Went out this morning with the temp around 30 deg in N E Ct and had to quit because I couldn't feel my fingers after about a half hour. Are there any gloves that work for fly fishing in the cold?
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Went out this morning with the temp around 30 deg in N E Ct and had to quit because I couldn't feel my fingers after about a half hour. Are there any gloves that work for fly fishing in the cold?
mole skin gloves are great fer cold weather on down to 25deg... dont know if ya have a (the sportsmans guide) near ya or not but thats where i bought them gloves about 3 year ago... sometimes the army navy has them... perfect fer fly fishing... they are no thicker than a pair of driving gloves, keep ya hands warm fer hours outdoors AND the fingers have a slit underneath the last nuckle part so ya can pull the finger ends up over the top making it easy to change & tie flies on the line...
I use a pair of Windstopper gloves called "3-2" because the thumb and first finger are exposed down to the first knuckle and the other three fingers are covered. I also put one of the "shake up" hand warmers inside the gloves on the top of my hands. Works pretty well for me. I think there was a product test of the Windstopper gloves here on FAOL.
I use fingerless wool gloves with thinsulate insulation in them. If it is really cold, I use a chemical handwarmer on the palm of my hand inside the glove. If your fingers get too cold, pull them in, hold on to the handwarmer for a minute, and go back to fishing.
Wool can get wet and still insulate (although you cannot get the handwarmers wet). Fleece is useless once it is wet, and neoprene never worked for me. Also, the mitten/glove combos are a pain because I always get the line tangled up in the mitten flap.
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Ditto on the fingerless wool gloves. Mine covers the fingers to the second knuckle and has a cuff that goes 4'' past my wrist. Great for grabbing trouts out of the stream, lake, net. Wool keeps on insulating even when it's wet. I bought mine at the Army surplus store a long time ago and keep them in a pocket on my tackle bag. AKA Ragg Wool gloves. Jim
What DG said. I use the cheap "whatever mart" rag wool / thinsolate flippy mitts. You can cut the flippy part off or you can leave it but it gets in the way. Just cut the end of the thumb off and your golden. I buy several pairs at a time and keep them in my winter fishing bag.
I use the "half finger" style gloves, but in fleece. In my experience, the fleece insulates just fine when wet. But I haven't tried wool gloves, so I can't compare the two. It might be that I do pretty well tolerating those conditions, so maybe it's not so much the gloves ??
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I'll second John Scott's recommendation. I think Fleece does an excellent job for this purpose.
Modern day fleece is made from 100% polyester (PET, PETE) which is very durable and doesn't absorb water or odors. So, fleece dries quickly and supposedly provides twice the insulation properties of wool. It does provide insulation even when wet but not as much as wool. (sorry for my previous statement). I don't typically dunk my whole hand in the water and the fleece seems to dry faster for me and I like that property.
It's not waterproof like neoprene but it sure breathes a lot better. I'm a fleece freak so I'm biased. I use it for cycling, hunting, fishing, and anytime I need to stay warm while managing moisture.
Of course the best plan for keeping warm is minimize the potential for getting your hands/gloves wet or using waterproof gloves.