Like many of you, I got into fly fishing lured by promises of wanton, promiscuous, exhausting sex. After years of nearly complete and thoroughgoing disappointment, I find that one of the things that keeps me interested in fly fishing, in spite of discovering this universal dearth of sexual high jinks, is Spey casting.
Unlike sex, Spey casting is a rapidly evolving activity. And unlike sex, Spey equipment seems to be getting more and more complex (at least unlike sex biologically; technologically, lord knows what the kids are up to these days).
Once upon a time, about 20-plus years ago in the early 1990s, when for some perverse reason I decided to go all the way with Spey, it was certainly different from the other fly fishing I knew, but it wasn’t more complex. As a matter of fact, as far as gear was concerned, our choices were extremely limited, which exactly matched both our ability to use the gear and the educational materials then available to address our ineptitude.
One instructional book to which we did have access — Al Gore hadn’t invented the Internet yet, so we couldn’t go to YouTube for instructional videos — was written by Hugh Falkus, a British gent who had a beautifully articulate way of communicating the skill of casting a two-handed rod in a manner that was completely unintelligible to Californians. In his book, he included photos of a contraption that he had made out of plywood, rebar, and staircase balusters, resembling a Nike Swoosh on ’shrooms, in front of which you stood with your Spey rod in hand . . . in order to do something. I never figured out what. That thing scared me. It also retarded my ability to pick up the Spey-casting art, because an image of that contraption always popped into my head when I was out on the water trying to cast, and it confused me to no end, and that’s what I’m blaming for my inability to cast Spey, not congenital spasticness.
Now we have a whole bunch of options for learning the Spey game, probably too many options. There is video after video on YouTube, and some of the instructors are great. Some. There are a lot more books, and there are DVDs, some of which are also great. Some. Caveat emptor, which either means “Buyer beware,” or maybe, “Learn basic principles of Spey casting first before you try the full-gainer-with-a-half-twist cast.” You might sprain something.
Back then, back in the day, in the distant early 1990s, there were only a few rods available to us. They were generally big and soft. There were only a couple of lines available, and they were generally long or longer, which made them either hard or harder to cast. We couldn’t really get any of this gear to work properly, in spite of an awful lot of obstinate trying over a lot of years. Experts sent by the rod companies would come by to teach us how to use the gear, but with the clarity of hindsight and with no offense intended to these guys, they really didn’t know much more about how to make one of these titanic fly rods throw a string than we did. Yet we persevered. If I was on a steelhead river, I was using one of these rods, ’cause it just had to be better! (Probably some of it was also because of the egotistic motivation of being able to use gear that other fly anglers couldn’t, even if I couldn’t either. Using a Spey rod back then put you in an even more exclusive subset of the already exclusive set of fly anglers who fished for steelhead, so the more esoteric the technique, the cooler you are, I guess.)
Since California is the land of innovation and motivation, as Californians, we figured that we would wait around until some dudes in the state of Washington came up with some lines that actually worked. They finally did and were gracious enough to send them south. Now I ain’t no historian, unless I can use history to obfuscate and confuse, which is exactly what using the word “obfuscate” in any sentence is for, so I’m not going to list which dudes innovated what lines when and why, even if I could. Suffice it to say that once these new lines started becoming available, once folks found that they could learn to cast a two-handed rod reasonably well within a reasonably short time using these lines, KABOOM! SPEYLIFERATION! The damn things are everywhere now. “Martha, get the gun!” And the hits just keep coming. Innovation building upon innovation. Lots of gear to choose from. Lots of confusing gear to choose from. Lots of obfuscation. That is the current state of affairs in the
Spey game.
I’m not going to tell you exactly what kind of gear you should use for Spey casting . . . oh wait, that is exactly what I’m going to do, in general terms, at least. And remember, in Spey casting, just as in sex, every rule is meant to be enthusiastically and vigorously broken repeatedly.
To begin with, there are two main categories of fly rods categorized as Spey rods. There are traditional Spey rods, generally longish rods with grips for two hands, and there are switch rods, the bastard children of two-handed rods. And that pretty much sums it up.
Honestly, here is the deal on switch rods: they were once an attempt to overcome a perceived market reluctance to purchasing Spey rods. A Spey rod’s use is limited; it is intended to throw change-of-direction casts and used primarily for swinging-fly presentations. The switch rod was offered as a more versatile tool to ease your way into the Spey game. You could use a switch rod to fish indicators (but not as well as a lighter single-handed rod). You could cast them with one hand if you wanted (but they are still a lot heavier, have more swing weight, and generate slower line speeds than single-handed rods). And the first switch rods really didn’t perform as good as Spey rods, either, at least not with the lines that were available at the time. That story has changed. Now switch rods have mostly become a category of shorter, faster Spey rods. And some of them are a friggin’ blast to fish. I am personally infatuated with a 4-weight switch rod fished on the Trinity/Klamath/Rogue to swing sweet, light Steelhead Muddlers on crisp fall days.
The evolution in Spey rods proper is analogous to dinosaur evolution: they are getting lighter and lighter, and pretty soon I suspect that they will be developing feathers and will begin to fly. Once upon a time not too long ago, a 6-weight Spey rod was considered ridiculously dinky. Now, in good measure because of the efforts of Gary Anderson, Southern Oregon Spey-rod maker extraordinaire, we’ve got 4-weight, 3-weight, and even 2-weight Spey rods. Two-handed Archaeopteryxes!
Now we need to talk lines. It’s a little confusing out there, so I’ve made this matrix: first, you need to trace the X axis to the 4th dimensional C6 plenum intake, where you will notice the purely mathematical vanishing point, which when pericombobulated with some Astroglide and a shoehorn. . . .
Seriously, it’s that confusing in the Spey line/leader market right now.
There are two main types of lines for two-handed rods: great big fat short ones, and more delicate relatively longer ones. We call these respectively, “Skagit lines” and “Scandi lines.” (“Skagit” refers to a river in Washington where they like things a little plumper; “Scandi” refers to a region known for lutefisk and unintelligible black-and-white movies from the 1950s.) For conceptual clarity, think of Scandi lines as the ones you would use on a bluebird fall day on the Klamath where eager fish will move a long way for your small, classic, lightly dressed pretty little flies swung in lower, clearer water. They are the lines to use when you want other anglers to appreciate your skillful and sensitive, light, titillating touch on your rod. Think of the porcine Skagit lines as necessary to cast an overendowed, overdressed harlot of a fly, held down to the riverbed with the heavy cable of a sink tip on a frigid, yet moist February day on the Eel, after a sluicing deluge when there is barely room between the redwoods and your deep, wet demise and where the words “water” and “clarity” don’t play well with each other.
(One perhaps unintended consequence of the popularity of modern, easy-to-throw Skagit lines and their ability to throw big, fat Orson Welles–sized flies, such as monster lead-eyed Intruders, is that now many anglers think that only giant lead-eyed flies catch steelhead. This is a shame. It’s a shame that on rivers like the Klamath, Rogue, Trinity, and many others where fish often respond best to beautiful light flies fished lightly, anglers are using these monster flies thrown on a heavy cable exclusively. Take my advice — you’d be the first to do so, ever — and try using the lightest fly and line you can, not the heaviest, at least not right away. Start with a light touch and work your way up from there. You know, start the action with a light kiss on the nape of the neck. You might be surprised by the results.)
Some companies make even shorter versions of Skagit lines for use on the compact switch-type Spey rods. Some companies call their longer Skagit lines meant for full-sized Spey rods “compact.” Some companies make lines that compromise between Scandi, Skagit, and switch lines all at once in one universal line that should work for everything. Kind of a short “Scangwich,” which would have been better than the name they gave the line. As a matter of fact, some of my fishing buddies think this particular type of line is a very good all-around line for all two-handed rods, but since the name that one of the major line companies gave their all-around line makes no sense, hardly any normal people know about it. That same company, which will remain nameless — what the hell, it’s RIO — also has a line that is longer than any of the lines we’ve discussed so far, and that line is called a “Short Spey,” but only because it is shorter than their longer lines, not because it is longer than their shorter lines.
Since we are now naming names, the supposedly universal line I was referring to is called a “Scandi Body,” which is great for all but the longest rods, unless, of course, you attach a longer sink tip. But the name makes no sense, unless they are talking about hot blondes from 1950s Swedish movies, so unless someone tells you that this is the one line you need, you probably wouldn’t guess to buy it.
RIO, however, also makes the exact same line in a second version, but it comes with a detachable tip, and they call that line something else — a “VersaTip,” or a “Short VersaTip.” These lines don’t really cast if you detach the detachable tip, but the Scandi Body doesn’t really work without the addition of a detachable tip, either. However, just to make things fun, the line designation for the Scandi Body is measured before adding the tip, whereas the VersaTips are measured with the tip. What this means is that if you buy a Scandi Body for your 6-weight two-handed rod, it will weigh 325 grains, but if you buy a VersaTip for the same 6-weight, it will weigh 370 grains. RIO calls them both 6-weights. Seriously? (Spoken with extreme sarcasm.) And WTF? (Same emphasis.) (By the way, the line profile shown on the RIO website is different from the line profile shown in the RIO catalog. One of them may be accurate, or not.)
RIO, the Spey world is confusing enough. Please either put a little more thought into the names of your Spey lines, or perhaps a little less. (“Switch Chucker,” that name of yours, makes perfect sense, however.) Also, it is the Airflo company that calls their longer Skagit line “compact,” so it’s not just one company that’s to blame for the nominalogical obfuscation of Spey lines.
Oh, one more thing: some Spey lines come in line weights, although the numbers don’t correspond to single-handed-rod line weights, and some are measured by how many grains they weigh, although if they are also to be marketed in England, they are measured in grams.
Now that you’ve got your rod and line all squared away, it’s time to figure out what kind of leader and/or sink-tip situation you want to get yourself ensnared in.
So, there are sink-tips, and there are leaders that are designed to sink, and there are modified sinking/floating “sink tips,” and oh, there are good old-fashioned tapered monofilament leaders that neither sink nor float. Some of these you can use with some types of lines, and with other types of lines they won’t work well at all. I hope that clears things up.
In a nutshell, however: if you use a Skagit line, use either one of the sinking/ floating combination tips or simply use a dense or denser length of heavy untapered sinking line to get your junk downtown. But always use a tip of some kind.
If you use a Scandi line, you can use a floating or a sinking leader, which come in various lengths and sink rates to suit your rod, the conditions, or your mood. Or you can do what I most like to do: use a long monofilament leader and just insist that the fish move to your fly.
But of course, it’s actually more complicated than that.
Next article: “Narrow Your Steelhead Fly Selection Down to the Best Twenty-Four Thousand Patterns.”
