PATroutMan wrote:
When fishing with a standard indicator nymphing rig, what needs to be changed when switching to a dry fly during a hatch that starts? Do I need to completely change leader, tippet etc.? Or can the same rig be used for dry flies and nymphs?
I often fish a run with nymphs, and switch over to dries to cover rising fish in a pool. I do this pretty much all day, so I have to have a versatile rig that can easily be switched over in a minute or two.
I furl my own leaders and have a formula to step down for nymphing or dries. I can switch over very easily adding or trimming a section or two and tying a surgeons knot or two. My pet rig is a 10' 4wt rod to fish both dries and nymphs. But any rod you prefer will work.
The same quick change-overs can be done with a store-bought tapered leader. For fishing dries, try using a 9' 4x leader and add 2-3' of 5x as a tippet, giving you an 11-12' leader. For fishing small flies on a 6x rig, try tying 1' or so of 5x to your leader and tie in 2-3' of 6x as your tippet.
For nymphing, it's often best to use a longer tippet, one that's 2 times or so the water depth. So using the same 9' 4x leader as your base, add say 5 or 6' of 4x-5x to nymph fish. You can attach your indy close to the tippet knot and adjust it up and down depending on the water depth. If you choose to Euro or high-stick without an indy, add your sighter (bright-colored line of your choice) below the leader and above your tippet.
One thing to remember with the above rig for nymphing, it's not really necessary to turn over your fly on the cast, in fact the whole purpose of a tuck cast when nymphing, is to have the fly hit the water with slack to allow your fly to sink. So a longer tippet section may be more of a help than a hindrance.
A tippet ring on the end of your leader would work great for easy change-overs, making it easier to add, subtract or change tippet to/from your base leader.
Also, you may want to consider using a furled leader as your base leader, and change out tippets as described above.
One final point, it may be necessary to scale down your rig with shorter rods in smaller streams. I do the same thing as above, using a base leader, but scale down the whole rig (maybe us a 7.5' leader as my base) when fishing shorter rods in smaller streams.
Play around with you rigs to see how it casts and fishes. In no time you will develop your own formula to easily switch over your rigs.
And with a tweak here and there, you can nymph a run and quickly and easily switch over to dries to cover rising fish.
