TOPIC:

FLY LEADERS

I catch dozens and dozens of fish each year on trolling flies, from little “tied on the hook” coho flies to big ol’ laker takers. All of these are pulled behind some sort of dodger or flasher made of metal or plastic. Probably 96% of the flies I use are home made and as such, the leaders I use to connect the fly to the attractor is made with some sort of “fishing string” I tie up myself.

The leaders are what I’m pondering today. Luckily, it’s not “rocket science.” Luckily, the fish often don’t much care if a leader is 20 inches or 22 inches long. Luckily the fish don’t much care if the leader is made from fluorocarbon or traditional monofilament and I don’t think it matters to many of them if the leader is tied using 20, 30 or 50 pound string.

Are there fish that do care if the leader is made from 30 or 50 pound material? What if there are those to which inches matter? What if catching that persnickity fish or a couple of them makes the difference between a poor catch and an acceptable catch? What if the picky son-of-a-gun is a 20 pound king or 16 pound steelhead?

If most of the fish don’t give a hoot and will bite the right fly on nearly any leader, doesn’t it make sense to make leaders that will fool the most discerning individuals, meaning you’ll catch some of the picky ones and all the lackadaisical ones?

Mono vs. Fluoro: I have no doubt fluorocarbon is less visible than monofilament to fish. So it makes sense to use only fluorocarbon for leaders. My feeling is f-carbon never hurts and sometimes helps. Any disagreement? That doesn’t settle the issue, however.

My early experiences with fluorocarbon made me a bit hesitant using it. I’d always used 20 pound mono as leader material behind divers, for leadcore and copper line. My first experiences with using 20 pound fluorocarbon for leaders produced some epic fails. This was early on, when fluorocarbon was fairly new “chemistry” for most producers. Question - is the fluorocarbon produced these days the same as f-carbon from the early 2000s? Question - f-carbon is available in reel-filler length spools 100 to 200 yards and in leader spools with only 25 yards on them. The price per yard for the reel-fill line is maybe ten cents a yard, the leader line is around a dollar per yard.
What’s the difference? If I’m using it for trolling fly leaders, is one better than the other. I’m not going to cast it. I don’t care if it has memory on the spool. It doesn’t have to be particularly abrasion resistant or fish tooth resistant.

Knot strength? Is the same palomar, uni, Trilene knot or others I trust and employ with regular mono suitable for f-carbon? I’ve seen a special f-carbon knot demoed on-line on YouTube by pro-bassers. It’s not a quick and easy knot to tie.

Strength? I’ve heard of guys who always used 30 pound mono for fly leaders switching to 40 or 50 since it’s invisible. Eh? If 10 pound mono is less visible than 20, isn’t 30 pound f-carbon less visible than 50?

Length? Used to be the rule for leaders was 1 ½ times the length of the dodger. I’ve caught fish on these shorties. Always wondered if the leader length includes the swivel thingy attached to the back in of the dodger. I just measured one and from the split ring attachment to the end of the curly-Q thingy where the leader attaches is over 2-inches. So should my leader be 7 inches or 9 inches? Where do you measure on the fly? To the head of the fly, middle or rear end? Over time, it seems like leader lengths have increased. Water clarity?

Action? I’ve heard one of the jobs of the dodger or spinner is to impart action to the fly. I’m sure it does. I’m sure the leader length has a lot to do with fly action. Put a fly on a 3-inch leader and that sucker is going to be flipping or rotating very fast. Put it on a 3-foot leader and (action wise) it might as well be on a 6-foot or longer length. I’ve heard the strength (stiffness) of the leader material affects the action. Really? How much? In my mind, length would be about 93% and line stiffness would be about 7%. If you want stiff line to make the fly really whip, why not put a really thin wire leader on it?

Does anyone regularly switch leaders while they are out fishing - switching lengths, materials or lengths? When making leaders do you actually measure it on a ruler or just unspool a length of line and guess-timate it’s a good length.

So what are your thoughts, opinions and experiences? I’d be interested in hearing from newbies and old timers, both.

Mike,

I'll jump in and give my 2 cents. In the old days when lickety-split Salmon flys was a registered business, everything we tied for leader was 40lb. Ande clear. Ande had some stiff line. We usually gave about a 2 -3 ft. leader with the fly and allowed the customer to make what length they wanted. With that said, our personal leaders were sometimes only 6 inches in length. 00 red doger with a fly in black or black mixed with another dark color seemed to work best. 2.2-2.4 for speed and a good figure 8 pattern by the dodger was the ticket. Again, the old days.
Now everything I tie is flurocarbon leaders. 30lb. seems to work well but I still prefer 40lb. Just to keep good transition of action to the fly. Over the last few years during early summer, speed seemed to be better fast which makes the dodger spin instead of the whipping action. Leader length got extended sometimes 18-24 inches. Doesn't make sense to me but is what the fished liked. Hard for me to use lighter lines as in my head it still makes sense to work with a stiff line. So I keep a special box with new leaders all tied up and adjust as I need to. There is nothing better to be on a pod of hot coho during dodger fly time. Some of the fastest action we have.

I used to use lighter line, then someone told me use stiff line because of the action duh!!!! So I thought about it for 2 seconds and realized oh......yea that makes complete sense. With a limp line, the dodger is trying to move the fly along the path of the line. If the line is limp it will have a harder time moving that fly as you will get much more bend in the line, sort of leaving the fly behind, at least to a certain extent. If the line is stiff, it will not bend nearly as easy, thus moving the fly farther, faster.

Once I went ot 40lb fluoro I my catch rates improved.

Heavy leader ande flouro 1.5 times attractor length has been standard for me.

One thing to note about flies: the more fish the fly has caught, the better the fly seems to become. Fish's mouth "shape" the fly with each one caught. I believe i also read the same thing in gla one time

I use 2x leader length and 40lb mono. It works and that's where I start. If the line gets fray I'll cut and re-tie which will be close to 1.5x attractor leader length. I personally believe fluoro doesn't create a benefit on a presentation creating as much disturbance as these do. There is a lot going on there with the dodger / flasher moving and the fly radically following. I would be shocked if the fish is actually studying to the point fluoro would actually influence a strike.

I use Seaguar Blue label for all my leaders. 50 for meat and flies. 25 as a leader for copper and core. Its not cheap but I've never had a break off or a knot fail due to the leader since I started used it 2 years ago. I use chapstick when tying my knots as recommended.

As far as performance, I've noticed the biggest difference in my copper and core catch rates. I started running longer leads on my flies from my spin doctors usually from 26 to 28. I fish out of South Haven so I'm also not dealing with as many early season coho as you.

A few comments are warranted. First, thanks for all who chimed in. I appreciate the input.

Next: It probably didn't come through perfectly in the original post. In my opinion, the amount of extra action one gets using stronger line would seem to be negligible...even when comparing 25 pound with 50 pound line. Do this (without any water pressure on the line which would exacerbate the experiment.) Tie a fly on a chunk of 20 pound line. Lay the fly flat, then grip the line exactly 3 inches from the head of the fly. Measure how high you have to lift the leader to get it off the table. Now tie the same fly on a chunk of 40 or 50 pound line. Repeat, holding the leader in exactly the same spot. Measure again. Compare. Not much difference, I'll bet, and if you repeat holding the leader four, six or ten inches, still not much difference.

My point, is the strength of the leader isn't as important as people think.

The best reason, I see, for using heavy leaders is so the leaders don't have to be replaced after only a few fish. I probably have some coho flies that have caught 20 or 30 cohos. Laker flies that have caught almost the same number, all using the same leader. If I were using 20 pound instead of 30 or 40, they'd have broken or needed replaced.

Another point, specifically pointed at Baron: I believe most of the time fluoro vs. mono is a wash. I also believe, mono will never outfish fluorocarbon but fluoro will sometimes outfish mono. When you figure the difference between the two when using them for leaders is only pennies per leader. Go with fluorocarbon.

Tmik: Fish are not "lure makers." If your fly works better after some fish mouthed it, your fly was too bulky to begin with. Flies can be made from fat-guys to sparse and one isn't necessary better than the other day in, day out. Work with it, but don't rely on the fish to do the work for you.

Also to Tmik: I used to always go with 1.5 dodger length as "proper." I'm sure it would still work if I ever used one that short some of the time. I no longer use one that short. Many of my early-season coho flies work nicely behind 6" dodgers with 18 inch leaders. Give some longer leaders a try and see how they work.

In my opinion (like belly-buttons: everyone has one) longer leaders work better when trolling speed increases and allows faster trolling speed which means the lure will get to the next fish more quickly. In my opinion longer leaders work better on plastic attractors like Spin-Doctors, Action Flashers and Coyote Flashers than on "traditional," flat metal dodgers.