While the right rod and reel are certainly important in fly fishing, it is the fly line that often has the most effect on fishing success. The right line can deliver your fly to the fish and help ensure it behaves in a way the fish deem edible. The more waters you fish, the more lines you likely will need. With fly lines costing as much as a hundred and ninety bucks, you’ ll want to make sure they provide peak performance for as long as possible. And it pays to have an efficient means of organizing and storing lines, especially when you have several that look the same. Fortunately, it’s not that hard to keep your lines organized and in good shape.
Cleaning Your Line
Modern fly lines are for the most part fairly low maintenance. If you fish only in clear mountain streams, your line may not need to be cleaned more than once a year, if that. Folks plying lower-elevation rivers and lakes, where the water often contains more organic matter, may find cleaning after a couple of trips is warranted. And if you enjoy targeting largemouth bass in sloughs and ponds, a daily cleaning would not be considered excessive.
For routine cleaning, pulling the line through a clean, wet cloth is usually sufficient. If the line is particularly soiled, the usual advice is to soak it in a bucket of soapy water for 15 minutes, draw it through a cloth, and then rinse in clean water. This is certainly a good idea before you go on a fishing trip, but not exactly practical when you are on the water. Fortunately, you can usually soften most of the caked-on contaminants by soaking the line for a few minutes in the river or lake. After the soak, pull the line through a microfiber towel, which should remove enough of the grunge to get things back in decent working order.
Lubricating Your Line
A simple cleaning is usually all you need with most fly lines, especially those that are less than a year old. Once the surface contaminants have been removed, the line’s built-in lubricants will be exposed, helping to create a low-friction surface. These lubricants (typically silicone) gradually leach out of the plastic to ensure the line stays slick. This low-friction surface is especially noticeable with brand new fly lines. No doubt you’ve made the first few casts with a new line and marveled at how easily it slides through the guides.
Depending on the type of line, how often you fish, and the fishing conditions, this low-friction layer can last for a few hours or a few months. However, the migration of lubricants to the surface of the line inevitably will diminish. The line will still cast fine, it just won’t shoot through the guides quite as smoothly. As long as the surface of the line has not been damaged, an application of fly-line dressing can help restore the line’s zip.
While a super-slick surface may not be critical in every fishing situation, there are times when a clean and freshly lubricated line can make a noticeable difference. Throwing flies from a boat toward shoreline trees and boulders is a good example. Accuracy matters, whether it’s a trout holding beneath an overhanging willow, a steelhead just behind a boulder, or a snook lying in a tangle of mangrove roots. If you could just cast a set length of line and fish such places, things would be much easier. However, the banks of a river are seldom straight, and overhanging trees are unlikely to resemble a manicured hedge.
To fish these places effectively, you have to place your fly at different distances on a cast-by-cast basis. This means you will often need to shoot varying lengths of line, and this is when good line lubrication can make a big difference. Any changes in friction along the line will affect the shoot, and this will inevitably impair accuracy. If the fly drops a few inches short, the fish won’t respond. A few inches too far, and rocks or trees may claim the fly for good.
Good lubrication can also be a significant factor when you need to cast a long way consistently. On lakes, large rivers, and at many saltwater venues, the ability to cast far should improve your catch rate. A lot of fishing in these locations entails prospecting, where you are covering water, as opposed to casting to specific locations or to rising fish. Under these circumstances, consistently longer casts mean your fly is likely to be seen by more fish. While an extra five feet on a single cast may not seem that significant, that difference adds up over time. Assuming you cast and retrieve your fly just once per minute, that extra five feet will cover almost half a mile of extra water over the course of an eight-hour day.
The value of dressing the line with lubricants can be especially pronounced with clear intermediate lines. These lines do not have internal lubricants, since they would render the line opaque. Instead, they rely on a factory-applied coating of lubricants, and once this layer has been depleted, the line will be noticeably slower through the guides. On warm, low-humidity days, it may even make a “nailson-chalkboard” noise, which can get old in a hurry. You can add a fresh layer of lubricant by dressing your line, but the coating inevitably will wear off, sometimes within a few casts.
Autolube
Clearly, the optimum arrangement would be to clean and lubricate your fly line prior to every cast. That way, your line would slide through the guides and deliver your fly with more distance and accuracy. When fishing involves waiting for long periods and casting only to sighted fish, such as tarpon or permit, this might make sense. But for most other species, it’s not that practicable.
Or is it?
I’ve been experimenting for the last two years with a setup that automatically cleans and lubricates the line prior to every cast without interfering with the actual fishing. It took a few sessions to figure out the best types of materials and how to make the system as user friendly as possible, but now it’s time to spill the beans. Even though this idea would have made me a multimillionaire, I’ve decided not to patent it. Kidding aside, this is a do-it-yourself system that anyone can make, and the total cost should be less than $20, including the lubricant.
The system is very simple — just two hand-made finger cots and some silicone oil. The first cot is made from a microfiber towel and is slipped over your index finger on your rod hand. Strip the line over the front (palm side) of this cot, and the microfibers remove any contaminants the line has just picked up. The second cot, which can be made from microfiber cloth or felt, is placed on your middle finger. A few drops of silicone oil are applied to the back of the second cot. As you pull the line over the second cot, it applies a thin film of silicone. You now have a line that is cleaned and lubricated prior to every cast. A few drops of silicone oil usually lasts for a couple of hours and can be replenished in seconds.
It’s easy to make the finger cots. Just measure the circumference of your index and middle fingers, then cut pieces of microfiber cloth one-quarter inch wider than a finger’s circumference. Fold the cloth and stitch the two sides together about an eighth of an inch from the edge.
Put a dot of superglue on the knots at each end of the stitching to ensure they don’t come loose. You should now have a tube with a seam running down the edge. Turn the tube inside out (to hide the seam), slip it over your finger, and test it for fit. The cots should allow you to hold the rod without straining the stitches, but not be so loose they slip off.
You can use commercial f ly-line dressings, most of which are based on dimethylpolysiloxane, the same stuff that’s used in skin moisturizers and personal lubricants. However, you might want to check to see if the dressing also contains other chemicals, such as solvents, which could irritate your skin with prolonged contact. I’ve been using Super Lube silicone oil, which is 100 percent (food grade) dimethylpolysiloxane and comes in several viscosities. The 100 cSt viscosity version makes the line slick, but not so slick that it is hard to grasp. Kinetic friction tests showed it reduced fly line friction by the same amount as a well-known line manufacturer’s dressing. This result isn’t too surprising, since their product is also based on dimethylpolysiloxane. A four-ounce bottle of Super Lube silicone oil costs about $15 and should last you many years. It is a pretty good reel lube, as well.
Another advantage of the autolube system is that it reduces wear, which should increase your fly line’s useful life. While it is hard to predict how a specific line will fare, preliminary results are promising. I recently replaced a line that had been fished for almost five hundred hours in the surf, which is a much more abrasive environment than most. It lasted so long I nicknamed it Methuselah.
Storing Lines
The more fly lines you own, the more likely it is that you’ll want to have an effective storage system. Not surprisingly, this can present some challenges when you have a dozen or more. And then there’s the issue of taking a number of lines on an extended fishing trip. You don’t want to find yourself on the water, only to discover the line you need is back at home, especially if home is hundreds or thousands of miles away. Not that I have ever done that. . . .
Perhaps the simplest solution is to keep your lines on dedicated reels and extra spools. If you need only a couple of lines, this is practical and not too costly. The lines will be fine staying on the reel as long as you keep them in a spot that doesn’t get too hot. If you have more than a few lines, though, storing them on reels and spare spools can get rather expensive. One solution to storing multiple lines is to rewind them back onto their original plastic spools. There are a few ways to do this. The easiest approach is to use a couple of pencils. One pencil goes through the center hole and the other gets inserted into a hole closer to the edge of the spool. If the spool doesn’t come with a second hole, you’ll either need to make one or superglue a piece of quarter-inch thick foam onto the spool, into which you push the pointy end of the pencil. Hold the other pencil in the center hole with your nondominant hand and use your dominant hand to rotate the spool in the same way you’d wind a reel. To ensure the line doesn’t slip on the spool, affix it with some tape or make a few overlapping turns by hand before winding it on.
A faster technique is to place a suitably sized bolt (1/4”-20 works well) through the central hole and hand tighten a nut on the other side. A couple of washers on either side of the spool will help the bolt grip it more effectively. Affix the end of the line to the spool with some tape and then place the threaded section of the bolt into the chuck of a variable-speed drill. Start slowly and avoid the temptation to use maximum speed, or you’ll run the risk of wrapping the line around the bolt, which might scar the line’s plastic coat.
There may be times when you need to take several lines on an extended fishing trip. If bulk and weight aren’t an issue, just load them on reels, spare spools, or the original line spools. But what if you need to maximize space and minimize weight, such as using carry-on baggage to ensure your critical fishing gear arrives at the destination? Standing by the luggage carousel and discovering that your gear is en route to a different country can be more than a little frustrating. This is when it’s best to store the lines as coils held together with twist ties.
You can create the coils by winding the line back onto the original plastic spool, as described above. Once the line is wound on the spool, carefully separate the two sides of the spool and gently ease the line off the plastic hub. Secure the coils with a couple of twist ties. If you use grocery store flag-style twist ties, you can use the label to identify the line. This can be really helpful when you have several lines that look the same, but have different weights or densities.
There are a couple of ways to load these coils of line onto the reel. One way is to slip the coil over the fingers of one hand and carefully unwind the line onto a clean floor. The downside to this approach is the line will develop twists that need to be removed before you get it on the reel. Pulling it through a cloth a couple of times will usually force the twists out of the line, but be aware they seldom go away without a fight.
Another solution is to use a portable line winder. I’m a big fan of DIY solutions to fishing problems, but making a compact, adjustable line winder is rather complicated. Fortunately, there are a number of commercial products that fit the bill. Most adjustable winders feature a set of articulated metal arms mounted on a steel shaft. One end of the shaft has a hand crank, and the other has a C-clamp for mounting onto a table. Most of these winders collapse down to about the same dimensions as a water bottle.
If you are looking for a very compact and lightweight portable winder, you might want to check out the Scientific Anglers Regulator Spool. This plastic winder is the same size as the original plastic line spool and uses a neat locking cam system that makes loading and unloading lines a breeze. This is a good solution for folks with significant space or weight limitations. I carry one to three extra lines in the front pocket of my waders when I make long hikes in search of surf-zone striped bass and halibut. About five minutes is all I need to swap lines and get back to fishing.
It doesn’t take too much effort to ensure that your fly lines stay in peak condition, providing years of service. This will certainly improve your casting and fishing. It will also save you money, which means you have more money to spend on fishing gear, such as more fly lines.
