I fish 4x tippets for nimphs and down to 7x for dry flys. How much tippet do you normally tie onto your leader?
I use 1.5 to 2.5 ft of tippet on a 7.5 ft leader
I’m with Pete. I usually tie on about 2 feet of tippet. Sometimes I use 9’ leaders and sometimes use 7.5’ leaders but tie on about 2’ of tippet in either case.
Jeff
With 7.5’ furled leaders I’ve found that you can turn over 4 - 6’ of tippet
Usually about 3’, sometimes more, especially with small dries. I replace it after I lose about a foot.
Mike
If I did that i’d be casting (?) nothing but leader and tippet on some of my streams. 
About 18" for nymphs
For dries …more. Up to about 4’ added on to a 10’ leader
Often I’ll step down my tippet
Say I have 18" of 5x looped on and I want to go to 6 or 7x
I’ll cut the 5x back a bit and add the lighter tippet to it with a blood knot for a total of 3’ or so
[quote=“Gramps”]
If I did that i’d be casting (?) nothing but leader and tippet on some of my streams. ;)[/quote]
And you’d find that it works quite nicely!
If the fly slams the water or snaps off; then you have too short a tippet - you should lengthen it by adding at least 12". If the tippet folds up on itself and lands in a pile; then you have too much tippet - in this case you can either tie on a heavier fly or shorten the tippet by like 2-3 inches till you find the sweet spot, or increase the power of your cast, and of course when it comes to hurricane like gale force winds, all bets are off.
I find myself fishing relatively long leaders (leader + tippet) these days…but then again, my new bamboo rod handles those very well. I typically start out with a 9’ tippet tapered down to a 4x and then for dries I’ll add anywhere from 2’-6’ of tippet tapered from just 4x down to 7x (I’ve never had to go smaller than that) depending on conditions. For nymphing, I usually only add an additional 2 feet, and not much more. works perfect for high-sticking without any fly line out…
Of course, most of the water I fish are big rivers…
~Randy
This heretic makes the tippet material the whole leader.
I guess that I am lazy in that.
Rick
I generally have 3 to 4 feet of tippet.
[quote=“CM_Stewart”]
If I did that i’d be casting (?) nothing but leader and tippet on some of my streams. ;)[/quote]
And you’d find that it works quite nicely![/quote:4ce65]
I found out it didn’t work for beans. yes, I can get the line to the fish, but letting the fish run didn’t work very good with so many loops in my system. Not a problem if I have a bit of line out.
Gramps, you must catch bigger fish than I do. On the small streams I fish, I’ve yet to have to let one run.
My tippet length is dictated by conditions such as the size of the fly and the weight of the fly and air resistance. Since the presentation is the most important thing I adjust accordingly till it’s just right.
In other words; I’m all over the map length-wise :shock:
It’s variable just like X in math. . .