This may be an old question, but I don’t remember reading it on the board before. For almost all of my fishing a really long cast will be about 30ft. The creeks just aren’t big enough for any lengthier casting, of course my skills aren’t either. But yesterday I got a chance to really let one fly, probably all of 45to 50 ft. (For my part of the world, that is a great big hole of water.) Anyway, I got into some of my fly line that isn’t used very often. I started to reel in some of the slack that I didn’t shoot out, and noticed that the line had stayed coiled up very tightly. As a matter of fact, for a moment there, I thought I had managed to tie a “wind knot” in my fly line lying at my feet! Thankfully that “knot” came undone without to much work. Which leads me to my question, do I need new line or do I just need to get out on bigger water occassionally and let my line out or what?
It’s called line memory. In colder weather it’s more pronounced than it warm weather. Sounds like it’s the first time it’s seen daylight since you had it put on. No big deal. Try fishing with Cortland Clear Camo in 25? weather. Now that’s sick.
Your line is ok in other words.
Periodically STRETCH your line. Pull it ALL off til you get down to the backing…and using line cleaner ( especially those little felt pads from Cortland) STRETCH it as you clean it and wind it back on the reel.
For some reason, ALL my fly lines seem to need ‘stretching’ at the beginning of the fishing day.
So, before I make a cast, I pull off a reasonable cast length, plus a little, and stretch it all, in segments. If I’m in the boat, I hold the line down with my foot and ‘stretch’ it upwards with my hand…I can do about 7-8 feet at a time this way…if I’m on foot, I stretch about four feet of line at a time between my hands, winding it back onto the reel until I’ve stretched it all.
Only takes a couple of minutes to do this, and then the line behaves properly right from the first cast.
Some lines are really not fishable until you do this-sinking lines and mono/clear lines especially. Some of my floating lines aren’t as bad, but I still do this just to make sure that the line lays out properly.
I just consider it part of the necessary preparation for the fishing day. A matter of my regular routine, like tying on the fly or forgetting something I’ll need…
Try taking your line off & wash it in a mild soap solution & warm water, put some line dressing on it ( if it’s floating line) & put it back on the spool. I have pegs set up in my basement to hang line up between seasons or trips ( bonefish lines, Warmwater & saltwater lines Etc.) This way they don’t take too much of a set. I used to wrap my lines around an old coffee can to store but I found the pegs work better
Your line is fine…but some lines have more memory than others …some so bad they didn’t survive in the market…
Buddy presents a way to do the stretching…however you presented a situation where you got into footages not gone to before…sooo…
Periodically stretch the whole line…preferably in warm weather…I lay it out on my deck railings and let it sit for awhile…when reeled in I use a cleaner as mentioned …but of course if some of that line hasn’t seen the light of day it doesn’t need the cleaner.
Some folks …stretch the whole line every outing before fishing …e.g. wrapping the line around something …trailer hitch …tree …whatever…before they fish
Like the others have said, you need to stretch your line.
When I go on a fishing trip I always clean my line by soaking it in warm water, then I clean it off using a warm moist face cloth. Then I apply a line conditioner. I do this to about 80 feet of line.
Then it is not uncommon to find me out in the hallway of either my house or the motel and I have the 80 feet doubled in half with the center around a smooth piece of metal (many door handles are great for this as long as they don’t have narrow cuts in them or sharp screws). I then pull the line tight and gently lean back for about a count of 10, stretching the line really tight. I gently release the stretch and do it again, usually three times. Then I reel the line up and go fishing.
During the course of the day the line will start to twist and if I am in a drift boat I do like I did at the motel, but I only pull out 10 feet at a time and use my foot as the center point anchor, give it a good stretch about 3 times then peel off another 10 feet, etc. If we have lunch on shore then I will stretch out the full 80 feet again.
I also usually treat the first 30 feet of my line with a line conditioner at least two times while I am fishing.
depending on how old your line is on that reel, you may want to think about stripping it all off including the backing and replace it all with the correct amount of backing and a brand new low memory fly line. cortland 444 peach certainly is a good one!
i have the 444 on a large arbor reel and i have yet had to stretch it out even after being on the reel for the winter. today’s fly lines don’t require too much stretching.
You might try - first cast, just throw it all down the river, then stretch it as you reel it in - that way you are stretching it out straight, rather than stretching the loops - does that make sense? Not sure it does to me, even, but I can visualize what I mean to say.
That’s how i do it herefishy, if there’s a problem that is. Usually happens more the colder it gets. Here on the Umpquas i’m always around big fast runs where i can let all the line out and just reeling it back in against the heavy current helps a lot.
Some of my lines aren’t memory prone though, and if lines weren’t free to me at times i’d only buy those that suggest that they have no memory. Like me. Wait, what were we talking about again?
But yesterday I got a chance to really let one fly, probably all of 45to 50 ft. (For my part of the world, that is a great big hole of water.) Anyway, I got into some of my fly line that isn’t used very often. I started to reel in some of the slack that I didn’t shoot out, and noticed that the line had stayed coiled up very tightly. As a matter of fact, for a moment there, I thought I had managed to tie a “wind knot” in my fly line lying at my feet! Thankfully that “knot” came undone without to much work. Which leads me to my question, do I need new line or do I just need to get out on bigger water occassionally and let my line out or what?