Also takes to spray paint real well if you want to add highlights or whatever.

What I don't like about raffia.

Constantly getting tangled in everything
Absorbed water - a lot of water
Would freeze in the colder weather
Would stay wet for a very long time during cold weather.

I am building a blind for my new boat and looking at synthetic type of raffia. I believe the name of one company is called blind grass. Take a look and see what you think.
 
The thing I don't like about raffia, and never have for grassing my boat, is how strong it is. You get tangled in this stuff, like your foot or a clip or something, you can't just rip it out and break it off.
 
I used BlindGrass on my boat last season. I’m happy with the material: it holds up well, doesn’t absorb water, and seems like it will last forever. However, I would advise against getting the panels. The wire that was used to hold the grass together is flimsy; I had three panels fall apart last season because the wire corroded and broke. I’m attaching the bundles to my blind this year with zip ties.

Whenever I get to a spot, I take whatever natural vegetation is present and stuff it into my grass loops. A good compromise that conceals well, and quickly at that.

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Another vote to consider Blind Grass
It is synthetic, waterproof, durable, many ways to apply it, reputable company, and many different types and styles to choose from. I do not have personal experience with it by if you go to RefugeForums.com Blind Grass Search you will find many examples. The owner of the company regularly posts there and is very helpful. From everyone else's experience on the product it seems almost too good to be true.

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I buy the biggest bails of raffia from hobby lobby. Probably can order it cheaper, but then I buy the dye there and dye my own. Its far cheaper, only takes a couple hours of sitting in a 5 gallon bucket of water and dye, hang it over night and then its ready to go on the blind. Have a layout I did ~10 years ago and the blind finally wore out before the dye in the raffia did. Just threw that blind away after last season.

For a boat blind though, I would use something that stands up and doesnt lay down. Blind grass is good good stuff, as mentioned above. I like to find natural tall grass on edges of fields that cannot be cut. Not even sure what the grass is but I have a farmer here who lets me come and cut it for my blinds. Its yellow and natural looking. Ill take a small handful, zip tie that bundle together and put it in the loops. You can then zip tie the grass to the loops you worked so hard to sew in and I will lose a little every year, but 30 min - hour of rebrushing and thats all it takes to get ready for the new season. I dont hunt out of a boat or a boat blind but the same concept applies for panel blinds or a-frames and this same concept works well on those.
 
Natural vegetation is the best. I’ve always grassed my boat with natural thatch, as I was taught by my father and his friends who are all old school. If you’re traveling a lot and hunting different areas with different vegetation, put a base layer of raffia or fast grass and then add natural vegetation on top of it.
 

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If your using artificial Blind Grass bundles is the way to go. Won,t be cheap but consider it will basically last forever . Rafia is alright but as mentioned it gets heavy when wet and needs to be dried out or mildew will cause it to basically rot away. Either can be threaded thru your grass loops and zip tied. I use a combo of both mainly because boat blinds were already grassed with rafia prior to Blind grass introduction. As more was needed and to give blinds some depth I've used Blind grass over it. If you go Rafia JSterns is the place to get it in bulk. You,ll probably need 30 or more pounds to grass blind right.
 
I am not a fan of rafia for all the reasons previously mentioned, but I am intrigued by Blind Grass although it appears somewhat rigid in the pictures I have seen. I need to be able to roll up the blind on my Bankes for transport, would the Blind Grass allow for that.
 

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Matt C said:
I am not a fan of rafia for all the reasons previously mentioned, but I am intrigued by Blind Grass although it appears somewhat rigid in the pictures I have seen. I need to be able to roll up the blind on my Bankes for transport, would the Blind Grass allow for that.
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that’s my concern too. I need flexibility to be able to pop up and down, will this stuff do that without breaking?
 
Matt C said:
I am not a fan of rafia for all the reasons previously mentioned, but I am intrigued by Blind Grass although it appears somewhat rigid in the pictures I have seen. I need to be able to roll up the blind on my Bankes for transport, would the Blind Grass allow for that.
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Blind grass rolls as easily as a heavily rafia grassed blind does. I use a mix of rafia and blind grass on 2 different boat blinds that roll to each side and store along gunnels. No issues.
 
William Reinicke said:
I buy the biggest bails of raffia from hobby lobby. Probably can order it cheaper, but then I buy the dye there and dye my own. Its far cheaper, only takes a couple hours of sitting in a 5 gallon bucket of water and dye, hang it over night and then its ready to go on the blind. Have a layout I did ~10 years ago and the blind finally wore out before the dye in the raffia did. Just threw that blind away after last season.

For a boat blind though, I would use something that stands up and doesnt lay down. Blind grass is good good stuff, as mentioned above. I like to find natural tall grass on edges of fields that cannot be cut. Not even sure what the grass is but I have a farmer here who lets me come and cut it for my blinds. Its yellow and natural looking. Ill take a small handful, zip tie that bundle together and put it in the loops. You can then zip tie the grass to the loops you worked so hard to sew in and I will lose a little every year, but 30 min - hour of rebrushing and thats all it takes to get ready for the new season. I dont hunt out of a boat or a boat blind but the same concept applies for panel blinds or a-frames and this same concept works well on those.
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Custom dyeing rafia is the way to go . I've actually redyed some from JSterns when color I ordered wasn't up to my standards. This will probably be the first season I haven't dyed some for boat blind use. Big crab steamer is what I use over propane burner.
 
I think I’ll order some blind grass for a base layer and then cover with natural, brown codura was roughly half the price of camo so I went with that. I broke it up some with rattle can paint but it definitely needs grass! How much blind grass would it take to cover that 14 footer?
 
Josh Jenson said:
I think I’ll order some blind grass for a base layer and then cover with natural, brown codura was roughly half the price of camo so I went with that. I broke it up some with rattle can paint but it definitely needs grass! How much blind grass would it take to cover that 14 footer?
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Depends you don’t want to go too thick that it will weigh the boat down when wet or have snow/ice on it, but also not light enough where there’s bare spots and the birds will be able to see you and/or the boat.
 
I ordered up some blind grass a couple of weeks back, it said back ordered, still haven’t heard a peep from them. Hoping it gets here soon!
 
Blind grass is good stuff and nearly indestructible, we used it on some of our pits last season. We'll see how it held up over the season shortly. I would suggest trimming the ends near your openings as we had one guy poke his eye with a blade that hung over the pit open, could be an issue for dogs also if at their eye level.
 
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