The Mono Rig

[DaveS]

I was going to mention that excerpt from Hump's book, but I didn't want to appear that old.
; )

 

[redietz]

SteveG wrote:

I never want less power being transferred from the flyline.

He wasn't talking about leaders, he was talking about not using any fly line at all (at least outside the tip of the rod.)

 

[SteveG]

I was addressing a question from another person.

 

[SBecker]

Does it work well with dry flies? Depends on the stream. I run a 18-20 foot leader system with the Cortland nymph line. Am I throwing dries on the Lehigh with it? No. Am I throwing dries on the Po with it? Yes

 

[PennKev]

Salvelinusfontinali wrote:

My solution to this (for now), is I carry one extra spool with regular fly line, and a tapered leader, and have the underweighted fly line on the spool that im fishing.

Much better than carrying two rods IMO, and its not that bad to switch out between the two if you HAVE to....

Ehh, I've had the opposite experience with spare spools. I've found that having a second rod with me is easier than switching spools. Switching spools usually requires removing all flies, indicators, and shot from a leader when making a change. The whole point of carrying two rods is so that I can make a few casts with say a streamer, then grab my nymph rig and more thoroughly cover a piece of water, and then move on and do the same thing on the next stretch. I'm a big advocate of constantly adjusting or changing rigging to match the situation, but spool swapping is just a huge time killer in the scenario I described. It really depends on how often you expect to switch techniques.

Kev

 

[nomad_archer]

I am going to have to try the flat leader setup next time I go out nymphing. The streams I usually fish are small it is tough not to tight line. I usually struggle with keeping the leader short enough that I get a bit of fly line out of the top eye. I do like having a bit of fly line out of the tip but that is only so that the line doesnt come back through the guides.

Seems like there is little value to a tapered leader in my setup. I may just try 7.5 -8ft of whatever spool of 4 - 6lb fluorocarbon I have laying around and see how it works. This could save a little on the cost of leaders since I usually nymph. I dont see a big deal changing leaders stream side if I decide to fish dries or swing wets.

 

[NewSal]

PennKev wrote:

Salvelinusfontinali wrote:

My solution to this (for now), is I carry one extra spool with regular fly line, and a tapered leader, and have the underweighted fly line on the spool that im fishing.

Much better than carrying two rods IMO, and its not that bad to switch out between the two if you HAVE to....

Ehh, I've had the opposite experience with spare spools. I've found that having a second rod with me is easier than switching spools. Switching spools usually requires removing all flies, indicators, and shot from a leader when making a change. The whole point of carrying two rods is so that I can make a few casts with say a streamer, then grab my nymph rig and more thoroughly cover a piece of water, and then move on and do the same thing on the next stretch. I'm a big advocate of constantly adjusting or changing rigging to match the situation, but spool swapping is just a huge time killer in the scenario I described. It really depends on how often you expect to switch techniques.

Kev

To each his own man, I move ALOT, I hate standing still, it would be very very difficult for me to fish with two rods, so your right, it really just depends on your style.

 

[mcwillja]

The_Sasquatch wrote:
"And so what if it isn't?"

Well...this is a fly fishing website.

Exactly squatch. For the same reason a crossbow is not a true bow and shouldn't be used for archery unless someone has physical condition not allowing them to archery hunt. I also don't care if the old timers used to fish with all mono, minnows, split shot, whatever. that doesn't make it flyfishing either. I personally don't care if someone fishes this way but im sorry it's not fly fishing in my opinion and I won't do it. Im not a purist by any means but i still draw the line at that point where I use a flyline on my reel to be considered flyfishing. Do it if you want I don't care but it's not flyfishing.

 

[redietz]

I wonder if they had this discussion when fly fishing went from being horse hair lines attached to the rod tip to silk lines attached to a reel.
"It's not real fly fishing -- you can change how much line you're fishing with. And that gut leader -- it's not even part of the line."

As far as I'm concerned, it's fly fishing as long as the terminal tackle is a fly. It doesn't matter how that fly get into the water. And a "fly" is just that -- an artificial fly -- not an artificial bait fish, regardless of how that got into the water. (Not that I don't fish streamers frequently, but it's exactly what the Brits call it: lure fishing.)

 

[The_Sasquatch]

Don't get me wrong, I only said what I said in response to the "so what if it isn't?" comment. Well, it's a bit like me going onto one of the pipe forums I visit and start talking about smoking cigarettes. Except, I guess in this case I'd be smoking cigarettes in a pipe, which some may view as "pipe smoking".

So I totally get why the OP felt it appropriate to start a thread like this. It's the old "what is fly fishing?" debate. Is fly fishing more than just using a fly rod and reel? Or does it include more than that? All we have is the regs at this point, and the regs say no, this approach is not fly fishing.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

redietz wrote:
I wonder if they had this discussion when fly fishing went from being horse hair lines attached to the rod tip to silk lines attached to a reel.
"It's not real fly fishing -- you can change how much line you're fishing with. And that gut leader -- it's not even part of the line."

As far as I'm concerned, it's fly fishing as long as the terminal tackle is a fly. It doesn't matter how that fly get into the water. And a "fly" is just that -- an artificial fly -- not an artificial bait fish, regardless of how that got into the water. (Not that I don't fish streamers frequently, but it's exactly what the Brits call it: lure fishing.)

So if I use a Zebco with a bobber (strike indicator) and a fly behind it, that's fly fishing?

 

[redietz]

The_Sasquatch wrote:

So if I use a Zebco with a bobber (strike indicator) and a fly behind it, that's fly fishing?

How's that any different in any way from what passes for nymph fishing, other than being less efficient? (BTW, I used to do that when I was about 10, hoping for better tackle some day.)

The only time it matters is when the laws designate a stretch of water as "fly fishing only". And in that case, the state, or whoever else made the rule, will tell you what the definition is.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

I used to do it too, which is why I brought it up. It's different from nymph fishing though, in that you aren't using a fly rod, a fly reel, and fly line.

 

[pcray1231]

So I s'pose I was a fly fisherman long before I ever picked up a fly rod. And on the first day of trout about half the guys out there with spinning rods are actually fly fishermen. Sucker spawn and wet flies are very common among spinning rod types. Heck, I've even fished minnows in tandem with wet flies and swung them.

Not that it matters much to me what shoebox we throw people in. But I've always understood that having weight in the line and a reel designed to hold that type of line to be the defining feature of fly fishing. Not the offering. Bait can be used while fly fishing and flies can be used when spin fishing.

 

[brookieaddict]

yep

 

[redietz]

In the 500+ years of fly fishing literature in English, casting wasn't described or even really mentioned for the first three hundred. The same tackle was used as for bait fishing. The only thing that distinguished fly fishing was the use of artificial bait.

My rhetorical question about whether they asked these kinds of question when they got away from fixed horse-hair lines actually has an answer in at least one case. In 1885, David Webster published a book called The Angler and the Loop Rod, which asked exactly that question. Silk lines, reels, and rods with guides were long established by that point; the train had already passed, but he still questioned there validity as "fly" fishing.

I just can't pretend that tossing a 12" long lure into chum slick to hook a billfish is in any way fly fishing, even if the reel is below the grip.

 

[pcray1231]

Don't care much about ancient history. I have zero interest in Isaac Walton and early English angling. And spinning reels are below the grip too.

Spinning reels, bait casting reels, and modern fly reels are all 20th century developments. The separation of various styles did not really occur until then. The father of all modern reels would actually be called a center pin reel today!

 

[NewSal]

Interesting responses everyone

 

[Grey]

Good stuff.

What I've tried to do with the nymphing articles about the Mono Rig is show it as an extremely effective and versatile way to fish.

You can use whatever you want for the butt section, but the thicker the line is, the more line weight and drag comes with it. I was stunned when I got out the scale and started weighing stretches of fly line and mono.

The competition lines and the 1 or 2 weight fly lines are a good solution if you hate the idea of fishing with only monofilament. They also will feel more comfortable in the line hand if you've never fished a mono rig.

About versatility: I often fish dry flies as a dry dropper with the Mono Rig. You just need enough weight in the trailing nymph to overcome the wind resistance of the dry. If I want to fish a dry fly with no nymph, then I change out the long Mono Rig leader to a regular leader. I store leaders on old spools of Maxima and change them out at a tippet ring (ten inches down on a piece of .017 from the end of the fly line). Swapping out leaders like that is pretty easy and can be done in about a minute if you hurry.

I fish both suspender (indicator) rigs and streamers with the Mono Rig now. It just kind of happened over time, as some of my best friends and I realized that most all subsurface presentations were improved by taking away the fly line.

I take no credit for any of this. As someone mentioned above, people have been doing this for a very long time. I first learned of the Mono Rig in Humphrey's Trout Tactics. Really ... it's all there.

George Daniel's book Dynamic Nymphing also lays out far more than I have on the blog, and he's an excellent communicator of these ideas.

There's a misconception that casting with the Mono Rig is clunky -- that it's nothing more than lobbing weight around. Maybe it is at first. But I think the comp guys will vouch for me saying that good presentations with the Mono Rig have a lot of traditional casting strokes and even delicacy at times. Again, it's just a really versatile system.

As far as what fly fishing is, my definition is no more legitimate than anyone else's, but here's my thought: If I'm fishing with flies and I'm not reeling in line after every cast (if I'm using my hand to recover and manipulate line), then I'm probably fly fishing. I never understood why the fly line itself would mean we are fly fishing. To me it's mostly the flies themselves.

Enjoy the day.
Domenick Swentosky

 

[LongLineRelease]

I believe even before Joe Humphreys talked about the mono nymph rig, George Harvey talked about it in Techniques of Fly Fishing and Fly Tying. He mentioned a streamer angler who used only monofilament spooled on his reel.

When I was a kid we learned to fish wet flies and streamers in lakes with spinning rods and casting bubbles. Also used them on high water streamers where we couldn't wade and reach with a fly rod. Caught lots of fish. I still use this rig for some bass fishing.