Been ask a Million times I bet, Best Fly Floatant?

FAOL Community Fly Anglers Online
1

Last year I saw some posts on here about ‘Frog Fanny’ floatant being better than sliced bread and being one of Pavlov’s Dogs went out and purchased TWO bottles of it. I am not calling anyone out with this or being critical of your judgement or use of this product. I am not nearly as good at fly fishing as some of y’all. I cannot get this stuff, the Frog Fanny, stuff to work. It will float a fly for one or maybe two casts and has to be reapplied. One of two things:

  1. Am I doing it wrong? Use the brush and rub the stuff in. Floats the fly once or twice.

  2. What is the NEXT best fly floatant?

2

i never had much luck with the powdered stuff except as a fly drier. gink works best for me and i tried a lot of em.

3

I stick with Gink as well. It’s everywhere and works.

4

Mark,

I use the dry powder silicon type floatants for really small flies. With the Frogs Fanny you need to jamb the powder into the hackles and body. When it comes in contact with moisture it forms gas bubbles that help keep the fly afloat. The gel type floatants can actually sink a really small fly.

For most of my dry flies, I use a gel or liquid type floatant. Loon makes a good product as does Gink.

For really large dry flies, I have found Mucilin to be a great products and a number of my guides use it as well.

None of the floatants will work for a long time. There are a number of factors that cause a fly to sink. Foam from the top of the water, dirty leaders and tippets, fish slime from the fish you just caught, choppy water, wind action across the top of the water, hydraulics of the water pulling the fly and leader down…they all factor in.

Larry —sagefisher—

5

Tiemco’s Dry Magic, 'cause it also works well on cdc.

6

Albolene…

7

FF is a water repellant. Once the fly gets eaten, the fly get water logged and you need to get the water out of the fly before reapplying FF.

I use a traditional floatant like Aquel that soaks into the body of traditional flies, and I use Dry Magic on CDC. Then apply the FF. After the fly gets taken, I squeeze the water out with an artificial chamois, then I treat it with a desiccant FF combo like Shimazaki Dry Shakeor Top Ride. The combination products will dry out the fly and coat the fly with the same material as FF. Blue Ribbon Floatant, that Loon Outdoors sells as re-filler for Top Ride, is the same material as FF.

Floatants work by 2 methods, soaking into the spaces between dubbing and/or coating the fibers and feathers. FF cannot soak into the spaces between dubbing like gel floatants can. So use both methods.

A third method is to “presoak” the flies in water repellants such as RainX or the old style (green can) Scotchguard. Spray the Scotchguard into a small capped bottle and soak the flies after you tie them, then place on a paper towel. Recap the bottle after use to save the Scotchguard.

8

I have used the paste, which is silicon, for 30 years and it works very well on all dry flies. Various dealers including Orvis sell it.

9

I use fumed silica on my dries. I mostly use a cdc comparadun style fly and the fumed silica has worked well for me. Usually I can get many casts in befre having to re-apply. After catching a fish the cdc will be soaked — squeeze water out with your fingers, apply liberal amount of silica, work it in well with fingers or brush, and you’re good to go. I fish with one fella who hates the stuff because you have to re-apply after catching a fish. My thinking is very simple … I’ll gladly spend the time it takes to put on floatant for a fish.

10

Hydrophobic Fumed Silica (brand name Frog’s Fanny) is by far the best all around floatant, as it will work on anything, including midges, CDC, and hare’s foot. To properly treat a fly, excess moisture needs to be removed. I use a commercial product called Shamadou, but a piece of Chamois works just as well. Once the excess moisture is removed, work in the FF with the brush. When used in this manner, there is nothing on the market that is any better.

11

Gink gets my vote too.

12

Same experience here … that fly shop was touting the Frog’s Fanny as the best floatant since the invention of the fly rod but I found it so so at best. And I’m a “Gink” fan as well, it seems to work the best for the most use. Now having said that, I’ve found that a dry fly after having been mauled by a fish or two, a re-application of the stuff does not work as well as the original application.

13

Another vote for Dry Magic.

Regards,
Scott

14

Check to make sure it’s not your flies? I can get more casts than that using no floatant in most instances.

It also helps to use a floating line, and not a sinking one. (smile)

15

I am with John on this one was thinking the same thing

16

Fly Fishing and Fly Tying Journal (the UK version) did a study a few years back on this question. The mag found that the best combo was using Watershed (or something similar) at least 24 hours before fishing and then drying the fly once it began to sink or got slimed by a fish with Shimazaki Dry Shake (or something similar).

Works for me. After I tie a dry, I put a few drops of Watershed on it, rub it in, and put in my box after 24 hours.

17

Gink gets my vote

18

This gets a third vote. All of the floatants will work. You didn’t mention the size of the fly or the materials used to tie it with or if it was certain sizes or styles of flies. If you are using fluro on small flies the leader could drag the fly under. I tend to be a fly changer until I hit the one that works for me. Sometimes I don’t put any floatant on because I will either catch a fish on that one fly and change it out when I inspect my tippet for nicks after catching a fish or I will change the fly before I have issues. Wulff patterns float like corks for a loooooong time. If you are tying large dries with wet fly materials that suck up a lot of water this will also cause problems.

If you look at this thread you will see a whole bunch of floatants that everyone says is the best, just like in your original post. That means that they all work gud nuff. Look for an answer to your delima somewhere else in the equation.

Rick

19

Back in the dark ages, when I first started fly fishing, I used the time-honored home-made standby: paraffin wax dissolved in white gas (gasoline fresh from the still; no additives). It worked OK, but left a lot to be desired (the price was right; Mom canned so she provided the wax, and white gas was $0.10 a gallon). Somewhere along the line, I was introduced to Gink, and it has been my “standby” to this day. I have also used Mucillin, both the red and the green label, with good success.

Frank

20

For the ‘cheapies’ among us:

Silicone Water Guard, available at WalMart in the camping section, will permanently waterproof your flies. After that, you don’t ‘need’ anything else but a clean and dry fly and if it’s tied correctly, it will ‘float’ forever.

But dry flies ‘sink’ for all kinds of reasons.

Drag: If the tippet sinks (flourocarbon sinks) or the current pulls on the tippet/line the fly can be pulled under.

Bouyancy:

If you don’t have enough bouyancy to float the hook, the fly will sink regardless of what you do to it. If you are counting on the surface tension to hold up the fly, like many traditional dries, you have to make sure that the weight of all the materials doesn’t overcome the surface tension. Real bugs weigh less than even the lightest wire hooks…

Fish slime:

Fish slime is a pure wetting agent, if you don’t remove it the fly will sink unless it’s made with foam or cork, etc.,. Your floatants, shakes, sprays, whatever won’t help. You have to clean the fly or it will sink. A bit of dish soap and/or a vigorous wash in the water can remove this.

Waterlogging:

Even if you pretreat the fly, if you tied it with dubbing or any loose material like that, water can get into the spaces left between the fibers and add weight to the fly. If enough water weight exists, the fly sinks. A samadou patch or one of the super absorbent synthetic cloths can help suck the water from a fly and allow it to float better. Best is to just let the fly dry out (change flies).

Be careful with the ‘dry shakes’ type stuff. What most of them are made from is a super absorbing powder that takes in water. After use, if you don’t get it ALL off the fly, when the fly next hits the water, the remaining powder will try to absorb the whole river, sinking your fly very quickly. Ten or more very fast false casts will sometimes flick of the remaining stuff, but doing this without using the dry shake will often do just as well.

And, lastly:

Rain-X is WAX, not a water repellent. It adds weight and won’t help your fly float. What makes it repell water on GLASS, is the ‘polishing it off after it dries’ on GLASS. It’s a very fine wax that fills the micropores in glass so that it becomes slippery. In itself, it ‘repells’ nothing. The ‘film’ that you polish off of the glass won’t help your flies float, actually the reverse. Since you can’t polish the flies after you add the Rain-X, and since flies are not made of glass, it’s just more weight.

Buddy