How many fish have you caught lately?

I tried to post a fish tail pattern as an alternative to the one in the original pattern.  I tried to have the hosting website to save the pattern for downloading but was refused as they did not consider it a pattern?!  Oh well, they suggested that I had it upload somewhere and set a link to there for downloading.  Never have time to find out how to do it, but now I think if I post it here, it will work :D

 

 

This pattern is not my original idea.  It is one of the knitter in the forum that wrote out the pattern in her comment. I followed the pattern and couldn't get the result.  I thought I was reading it wrong.  As you can see, the comment dialogue there has very limited formatting, eg., you cant have asterisk typed in the comment, so I tried reading it many different ways. After hours of trying and going nowhere, I decided to go to YouTube and look for ribs increase in knitting instead.  From then on, I tried a few more different ways, and finally decided on the stitch pattern \o/

 

 

Now, one thing about this pattern, you will find that the fish tail is not "anatomically" correct.  Fish with this tail will be swimming like a dolphin, but it falls flat on the back nicely.  For a fish to swim like a fish, all you need to do is to slip a few stitches to align the tail, carry the yarn over (since it is still in circular knit arrangement really at this stage, I will say the yarn needs to be on the wrong side, that will help to hide the carry over yarn) before knitting out into straight row. I do that for shark hat and small fish cap, and works well.

The extra material that you might need is a set of DPN of the same size for those that are died hard fans of circular needles ;) You might want to try it with one size smaller if you are a loose knitters as there are 2 rows of increase coming right up one after another.  Personally, I use the same circular needles to do all that (and yes, I seldom change to DPN in circular knit even if there is 4 sts left in the circular knit :p), the 3rd needle will be any needle (size the same or smaller than the one I am using) I find right next to me.  The exact sizing of the 3rd needle is not really important as it will only be for one row. I change back to the circular needles I am using on the next row.

Alternative fish tail for fish hat (dead or alive?)

Abbreviations

st(s) = stitch(es)

k = knit

p = purl

m = marker

pm = place marker

sm = slip marker

t&w = turn and work

BO = bind off

This great basic design is from SailorCarol and I made 2 modifications for my own preference, please feel free to try it out :)

So after the final decrease round in the Fish Hat, you will have 22 sts in round

SET UP

Continue to k 3 more rounds

Then k and p (starting the rib pattern for the tail) it into a straight row as follows:

1.       Put the first (start of the round) 11 sts onto the 1st needle and the following 11 sts onto a 2nd needle

2.       Hold the needles in parallel such that the start of the round and end of the round sts are both on the right side of the needles (for right hand knitters and for those lefties out there, you need to figure that out in mirror image :p)

3.       use a 3rd needle to k into the st on the 2nd needle (that will be the end of the round st) and p into the st on the 1st needle (this will be the start of the round st); repeat this *k1 2nd needle, p1 1st needle* until you are done with the 22 sts ending in p stitch from the 1st needle

Now you should have all 22 sts on the 3rd needle in 1x1 rib set up.  Let us now start knitting the tail in rows

BODY

Row 1 *k1, p1*, repeat * until the 11th st, pm, continue the pattern until the end of row (22sts)

(check: you should have 11sts before and 11sts after the m)

Row 2 *k1, m1r, p1*, repeat * until m, sm, continue the st pattern but switching m1r to m1l (33 sts)

Row 3 *k1, p1 m1r, p1*, repeat* until m, sm, continue the st pattern but switching m1r to m1l (44 sts)

Row 4 *k1, p1*, repeat* until the end of row

Now you should have 22 pairs of *k1, p1* sts

Repeat Row 4 for 11 more time (that will be ending in Row 15)

Now we are going to make the "fork" of the tail using German short row.  If you are not familiar with this technique, please consult YouTube or other medias for info. Alternatively you can use the basic wrap and turn technique and your st count before wrap and turn will be 1 st less (eg. for Row16, you will wrap and turn on the 20th st)

Row 16 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 21st st, t&w

Row 17 (and alternate rows) *k1, p1* to the end of the row

Row 18 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 19th st, t&w

Row 20 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 17th st, t &w

Row 22 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 15th st, t&w

Row 24 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 13th st, t&w

Row 26 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 11th st, t&w

Row 28 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 9th st, t&w

Row 30 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 7th st, t&w

Row 32 *k1, p1*, repeat * to the 5th st, t&w

Row 34 *k1, P1*, repeat * to the end of the row and pick up the "wraps" along the way

Row 35 onwards, repeat Row 16 - 33

After that, BO knitwise (treat a "wrap" as a st) to the end of the row, cut yarn and weave in the tail.