Big Trout on Tiny spinners

premiercad

Can anyone help on two questions I have?

Firstly I was fishing last night and Ive never seen conditions as good, it was so balmy and BWO's and sedge flies were hatching everywhere. However, Trout were feeding very off and on and their rises were tiny maybe 6 inch circles? I've never seen such carefull rises.

I must have covered 20 trout with no joy changing from spinners to emergering Klinks etc. I finally broke the deadlock in the half light at 10.30 when one trout finally sipped down my little 16 sherry spinner. He immediately tore down stream 30 yards and despite me trying to give him line he broke my 3lb leader like it was thread! :mad: :mad:

Which made me think (a lot)

1. Was it my line that was putting them off earlier in the daylight. Is 3lb/4lb too heavy with these 16/ 18 flies? These trout are all wild and well in the 2-3 pound mark judging by one I missed. I'm afraid to go down to low a weight with tippet after that episode!

2. On fly selection should I reduce fly size to get into the surface film for these trout maybe size 18 20 or is their a better BWO pattern I could fish?

Any help would be appreciated.

coolwings

I think (based on my experiences with fussy Liffey trout) that 3lb mono is pretty much invisible, unless there is drag. I would think that 4lb is very visible to the same fish, and the number of takes might be 1/20th with 4lb compared to 3lb.

Regarding the line breakage, unless I am using a 5 or lower rated rod, 3lb is hard to "mind" both on the strike, and during the plunges and head shakes that follow.

So if you had 4lb mono on, yes, I'm sure they were looking at the line, until dusk came.
There is another possibliity - that they were looking at you until dusk came!

premiercad

Thanks Coolwings I had a look at 3lb versus 4 at home and as you said there could be a big difference visually to a trout. As for the watching me bit I'm sure a few of them saw me alright although most continued feeding during my feeble attempts to catch them out!

Was talking to a mate yesterday who also suggested a flurocarbon tippet or failing that degrease the leader to stop it sitting so high?

pullandbang

You should always degrease the 12" behind the fly to get it to sink.

coolwings

Here we get into personal preference, and therefore, we get picky ......

I prefer fluoro for nymphing. it is made of a heavier substance, and sinks better, and when retrieved slowly it better resists rising to the surface and making a trace in the surface film from underneath.

For dry fly I prefer mono because it's inherently buoyant, but after 20 mins mono takes a bit of water in and gets slightly heavier (easier) to cast (like fluoro) but no heavier when in water, because the extra weight is water.
The tapered (thinner) section of the floating line is greased and the mono leader is degreased exactly as the post above said, and a mono leader doesn't drag your dry fly under so much as fluoro will.

Sometimes I use fluoro for a dry leader, but never in sunshine. A dark coloured mono (maxima) does that job best.

Knowing all this is interesting, but it still doesn't make the next fish take!