** This is Part One of a short Troutbitten series about contact, feel and sight while tight line nymphing. Be sure to find Part Two (How Much of this is Feel?)Â and Part Three (Contact Can Be Felt at the Rod Tip) ** Smith arose from his halfway crouch and took a step...
There’s a sweet spot to every drift. For each swing of a wet fly, strip of a streamer or drift of a dry, there’s a range — a distance — where the fly looks its best. This is the moment where the fur and feathers tied to a hook are most convincing or most natural. It’s...
A simple piece of colored monofilament might be the most important element in a tight line nymphing rig. The sighter, placed just above the tippet section of the leader, shows us everything about the drift. When fished well, a Mono Rig or a euro nymphing setup...
I field a lot of questions about the Mono Rig. It’s a little different than a standard euro nymphing setup, because the Mono Rig is intended to handle every tactic and every type of fly that you might cast on a fly rod. For me, instant versatility on the water is a...
A good sighter is highly visible and responsive. We use it not just for strike detection. It also tells us how and where the flies are drifting under the surface. But how high should it be off the water?
So why do we use a Mono Rig over fly line? What’s the advantage?
Just like a tight line nymph rig, we gain more control over the presentation of the flies, and we have better contact throughout the cast and the drift. With fly line in the game, we cast and manage the fly line itself. With the Mono Rig, we cast and manage the streamers more directly.
With the Mono Rig, we can stay tight to the streamer after the cast, we can dead drift it with precision for the first five feet, keeping all the leader off the water. Then we might activate the streamer with some jigs and pops for the next ten feet of the drift. And for the last twenty feet, as the streamer finishes out below and across from us, we may employ long strips. All these options are open . . .
The modern streamer approach asks trout to get up and chase something down, to kill it and eat it, while the old school streamer game presents an easily available chunk of protein to the trout. It doesn’t ask the fish to chase very much. In essence, old school streamers come to the trout, and modern streamers flee from the trout . . .
Tactical Fly Fisher. No doubt, Devin Olsen chose the correct name for his operation. Every week, I  receive a few emails asking for more details on nymphing rigs and other technical fly fishing topics (keep them coming), and while I usually have some answers and ideas...
Sometimes trout are feeding so aggressively that the particular intricacies of how nymphs are attached to the line seem like a trivial waste of time. Those are rare, memorable days with wet hands that never dry out between fish releases. More often than not, though, trout make us work to catch them. And those same particulars about where and how the flies are attached can make all the difference in delivering a convincing presentation to a lazy trout.
Two nymphs can double your chances of fooling a trout. But there are downsides. Here are some strategies for rigging and getting the most from two fly rigs.
The Mono Rig is a hybrid system for both tight line and indicator nymphing styles, and for streamers, dry-dropper and pure dry flies.