Thread: flyline and leader

thought i'd try catching gills and crappie this year on a fly rod. bought a 9', 6wt. st croix rod and a pfleuger real from gander mtn. could use your help choosing the line, leader, and the best knot to splice them. thanks.

Originally Posted by dwaw

thought i'd try catching gills and crappie this year on a fly rod. bought a 9', 6wt. st croix rod and a pfleuger real from gander mtn. could use your help choosing the line, leader, and the best knot to splice them. thanks.

My first suggestion would be to take the outfit back to GM and have them put a line and leader on for you. In every fly shop I've ever been to, they will load the line (and backing) on the reel for free, as long as you buy the line there.

If you want to do it yourself, any basic fly fishing book or DVD will give you step-by-step instructions. LL Bean's FF Handbook (by Dave Whitlock) and Larry Dahlberg's Bass & Panfish DVD are excellent.

I'll say it again, though: I'd get GM or a local fly shop to do it for me. The difficult part of doing it yourself is getting the correct amount of backing on the reel. (The backing goes on first, then the flyline.). A shop can do this easily in just a few minutes.

Congrats on your new outfit. St. Croix and Pfleuger are a good combination.

Merry Christmas, DWAW!
6-weight is a bit stout for your purposes, but you can still have a good time with it as well as tame some nice bass with it.
I'd go with a straight-up WF-6-F line; don't spend a bunch of money on it - $40 or so is good! If it has a braided loop connector on the leader-end of it, good. If not, put one there. Then loop-to-loop the leader to it - 6 feet tapered to 8-pound or thereabouts should suffice. If there isn't a perfection loop on the butt-end of the leader, tie one there for loopoing to the braided connector on the line. Then tie around 1 1/2 feet of 8 or 6-pound mono to the end of the leader with a surgeon's knot (Double-overhand). That will give you some "extra" to tie flies to without overly shortening the tapered part of the leader.
Finally comes the hard part - waiting on spring!
Good luck!
Pete

thanks for the quick responses fellas. on the one hand Death says have GM do it. on the other hand Sneaky says (here's what you ask for) and do it yourself. let's see, have GM do it for me or bone up on my greek, translate what Sneaky said, and do it myself. sounds like i have all i need to make a decision. Merry christmas

I can't believe GM let you out the door without selling you a line and leader! :D

Seriously, though, I've loaded line, backing and leader on a couple of my outfits, but I've had Bass Pro or a local fly shop do most of them.

they did frisk me first and determined they'd have to wait on the rest. i think havin' them do it makes sense, at least until i learn the ropes a little bit. talk about "visions of surgar plums" can't wait til spring.

See if GM offers any beginning FF classes. My local Bass Pro has FREE classes almost monthly.

Next thing to buy, a heaping tackle box full of patience. Learn the basics and don't stray from them. You may get frustrated but if you stick with it it makes all the difference.

WF-6-F, If I remember right a 5x or 6x leader and pick a matching tippet. 6wt is a good one to learn on, too light a rod is hard to learn on, I know. I started with a 4wt and about broke it over my kneee I don't know how many times. I got a 7wt and learned quickly and was able to go to a smaller wt much easier.

I have used monofilament as a leader in the past and I have found I broke my leaders on fish way too much. I started going a lot lighter on my leader and this stopped but when I matched my tippet to my leader I never broke another leader.

And I will second the odea of a good 18" of tippet/line for the leader. It is a pain to tie on new tippets all the time if you start too short and lose a dozen in the bushes behind you on in your hat.

thanks for the input fish 4. i've re-read sneaky's post and your description and i think i need a visual reference for the pieces parts. its like going to a foreign restaraunt and trying to read the menu, w/o a picture i'm strugglin' big time. my plan though is, once i'm rigged up is to go out in the yard a practice getting my casting down and go from there.

If possible, get a casting lesson. It can save you years of frustration. At the very least, buy a good casting DVD.