It always takes a decade for us colonials to adopt what everyone else is doing; Spey casting is the latest in a long line of European imports that took us a couple hundred years to find a use for… The first hundred was spent claiming we invented it, and the second hundred we kept at arm’s length when proven we didn’t.
Anglers always drag their feet when faced with change, “Naw, we’ll never use that stuff ..” then they adopt it with the ferocity of enraged wolverine on road kill. I’d always assumed that our reluctance was due to the “relaxing pastime” label for fishing, which eschews latest, greatest, and trendy.
I keep an eye cocked on angling sites in Europe, never knowing whether something they’re doing is going to dominate my fishing shortly. Fish and Fly has always been a favorite read, they seem to have a good feel for gadgets, tactics, and the oddball trend that fits neither.
They’ve got a series of articles on “Fishing the Frontier” – and the latest installment was about Spain, wherein the author participated in an angling tourney. The descriptions of the tackle used by the professionals caught my eye, as he’s bemoaning the 10′ #4 as being too short:
Bear in mind that a 10’ rod is short by modern standards among European competition river fishermen. 11’ is almost standard now, for a 3 weight line, and this affords much better control of the leaders up to 8 metres that are commonly used at this level.
That’ll galvanize the American rod makers into action, as there’s nothing better than a trend that “forces” you into a new rod. I’ve always leaned toward long rods, but anything over 9.5′ has always been exceptional, never the norm. As described, these competition rods may be a reversal of the “20 billion modulus” fast tip – as an 11′ #3 would be a very supple, slow action rod.
The article has some interesting notes on leader construction, and for the gadget freaks, meet the coiled strike indicator .. It may be the perfect use for that spool of five year old Maxima you found under your desk..
They’re really using 8m leaders???
I recently got a recipe for these leaders from a guide in PA. The strike indicator is made by wrapping the stren around a wooden dowel. Boil in water for 10 minutes and then put in the freezer overnight. Voila! Permanent coil.
Z-Fisher: Thanks for the tip. What’s the overall length of the coiled area – not much in the photo to give you a size perspective … I was guessing it may be 2-3 inches.. ?
I bet casting with that indicator could be a pain.
I like the concept, but almost wonder if it would be more effective scaled down. The article says the coil is about 15cm long(I’m guessing that’s the length of the coil, not the length of line used to make the coil), so 6″. From my experience, bigger indicators floating overhead spook fish- especially in smaller or slower flowing streams.
I think I’d be comfortable if the coil length was around 1″, tops.
Fourteen Inches — so before your final piece of tippet you’re putting in place this 14″ curl of 8lb Stren (use gold or green to improve visibility), which in reality is shorter when coiled, and then putting four to eight feet, yes, feet of tippet in the final diameter. The way to connect the thick coil with the fine tippet is by using a mini tippet ring (search for them on jsflyfishing.com to see what they’re like) at the end of the coil. It’s pretty cool system. It takes some getting used to.
Tripper — they (the recipe I’ve seen is a French design) also build a custom leader up to the coil. The leader starts with a 30lb Maxima and tapers down to the 8lb used in the coil. It’s got a good backbone for casting.
8 foot of tippet sounds like the casting energy would bleed out leaving a loose puddle to pay out a dry fly…
The article mentions “czech nymphing” – can we assume the same leader (and proportions) are used for both dry and wet fishing?
Thanks for the assistance in straightening out my quandry – I couldn’t find any online information that covered this technique (in English).