Fumbling in the dark:

I’m not talking about trying to get close to your first girlfriend in the back seats of the local Roxy. I’m talking about the annoying pastime of tying a small dry fly on a fine tippet when the lights fading and the trout are rising.

The above fly is a size 26 and tying one of these at the bank side is not easy. Let’s be honest with advancing years, a size 16 is difficult. Answer? Tie them on at home.

Picture above shows a tapered leader (right) and our size 26 fly tied on a length of tippet and wrapped round a rig holder. The tapered leader has a loop at the point end and the tippet has a loop on one end. Now I attach my tapered leader to the end of my fly line and then using the loop to loop method ( plenty of examples of this procedure on line) I attach my tippet plus fly and hey presto I’m fishing with a ridiculously small fly without any hassle.

The beauty of this is that you can carry multiple flies pre tied on tippets and swap and change when you want.

The above picture is my own homemade rig box but others are available on line.

Hope you find this useful.

Any questions contact me at matt@castaflywithme.com

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