I have been chucking flies for a good many years and have always had a problem with the tippet section of my leader becoming severely twisted when casting traditional or “Catskill” style dry flies. The fly spins like a propeller during the cast, but WHY?
My tippet length is 30 to 36 inches and sized proportionatley to the size of the fly.
Dick
…
You learn something new every single day of your life. If you don’t, you weren’t paying attention.
Wings on dries, especially big ones, act like, well, wings sometimes, and impart a spin to the fly. There are two ways to deal with this: change flies, or increase the size/stiffness of your tippet. I have found it is very hard to twist 4x with a #16 fly (although it can be done), but 6x loves to twist.
If you don’t feel you can up your tippet size, start doing surgery on the flies, or leave the wings off of em when you tie.
Dennis
Grandpa,
I noticed this problem a few years back, when I use to divide my upright winged patterns, especially patterns with calf tail for the wing. Just my 2cents
1more
Dear grampaflyfish,
Ditch the super limp tippet and fish Maxima Chameleon. No more tippet twist and just as many fish.
You probably won’t want to do that so here goes. When fishing limp tippet the fly needs to be properly proportioned. Assuming that is the case, fish flies that are no larger than 3 times the size of the tippet and you should be OK. EX - 4X tippet equals a size 12 fly or smaller.
Too many people have the tendency to fish too small a diameter tippet too often.
Regards,
Tim Murphy