Transcript: Fly Line Essentials with Mac Brown
S5, Ep 122: Fly Line Essentials with Mac Brown
2023, Marvin S. Cash
The Articulate Fly
http://www.thearticulatefly.com
Transcript
Marvin:
[0:04] Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of The Articulate Fly, and we're back with the last installment of Flyline Essentials with Mack Brown, the Q&A. How you doing Mack?
Mac:
[0:13] I'm doing great. How are you Marvin?
Marvin:
[0:15] I'm just trying to stay out of trouble and I wanted to apologize to folks.
We're a few days late getting this out, but we had a good excuse in the fly fishing world.
Mack was fishing. So, very good excuse, had a lot of success in Michigan and in the Driftless, and if you listen to future episodes of The Articulate Fly, you'll learn more about that.
But we really want to thank everybody for all the questions that were sent in.
And, you know, Mac and I have got four or five of them we're going to go through, and then we're going to announce the drawings. And there you have it.
So you ready to go, Mac Brown? I'm ready. All right. You adequately caffeinated?
Mac:
[0:48] Adequately caffeinated. That's always important.
Marvin:
[0:52] Very, very important. So the first question is from Iamtheboaz and he says he's a new angler and he wants to grow in advance, but he wants to know, you know, when is he going to know if he's outgrown in his base or entry-level fly line.
Mac:
[1:08] Yeah, that's a good question. It's hard to answer without knowing what the entry-level fly line is using, so you know if he bought an entry-level double taper, I'd say he's not going to grow it until he wears the line out, but if he bought it, you know, it depends what it is.
If it's a it's just hard to say, but basically, just buy a double taper first and you will not grow it, I guess is the way to answer that.
Marvin:
[1:31] Yeah, you know, I would imagine what today these days most people probably are going to have some version of a weight forward line is probably gonna be their entry level line, right?
Mac:
[1:39] For most, yeah, this is, you know, the most choices, a lot of choices.
See, that's the thing, like, even SA offers a really great double taper, and then people ask me this on the road a lot.
Why don't they offer 20 different makes and models? Well, let's think about that and answer it like this. There's not a lot of creativity that you can do with a double taper. I mean, it's great, it's very well-rounded, roll casting, distance casting, you name it, it'll do it. It's good at short casting.
So, there's really not a lot of limitations from choosing that.
For the weight forward, we have a lot of different combinations from tapers for the rear taper and the front taper.
They can be long, they can be short. You can have different lengths and bellies.
They can be 30 feet, 40 feet, 50 feet, all these different combinations, which is the reason you see so many choices offered for these different weight forward setups from snook lines to trout lines, to redfish lines.
I mean, there's just a lot of different choices because those lines are specialized more for those applications, but for somebody that's new, you know, talking about to not outgrow their line, I would say for the budding caster, just go with the DT to start with.
Marvin:
[2:49] Yeah, got it. And I guess if they have a weight forward line, you know, that's fine.
And probably the thing to do there is to kind of wait to see how you fish the most and maybe, you know, either by double taper when you're ready or fine-tune the weight forward taper for the type of angling that you do the most.
Mac:
[3:08] Yeah, yeah, that's true. I mean they could start off with one that's you know short But the other problem of that is you know how a lot of people show up with gear.
That's 30 40 years old But that kind of leads to problems too though because then they're trying to roll cast 40 feet But they're trying to throw skinny line to turn over a fat line because they don't know better You know what?
I mean? So how do they know when to move on?
I just think that when I think about all the spectrum of what's offered that I still think the DT Like I said, for my kids, even that's the reason I started, and there's no way they cannot grow it as they grow and their skills progress and they're better and better at roll casting distance casting.
There's no limit to what they're going to do, because then they're holding the backing, not at 90 feet and able to false cast it. That's a little hard to do with a 30, 40 foot weight forward. Yeah.
Marvin:
[3:56] Yeah. Yeah. Got it. the next question from that guy named Lee and he wanted to know, is it possible to keep your line tip floating for more than the first 20 minutes?
Mac:
[4:08] I think that's about gear as well.
You know, without knowing what it is, I've never had a tip sink personally that I've used and so buy a better line. I mean if it's sinking then I'd look for a different brand.
I mean there's all kinds of configurations of that nowadays too. I mean.
[4:29] Another thing that I like though is I've always cut the tips off since I was a young kid.
I mean the front taper usually is like one to two feet on a lot of these configurations that are on the market.
And so it's going to float a lot better having the fatter part of the coating.
You know the PVC if it's a floating line for instance. So I would rather think of mass transfer of energy or dissipation of energy is what I do building my leader because that's what the leader is intended to do. You either bleed off energy or you want it to turn it over.
And so I would rather do that with my ability and leader construction and just have the fly line come to abrupt, you know, diameter without the fly line being part of the taper.
Then that's probably why I've never had that problem too because I use a needle, a needle knot like the Dave Whitlock connection usually with a nail knot tied in above it.
You know, you pull it out and and wrap it around and that works really well.
And then there's no way the water's getting inside the core and it's fat line that's leading to the leader. And it seems to work really well, but yeah, I've seen cheap lines. I mean, I've had some clients this summer that saw online, some $5.
Chinese lines that they're trying and the whole thing sinks.
So it's not just the tip, but that's just because they're buying inferior products, you know? Yeah.
Marvin:
[5:47] I mean, I guess the only other thing I could add is, you know, one, clean your line because the dirty line will sink.
And then to your point, if you've got a crack in the loop or you've tied on your leader directly to the fly line, I don't know, in those situations, I'll almost always dab that stuff with some UV resin and hit it with a light just so I have a smooth bump that goes through the guides.
And that might help seal the tip of that fly line too.
Mac:
[6:13] That's right. No, I like to have a really clean. Yeah, I'm the same.
I mean, it makes me cringe.
As a guide, even in doing schools where there's big old mail knots and things and you got a long leader and every time they go to land a fish, they're fighting this big bump bump and it gets caught at the tip.
And it's like, I don't want that. I mean, I think a leader ought to be able to be cast like taking the fly off the hook keeper.
Or I usually I'll wrap it around the reel and set it way up high.
But when I, when I take the fly off.
I like to be able to start casting it from there and not have anything make a bump or anything so it all goes out.
But that's not the way most people rig as you know. Most people have a big bump bump and they wonder why it's so hard landing and casting again and landing and casting again. Well there's better ways.
I think the nail knot's obsolete personally as far as that because I think it's a lot of work having it come out.
That'll aggravate you once you, you know, if somebody's fishing quite a bit more than that, what is it from the statistic, Marvin, that you said, oh, last year when we spoke, I think 70% go three days or less.
If they're still throwing nail knots, they need to move away from it.
That's part of the process of growth, you know?
Marvin:
[7:23] Yeah, I think the stat is a general rule for as long as the Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation that I've seen has produced this study every year, probably somewhere between, 40 to 45 percent of people that fly fishing and giving your fish one to three days.
Mac:
[7:38] Okay. Yeah, that says it.
That says it all. So, they want to move away from that. That's part of their learning experience, I think.
Marvin:
[7:48] Yeah. And so, you know, moving on to the next question, you know, Firefish and Art wanted to know, you know, does line color matter when you're site fishing?
Mac:
[7:59] Yeah, that's a great question, too. I think when people are starting out, I think it's really important that they can see their lines so they're developing as a caster, they're developing their watercraft and mending.
And if they can't see it, like in other words, a lot of lines that blend in with a cover or with the sky, if they can't see it, they don't know if they're loops or parallel legs and if they're big or wide or narrow.
Narrow. They need to be able to see that in the learning phase and once it's once it's learned it's just like you know playing a musical instrument once once you say play a G pentatonic scale I know what that is I could you know you know how to do it now so when people are new I think it's great to have like even the bright orange lines or the chartreuse colored lines that show up so they learn the fundamentals but do I prefer to fish that personally I don't because I think I know when I'm going to mend, I know kind of where my line already is.
So like New Zealand, working down there for a long time in the eighties and nineties, I'd always have an olive colored line that I would dye and I would sometimes camouflage them from, you know, darker colors, dark olives to lighter olives, and that seemed to work really well with the canopy, a lot of green backdrop.
Marvin:
[9:14] Right. And so, you know, putting aside, you know, you know, knowing where your fly line, you know, is, we kind of touched a little bit when you started talking about New Zealand about spooking fish and so, you know, do you like a more neutral fly line color or I know like, for example, you know, essay makes some clear tip fly lines, right.
That, uh, that anglers can use over kind of snotty fish. Yeah.
Mac:
[9:37] Those clear tips are good. Uh, I do it off. I mean, I think the leader does the same thing.
So like if I'm using the proper leader with it, I think it'll do the same thing.
But I have a lot of glass lines. And I like glass lines quite a bit during the wet flower season in the spring.
And same idea, the glass lines, a lot of them are clear.
And those tend to work really well. They cast well.
And yeah, I just think that matching it to your environment.
Like out there in the driftless, I I used the, um, essay double taper on my two way.
Like that's what I threw the whole time. And it was a kind of a tan color, like a light Amber tannish color.
And it blended in perfect with all the willows and the backdrop of where I was out there fishing.
And a lot of those willows, as you know, can get pretty tall and they, they kind of line the bank on both sides. So I felt like that one was a good advantage, you know, for matching the side of the canopy. Yeah.
Marvin:
[10:37] And the great thing too, right. Is, you know, like if you're nymphing, you can watch that color contrast between the end of your fly line and your leader and watch for movement there and you know you can use that to work on your hook set.
Mac:
[10:50] That's right, that's right. That line, I just thought of something else, the line that I was just using up there.
It was a DT, and one thing that's really nice is it's both colors.
So you buy that line, and it had chartreuse on one side, which would be great.
If somebody was new, I would rig it that way for them, and say, you know, here, you can see the line, you can see your loops, you know, have a sense of awareness where your line is around you.
And then the other side, you can flip it around, of course, and fish the, you know, the amber colored.
So they get better and better and go more than, you know, a handful of days a year to where they're going 10 to 20 days a year.
Then they get a little better skill and all they got to do is switch it around.
And those lines, Marvin, I think we said this early on in the podcast, but the lines, I mean, I've still got on the double taper that is on the other three way. It was made in 2008.
We're talking about a line that there's no reason to replace it until you physically see damage on the line.
There's no cracks on it. I mean, it's still really good shape.
Marvin:
[11:55] Yeah, got it. And, you know, before we move on to the next question, uh, fire, fish, and art, uh, there is a blog post on the articulate fly website about the rule of six and how trout see, which is something that, uh, we need to move on.
But if you check out that blog post, it'll tell you a whole lot about, you know, how trout see based on where they are and how deep they are in the water column that'll kind of help you on this line color thing, too.
Mac:
[12:20] That's right. That's all a big part of it.
Marvin:
[12:21] Yeah, and so I think our last question is from Brenner, and it's kind of a multi-part question.
We'll kind of unpack it, and it's really around sinking lines and sinking tips and whether, you know, when you're picking a line in that situation, you kind of think about flyweight.
And I think in some ways what Brenner is getting to is he's trying to figure out if you use a sink tip or sinking line you need to weight the fly as well.
Mac:
[12:47] Do you need to wait the fly as well?
Marvin:
[12:50] Yes Yeah, so I mean, yeah exactly So, I mean, I think the trick is right if the weight is in the line as a general rule You're going to probably have the fly unweighted A lot of times ms.
Mac:
[12:59] I mean you could wait it if you wanted I mean, it's just going to be the total sum.
So if you wait the fly and you're using the sink line The sink lines that i've used for i've always had sa sync combinations that go from 10 to, 10 to 18 and I don't think they're available anymore, but they used to sell them in like 300 meter spools.
And so what that stands for is that the 10, it means in one foot, it's 10 grains per foot.
And if you're using an 18, same thing, it's 18 grains a foot.
So for instance, on a six weight, the average six weights, I mean, with a lot of the rods being stiffer and faster today, that means you wouldn't want to exceed, here's how it works, 300, about 300 grains.
So let's say you're going to throw a streamer that weighs 20 grains, okay, so now we're down to 280.
So if we do the math, if we're going to use T10, we'd have to use 28 feet, because that's easy math. I mean, 10 into 280, 28 times.
So that's what we'd throw, and then you wouldn't exceed, you know, the 300. If you're going to use 18, though, doing the same math, it's going to be much shorter.
And so that's kind of how that works. It's a combination of the two, you know, when we talk about what a rod can handle and what it can't.
Marvin:
[14:14] Yeah, I think part of it is really kind of the presentation you want, right, because the fly is going to behave differently if you've got, for example, a streamer with lead eyes on it and you put it on a really heavy sinking line.
It's going to behave differently than if you have like a neutrally buoyant fly, like a zoo cougar that you put on a sinking line.
And so I think some of it is kind of the action you want. And I think, you know, my general understanding is people like fishing sinking lines because they can get a more natural presentation from their fly and achieve depth.
Mac:
[14:44] That's right. I like them quite a bit for just wet flies.
I mean, I'll put, you know, to fish wet flies deep during a hatch and they're starting to get active and then we lighten it up a little bit, bring it up in the mid column and then it's going ballistic on the surface and now we're throwing an intermediate.
I like them for that and just let the flies be unweighted.
Because the line's doing all the work you know. That's what I do a lot in the spring, the tackle bag that I take out in the boat.
I've got like 18 different spools in the boat at all times depending on what what the fish are doing.
Then you can just reach and grab the you know if it's real bright sun in the spring we're going to start off you know when it's bright like that usually we'll start off a lot deeper and as it gets cloudy we'll move up through the column.
If it's going to stay bright sun all day chances are there's not going to be a hatch if it's real bright all day in this part of the country.
But most of those good hatches happen in the cloudy weather.
Marvin:
[15:42] Yeah, got it. And, you know, folks, we want to thank everybody that sent in questions.
We really appreciate it. And we absolutely want to give a shout out to Scientific Anglers for generously sponsoring the series.
And, you know, now, folks, we're getting to the moment you all have been waiting for.
And the first winner we're going to announce is the person that's going to to win the signed copy of Casting Angles and that winner is Tom Jackson and so Tom I will put you in contact with Mac so he can personalize that book any way that you want and then our winner from the folks of the questions that we asked today and they're gonna win two essay fly lines of their choice and that winner is that guy named Lee and I will reach out to you on Instagram and you know if you'll let me know the two lines you want we'll put that order into essay and we'll get you hooked up.
And everybody, I hope you found this productive. I hope it makes your fall fishing more effective.
And as I always say, if you're a frequent listener to the podcast, you know this, that fall is my favorite time of the year to be on the water.
So folks, take everything we've told you and get out there and catch a few.
Tight lines, everybody. Tight lines, Matt.
Mac:
[16:48] Tight lines, Marvin.