basic nymhing techniquies and info

[EA88]

I've been fly fishing for 3 years now and just can't pick up the skill of nymphing or the techniquies of it and also im looking for info on techniquies well as indicators and wights and were to place them on the leader any info would be much appriceated

 

[afishinado]

Attached are some links to articles on nymphing to get you started. There’s a lot of info in there, but here’s the short version to get you started:

A 9’ leader tapered to 4 or 5x should work fine. Tie on a single nymph to the end of your leader. Place a Styrofoam strike indicator above the fly at 11/2 – 2 times the depth of the water. Make a cast quartering upstream. Keep as much line off the water as you can, and keep slack out of your line by raising you rod and following your line downstream. If the line begins to drift above or below the indicator and starts to drag it, flip the line in the opposite direction it is dragging to allow it to float naturally, this is called “mending”. If the fly does not reach the bottom after a couple of drifts, add a small split shot 6-8 inches above the fly. If the indicator stops or moves in any way, tighten up your line. It could be the bottom or it could be a fish. Cover all the water in front of you, move a few steps up or downstream and cast again. Move your indicator up or down if the depth of the water changes as you move, and add or remove split shot to and keep the fly near the bottom. If you don’t drag your fly and you keep your nymph close to the bottom – good things should happen. Good luck.


http://www.flyanglersonline.com/begin/101/part31.php

http://www.flyanglersonline.com/begin/101/part45.php

http://www.flyfishinggear.info/how_to/nymph_fishing.shtm

 

[bushwacker]

EA88, where are you located. I'm in lancaster. I'd be glad to wet a line with ya and help you with the basics. I'm no expert but I fish nymphs more than any other method and am usually successfull.

 

[EA88]

thanks but i live near pittsburgh

 

[wetnet]

Everyone has their own method and learning style but hat did it for me was a 3 colored line indicator between the leader and tippet. I don't use any other indicator. Use the same method that Afishinado mentioned but watch your line indicator. What I like about not using any other indicator is that this visable piece of colored thread will show you depth, hits that most won't show and it does not distract you by staring at a dot. (I get mesmerised) Cast upstream, hard to sink your nymph. Not a typical dry fishing cast. When I started out I just casted upstream let it drift by and at the end of the drift I set like I'm hooking up on a big one. Then I immediately send my nymph forward and down. (If that makes any sense). Not pretty but the goal is to effectively slap that nymph hard and deep. (Not something to practice and catch fish in wild trout waters) Then while not having any extra slack(You'll slowly figure this out by not dropping your arm after the cast) you follow the line indicator hopefully trying to keep it looking tight while allowing it to feel the bottom. You'll feel it catch on rocks and such but what you want is to keep it moving without slack, Arm extended to prevent any drag other than the current. To feel current pull and rocks grabbing your hook is a good thing. At the end of every drift not too far past the swing you set again (fish or not) to load your line to be able to send it forward and sink the nymph deep again. Repeat many times. It took me way too long but I am a real slow study.

I am always an advocate of a lesson it will totally help with the learning curve. As with anything instructors as well as students they can differ but a match can be a match worth paying for.

 

[riz]

if you want to get together some time, i'll be happy to take you to volant and show you some techniques.

 

[AlwaysWading]

It took me a bit of time to learn how to nymph fish. What I found is that I picked up the art of fishing with dries rather fast and can hold my own on most streams. But nymph fishing always seemed to be one of those, darn how the heck do you do this. Then I realized it was more lack of confidence than anything else. Now I can nymph under a dry, or an actual indicator, or by itself weighted or unweighted. For me, the more I simply entered the stream put on a nymph and caught a fish without thinking too much about it, the easier it became. Books are good methods of learning just as fishing with someone who nymph fishes well, but simply trying to nymph more and more times to build confidence can get you from point a to z. Go one step further, and tie a few nymphs on your own, then go catch a trout on one of them, thats a real confidence builder. One final note, no matter how good or not so good you may think you are, remember that spending time wading in a trout stream with a fly rod in your hand is something that simply can not be beat.

 

[DGC]

I am no no expert, but perhaps this will help:

I have heard from a few people that they just did not see how the fish could ignore split shot and still take a nymph. They really do, and often, and with greater confidence than a dry fly in many instances. Perhaps on ultra pressured streams would be an exception, but even there you can use weighted nymphs and longer leaders. So confidence to stay with it is important.

You absolutely never cast a weighted nymph rig (i.e. with split shot on the leader) like you do a dry fly. It is a good way to zing yourself in the back of the head. Roll casting is not possible, either.

You may want to expand the variety of nymphs you use, and also use smaller sizes, i.e., # 16 and smaller in many instances, unless the water is running high and/or murky.

A great learning tool is the dvd A Casting Approach to Nymphing Tactics, by Joe Humphreys.

Of course, an onstream lesson would be great as well.

 

[Edmo]

DGC wrote:
You absolutely never cast a weighted nymph rig (i.e. with split shot on the leader) like you do a dry fly. It is a good way to zing yourself in the back of the head. Roll casting is not possible, either.

I am no expert either but I don't think the above statement is true. I do both and especially roll casting...how else would I get the nymph into the proper position?

 

[trowpa]

I rollcast weighted nymphs too. Its not as easy of course, but sometimes its the only option given the surrounding trees, bushes, etc

 

[jayL]

Yeah, I fish em normally. I just open the loop and slow the stroke down and it works fine.

 

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[AlwaysWading]

I agree with the gents who mentioned they cast in a normal manner using weighted nymphs.

When I hit the Lake Erie tributaries and we shift to fly fishing with nymphs rather than an egg, we always use split shot. sometimes one, more times than not three or even four if I am in fast water.

I do not change anything in regard to style during those times. I roll cast and use my dry fly techniques just as if I were unweighted back here in the Lehigh Valley.

Of course reality it to each their own. Many of us learned particular techniques so it is what we use. I doubt any of us are right or wrong, we just use what we learned and what works for us.

 

[wetnet]

You can roll cast a nymph. If you add weight you can still sink your nymph using a standard cast. What you can't do with a typical cast is keep up with your slack as quickly. You will miss more fish that you never knew you had. A roll cast works as well but you need to be adept at keeping up with the drift without losing that fine connection. I do not use indicators anymore. I do not use split shot which would explain part of my technique that differs from yours. I do use weighted nymphs but they are not going to sink the same as a nymph with a bunch of split shot. I smack them down hard to get them to the bottom. Most times I get a hit early on and have sucess when I'm following the drift without dragging it. You seem to have a good place to start. It doesn't matter how you learn what but that you are open to learn more. The day I slapped a nymph into a plunge pool and immediately hooked up, first hit, first cast, I realized I had taken one more baby step forward. One of many.

 

[pcray1231]

I wish I was a better nympher than I am, but I'm getting there. These are my $.02, feel free to take or ignore whatever I say.

There are many ways to cast. You can cast just like a dry fly, and you can roll cast, and in certain situations those will work. I end up doing a lot of role casting actually. I found that most commonly I'm doing (or trying to do) a tuck cast, it just gets the nymph to the bottom more quickly. This is especially needed in fast, deep runs, because otherwise you're drift is pretty much over before the nymph even gets deep enough. Basically, the goal on this cast is to get your nymph to enter the water vertically and with power. I basically aim for a point 3 feet or so above the water and beyond the target, the cast straightens out in mid-air, and you stop it in mid-air, the nymph just dives and enters the water first.

A few pointers, try what you want to:

1. The closer the shot to the nymph the deeper it will go.
2. If you're not snagging up at least occasionally, you're not fishing deep enough. Add shot, move it closer to the nymph, change casts, but at least change something! A good nympher is constantly adjusting weight, leader, cast, etc. I like using weighted nymphs personally, its easier to change to a heavier or lighter fly than it is to change shot, at least for me.
3. A classic tapered leader is not necessary for most nymphing, most of the time it works against you. I go straight from my butt section to a long piece of 2x or 3x tippet, and follow it with 4x or 5x. Its very common for me to have 1 foot of butt, 7 feet of thick tippet, and maybe 1-2 feet of finer tippet. You need to open your cast, which means this is best on bigger water. But it lowers the resistance of your leader to the current, and you get a better drift with better sensitivity.
4. I've found I do better without indicators. There are exceptions, if distance casting is necessary an indicator helps, and those long slow pools of relatively constant depth.
5. When the trout fishing is slow, suckers are excellent practice.
6. 2 nymph rigs do work, but I don't recommend them until you start to do well with 1 nymph. They can just lead to tangles and frustration. If and when you decide to add a second nymph, I like the dropper method. The dropper line should be short (less than 4 inches) and a larger size (or at least stiffer material) than the line its attached to.
7. As a searching pattern between hatches, nothing beats a nymph below a dry.
8. During a hatch with rising fish, don't be afraid to fish an unweighted nymph near the surface, you might be shocked at the results.

 

[vern]

What PCRAY said.
If you have trouble with knowing what the tuck cast is, get Humphrey's Trout Tactics. The tuck cast is a Geo. Harvey fishing cast, and he taught it to Joe and Joe taught it to many others and many others continue to teach it. It works and should be learned.

Once you get the skill of the tuck cast down, both close up and distant, then you can work on tucking the cast left and right - in essence hook casting, which has great application fishing dries as well.

A Fly-O - Lee Wulff's indoor casting practice setup - or using some wind resistant yarn strung through the top section of a flyrod you don't especially care about - is good until you can practice outside. With the fly rod section and the yarn, tie a knot in the yarn at the end and you can practice tuck casting behind chairs, etc.

It transfers well to the real thing.

If it helps, when I bottom nymph, I generally use a two-finger rule: I use two small split shot - the smallest you can find - and secure the first one two finger widths above the fly; the second one just above this, to create a two-shot chain. This helps keeps the tippet from lining the fish, and keeps the fly rolling along the bottom.
I do this for sucker spawn and stoneflies, and others that I tuck cast - a la Geo. Harvey (J. Humphrey) - almost straight upstream and fish back down deaddrift If that weight isn't enough - and it generally isn't, except on the smallest flows, or slowest flows - I begin adding the weight above that two-shot chain that I need to counter the drag of the leader.

Also, keep in mind that "upstream" is relative to the flow of water you are fishing - not the stream relative to the bank. The flow of water in a pool goes is in every direction relative to the bank. The flow the fish are holding and feeding in is the one you want to fish.

Hope that helps.

Vern

 

[DGC]

Guess I will have to be in the minority on this one.

In dry fly casting you are forming a loop in the fly line and the energy of the line going out makes the nearly weightless dry fly follow. With several split shot on the leader, the opposite is the case, that is to say the weight on the leader makes the line follow.

That is why in the Humphreys video, for example, he suggests waiting until you feel the tug of the weighted fly and split shot on the backcast before applying the forward stroke.

Ultimately it makes no difference how we describe these casts to ourselves as long as we are getting the delivery we want. And frankly, the less you have to think about it and just "get-r-done,"
the better.

For someone struggling to make the transition from dry fly fishing to nymph fishing, however, I think it is helpful to look at the two as using different approaches to the casts.

Not looking to make a big deal out of this or get into a debate, as I appreciate there is often more than one path leading to the same destination.

Good luck, EA88

 

[vern]

DGC said:

"In dry fly casting you are forming a loop in the fly line and the energy of the line going out makes the nearly weightless dry fly follow. With several split shot on the leader, the opposite is the case, that is to say the weight on the leader makes the line follow."

Couldn't let this pass without a correction.
In fly casting, the weight of the fly line always carries the fly.

The role of split shot is to not to augment the casting at all. It is merely to offset the resistance of the leader and tippet to the energy of the water and current.
There are two forces that need to be overcome: the force of the water that resists being penetrated; and the force of the flow upon materials within it.
On cross section a flow of water has varying forces, depending on slope, volume (head), and texture of its conveyence (bed).
The goal of drifting a nymph is have a balance between the forces and the resistance to achieve an acceptable (to the intended quarry) drift speed.
The very small amount of weight provided by shot on a line can easily be carried by the weight of the fly line.
If the need is for truly heavy flies or rigging, this is why we use heavier fly lines - to carry heavier flies and rigging.
Other forms of casting depend on the weight of the terminal tackle to propel the line - bait casting and spincasting - not fly casting.

In dry fly fishing, the hackle and wings of the standard dry fly provide resistance. (That resistance can be greater than that exerted by the weight of shot on line.)
To overcome that resistance, stiffer leader and tippet material is needed.
Again the goal with dry fly fishing is to achieve an intended drift.
A very lightweight unhackled deer-hair beetle, or a hackle-less cylinder ant will not have the wind resistance, and will perform similarly to a rig that incorporates shot - in that at the end of the cast, the transfer of energy from the fly line down the leader will exceed that needed to achieve the distance and the fly will hook back on itself. To overcome this, adjustments to tippet or other casting adjustments can be made - such as check casting.

The proper rigging for dry fly or nymph fishing needs to be determined for each specific application.
As with any other presentation sport, the speed of the individual in achieving this balance comes with practice and experience.

It's a matter of physics, nothing personal.

Vern

 

[DGC]

Vern, no problem here I don't take stuff like this personally at all.

We will just have to agree to disagree this time around.

 

[vern]

I think I understand what you were presenting - either lobbing, the practice of nymphing very closely, in which the weight of the split shot is used, similar to what is done with any rod fishing close and generally used in bait fishing and nymph fishing; or in trying to explain what happens when the energy isn't dissipated as it transfers to the fly (dissipation occurs through wind resistance or the fly or length of leader) and results in the lob-like hooking of the tippet and or leader.

But especially for those new to fly casting, lobbing isn't fly casting.

If the flow one wants to fish is 30' or more distant, and the intent is to tuck cast - getting the nymph down into the water before the leader lands on the water surface and begins to pull, then the person needs to understand the difference.

A tuck cast is also very possible through a roll cast.

Again, nothing personal, just the physics.