06-12-2011, 05:54 PM
You could do this with other rods, but it does help to have a floating fly line so that you don't get a belly in your line. If you have a belly you will miss lots of fish.
The usual fly of choice for this particular form of deep nymphing is the chironomid. They are a very common insect in lakes and the fish look for them.
Chironomids don't swim. They float straight up from the bottom -- very slowly. As they are building up enough gasses to go up they are suspended about a foot or two above the bottom. They are very vulnerable then, so this is the stage that most want to fish.
To suspend the fly just above the bottom vertically, you need a very long leader and a floating line. The indicator helps to keep the tip of your line from sinking and "swimming" the fly. It also helps to keep the fly at exactly the depth you want it to stay at. If the depth isn't too great and your flies aren't too heavily weighted you can do it with out an indicator.
The "slip indicators" are better for this than a fixed float of any kind, because when you get a fish on the pin on the indicator comes out and allows it to slide down your leader so that you can reel in all of that extra leader.
You could just use a sinking line and occasionally you will get your fly in the right zone, but not very often. Plus it will usually swim the fly more horizontally or even down when the real bug is straight upright and pretty much static or slowly rising.
I have seen FG catch some really big fish with this technique. It is very effective for big fish that are wise to a lot of other offerings.
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The usual fly of choice for this particular form of deep nymphing is the chironomid. They are a very common insect in lakes and the fish look for them.
Chironomids don't swim. They float straight up from the bottom -- very slowly. As they are building up enough gasses to go up they are suspended about a foot or two above the bottom. They are very vulnerable then, so this is the stage that most want to fish.
To suspend the fly just above the bottom vertically, you need a very long leader and a floating line. The indicator helps to keep the tip of your line from sinking and "swimming" the fly. It also helps to keep the fly at exactly the depth you want it to stay at. If the depth isn't too great and your flies aren't too heavily weighted you can do it with out an indicator.
The "slip indicators" are better for this than a fixed float of any kind, because when you get a fish on the pin on the indicator comes out and allows it to slide down your leader so that you can reel in all of that extra leader.
You could just use a sinking line and occasionally you will get your fly in the right zone, but not very often. Plus it will usually swim the fly more horizontally or even down when the real bug is straight upright and pretty much static or slowly rising.
I have seen FG catch some really big fish with this technique. It is very effective for big fish that are wise to a lot of other offerings.
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