Author Topic: Fishing close in (Read 1249 times)

Louis Martin · « **on:** February 01, 2011, 03:54:35 PM »

As a follow up to my first question below, how many of you use curly/slinky sighters when polish/czech nymphing or high sticking? I typically use two or three dots of strike putty for most of my nymph fishing, which allows me to put a 7-12 foot leader into many configurations—long lining, with most of the leader subsurface, or fishing close, with much of the leader above the water. If I fish a slinky on the end of a 6-9 foot leader, plus 4- 5 feet of tippet, it seems it will be harder to manipulate the leader into different configurations as I’ll need to keep the slinky floating, or just above the surface. Any thoughts on this?

Loren Williams · « **Reply #1 on:** February 01, 2011, 05:37:47 PM »

Louis,

For me, the rationale of using a long leader is to allow me to cast accurately and fish at distance with exceptional contact to my flies since I do not need to contend with the mass of my fly line. The curly is my choice of sighter, but many anglers better than myself use straight mono sighters.

With my long leader I can CN or PN close one cast then make a long presentation on the next so yes, my curly is always on my leader with my opition of how and when to use it. For me it is the ultimate in versatility.

Zach Bearden · « **Reply #2 on:** February 01, 2011, 06:10:01 PM »

I have pictures of Loren fishing a curly about 10 ft away with heavy flies. I figure that's pretty well close in. I'm pretty sure Vladi (yeah, the condom worm guy) hates curlies. I know he hates nymphing with long leaders and will yell about them. lol He's a previous world champ but his personal favorite style is short leaders and straight mono.

I don't think there's a limit as to how close or far away you can fish something. Now, don't get me wrong. Somethings will lose their effectiveness with distance, but nobody is going to slap you because you try something.

Dejon Hamann · « **Reply #3 on:** February 02, 2011, 01:32:42 PM »

As echoed again I also use the curly regardless of proximity.

In case it's not obvious, which it may well be, know that more than 90% of the time my curly is suspended from 1-5 feet above the water line.

Jim Frazier · « **Reply #4 on:** February 02, 2011, 10:12:34 PM »

dejon ,

are you simply using the curly just for the maybe say 5% of the time fishing when you need to be able to float it. If fishing it suspended isn't it in essence a streight sighter at that point or is there still a difference between the 2 in strike detection ?

Dejon Hamann · « **Reply #5 on:** February 02, 2011, 10:22:05 PM »

Not at all, the primary use of the curly is as a suspended strike detector. The difference in visual strike detection between a straight sighter and curly is almost without comparison. Think about it for a second: the straight sighter is a visual cue that you need to see change in relation to the background. The curly is more of a small device which expands and contracts - giving you multiple visual cues which change in relation to each other (ie the individual curls). Thus one reason it's so darn effective at long distances.

I really need to produce a better visual aid to demonstrate this difference, but here' one from an older thread: