Realistic canid tails?

I always see this problem and I feel like it bothers me more than it should but whenever I see canid tails made they just look like solid fluffy tail shaped pillows instead of actual tails. The tail of a canid (wolf for easy example) is thin but the fur is very long and fluffy. I want to accomplish this without it looking like it doesn't belong on a suit with semi short fur for the body suit and sudden long fur like monkey shag for the tail. Would a spine (pool noodle, pvc) giving it a more realistic wag help with the image? I see this issue a lot with fursuit dancers where their tail just flops around like a stick instead of an actual tail bending at certain key points. Any tips would be awesome
EDIT: sortof unclear about my question at hand but.. are there any other techniques out there that I could use besides building a spine for a tail? sorry for not really clarifying that beforehand