FLYMPH FORUM

I drove to the other side of the state yesterday and back home this morning. I was listening to some Orvis podcasts. With Tom, can you guess my politics Rosenbauer. I was randomly picking podcasts to listen to.

Yesterday the podcast I was listening to was about the Mono rig. It is a nymphng rig similar to, but very different from the Euro-rig. I use the Mono rig, and wanted to hear the guest of Toms take on it. The guest of Toms was Domenick Swentosky. Publisher and owner of Troutbitten.com.

Dom had some good info on the Mono rig system, and I enjoyed the interview. Towards the end of the interview Dom disclosed that with the Mono rig he is able to cast dry flies with no line on the water, just the 20 to 30 foot leader. I had watched him do it before on one of his YouTube videos, but not caring to throw dry flies, I paid little attention to it.

On the way home this morning I found a podcast with Davy Wotten. I listened to it. The entire interview was dedicated to fishing soft hackles and spiders. I am not a Wotten fan, but I do like reading and listening to anything wet fly.

As the podcast went on the subject of fly lines came up. Wotten likes a medium action 3 to 5 weight, 10 to 11 feet long . To this he prefers a double taper line. In his opinion the DT does not pull the flies down toward the rod as fast as a WF. This is after the cast has been made. This would be on an upstream cast. He believes that the extra weight of the Weight Forward line pulls the flies faster than the DT. I also have the same opinion. I have the same opinion but never felt the need to purchase a double taper line.

A few moments later Wotten went on to another aspect of his technique. Just then my wife informed me we needed to make a pitstop soon. I pulled into a convenience store in Avon Colorado. Not listening to anything but the traffic going by, my mind wandered. I am planning on fishing 3 to 5 times in the next 8 days. I was developing a plan to fish three rivers. Then I started thinking how wanted to fish them. I have not devoted much time to my Mono rig technique this Summer. Caddis and soft hackle season will be over soon. Float or wade, or both and how many days doing what. Yep, I am over thinking. Life is better with options, but too many options make my head hurt.

I decided I would try to hit he Gunnison tomorrow after I take the cat in for his shots. Caddis season is here and I need to take advantage of it. I have all Winter to nymph.

I was just about to resume the podcast when I remembered the Mono rig being cast with no weight. I doubt I got a smile on my face, but I was feeling good about myself. Tomorrow I will use my Mono rig exclusively. It has a 25-foot butt section of 20lb mono. After that it has a 5-foot section of 12lb. That would be considered the sighter if I actually used one. To the end of that is a micro knot I use to attach tippet, then my nymphs and weight. Most people use a tippet ring. I find that silly, but to each their own.

My idea is to work my way upstream, nymphing. When I see the caddis activity I plan on switching to three wets and attempting to cast upstream with the mono-rig.

The Spotify podcast with Wotten. The interview is probably somewhere on the Orvis website, but I don't know for sure
https://open.spotify.com/episode/2miWrl ... YE9d50kInA

Great post Wayne. I am interested to hear about your upcoming fishing trips.

I found the discussion about DP line interesting, and will need to pay more attention the next time I fish with my new DP line. I bought one when I rerigged my Dads old reel earlier this year.

Thanks for the heads up about the podcasts. I’m a big “Hardcore History” fan (Dan Carlin). Fascinating stuff to listen to on long drives.

DUBBN... mono rig... I'm a fan of Troutbitten, watched and read a lot of Dom's stuff. I've used his system quite a bit and prefer a lighter rig than the 20#butt section. I've at times gone down to 5# which some would say is Spanish Nymphing. There's a section of the Metolius in the winter where the thin line seems to make a difference. Splitting hairs I guess... 5# line in the wind is not a great option, and I don't try to fish dries on any mono rig system. I tend to go hybrid at times and combine Dom's ideas with George Daniels simple leaders and sighters. Can't say I love Rosenbauer's stuff, maybe its just his style of presenting material.. Hope your trip is a good one.

Curious, how often do you guys use the mono-rig versus the fly line? Do you switch from one to the other on the same rod, same day, or bring two different rods, or different days different rigs? Do you continue to use a traditional fly line, and when do you prefer that if so? I've read the trout itten stuff and Daniels, but have never (yet) taken the leap... creature of habit...

Great tip Wayne! There is also one for Apple:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/t ... d278930814

Wayne I'm in awe. Man do I need more time on the water

Chug... my decision to go mono depends mostly on water I'm planning to fish, and wind. Unless i'm using heavy jigs and fishing deep, trying to fight the mono rig and casting into a wind just gets old in a hurry. If fishing this way, I carry a rod set up with the mono rig. If I'm thinking I may want to Euro nymph part of the time, and only carry one rod... I have RIO's Euro Nymph Shorty, which is a short thin diameter line that loops onto the regular fly line and becomes a mono rig to which a sighter and tippet is added. I use it quite often and since its a quick change over, it only takes minutes to go from dries, or soft hackles to Euro style nymphing. Also, my old shoulders can only stand mono rig casting and fishing for so long..
There are times, when its the only way to go, and others its just another arrow in the quiver.

Thanks Ron, appreciated! I've been fly fishing for about thirty years now (yikes, I should be good at it by now), but I'm an absolute novice over in this neck of the woods.

chugbug wrote: ↑Mon Sep 11, 2023 10:38 am Curious, how often do you guys use the mono-rig versus the fly line? Do you switch from one to the other on the same rod, same day, or bring two different rods, or different days different rigs? Do you continue to use a traditional fly line, and when do you prefer that if so? I've read the trout itten stuff and Daniels, but have never (yet) taken the leap... creature of habit...

I've been using a 'mono-rig' for years now. I use Cortland black/white 12lb sighter material as my butt (Spanish) OR a tapered 20/15/12 of Chameleon. One little trick I do employ is to add 3 backing barrels to the terminating end / sighter. I like to mix up orange, white and yellow for the backing barrels, but white is usally the best. For a sighter I have come to love the tri-color sighters from Cortland. With three backing barrels and a tri-color sighter it is tough to not find your sighter. I don't leave any tags and keep the blood knots to a minimum as much as possible.

I definitely still use fly line. For fishing freestones I like to use #3 Cortland Spring Creek or Rio 3D SHS. Of course, I've been on trips where I never have fly line out of my guides, but I also am still a big fan of high-sticking - especially when I'm not fishing weighted nymphs or when I'm swapping back and forth. And, of course, I love fishing flymphs, wets and soft hackles so I'm definitely going to have some fly line.

While I'm not much for rig keepers (they encourage the use of beat up tippet) I do store my 'euro' leaders on them. That's two rigs - one tapered and one uniform.

My advice is to always go with a rig that is easy to modify quickly. And, unless I'm fishing a large river and all day, I never bring two rods on the river. Good grief people, are we going to do costume changes next?

I've found that I will not re-rig if it takes me off the water for more than about 5 minutes or requires me to find a place to 'spread out.' I'm sure I'm not alone there. That means, no reel or spool changes unless it's lunch time or nap time. That also means I should be able to swap between tight line and classic techniques standing in a run.

I would highly recommend checking out Dave Rothrock's approach to nymphing. I'm gradually finding myself going his way. He uses a rather short leader and unweighted nymphs. He has some great videos online, but I would start with his blogs. https://www.therantingangler.com/2022/0 ... shing.html

Many ways to skin this cat, I'm seeing.... my interest comes in because I inevitably feel like catching trout on the bottom has been more luck than skill for me. I've got some mono staring at me, so I'll give it a shot with what I've gut on hand and proceed from there.

Thanks gents!