Last season I tinkered with silk and furled leaders - the latter from Phoenix and the former from Terenzio. These are about 7' long and attach to the end of your fly line with a loop. A tippet then goes on the end of them. I was using tippet from 3' to 6'.

Presentation was at times excellent, particularly on longer casts and the short tippet meant it was fairly easy to judge the positioning of the fly. They also let you cast with a couple of feet of leader only - you don't need to get down to the line.

This year the stream is smaller, clear as a bell and full of spooky juvenile fish. Even a fine silk leader seems to put them off if not landed absolutely correctly (which is most of the time for me).

Additionally, with the extreme difficulty of some of the casting a little more leader that 6' is needed to cope with the difference in current across the stream.

So I've stopped using them and put a tapered leader on. Eventually I'll tie a loop in the leader and fish a 3' tippet again.

On top of this, I felt that using leaders like this brings the effective line weight down - to exactly what I don't know but I guess something like 2 or 3 (from 5) on my rod. The line works the rod slightly better over shorter distances.

I'm unclear on the purpose of furled leaders/silk leaders now: thye seem to be line extensions as much as anything. Rather than attach a tippet to one of these leaders, why not knot it directly to the line?

I haven't finished experimenting yet, but with the extreme difficulty I'm having getting anywhere near a fish I may not or a while!

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Pretty much what I experienced, which is which I got rid of the Terenzio leaders to some poor unsuspecting..
I also experienced some pretty bad hingeing due to the weight of the leader I think. I went back to just plain shop bought ones, Frog's Hair and the turnover/hingeing disappeared. The lightness of the mono leader was also a relief to the heavy silk, especially when it got waterlogged. I tried hand-tied which were superior but I took too long to make them, and the knots were bulky and untidy. (Anyone want to buy 10 spools of Maxima and a blood knot tool?? )

Hey I think I crashed the site; I went in to edit a typo and it hung so restarted IE; when I reentered there was a Database error!

Steve - It was comments from you and Phil Bailey that got me thinking! I've got a spare silk leader if you need one.. :-)

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time to try a rod dibble 3.5' by the sound of it!

I used to use those (from Spidersplus) before the silk. Good, but also needs greasing or they sink and grip the water.. I think I'll stick with Frog's Hair for the time being.

Pom, I seem to remember a discussion where I put forward a 3' tippet theory. It would have worked fine on the river I was fishing at the time (and did). I also seem to remember putting forward a theory of clipping the hook off my flies. Until I winkle a fish out of the current stream all these theories can whirl around in my head!

I still use backwards flies though.. although my Roy Christie Reverse Parachute seems to sink like a stone. I must get a refund. The sinking gunk I used probably didn't help.

I have another theory though: the length of leader shold be related to your ability to present the fly at the end. This still pushes me towards shorter leaders of no more than 8'. And quite frankly the number of casts I make where the line tip is only a few feet from the fly makes me shudder.

Should one be making a decent cast most of the time with good line management (5' leader say) or a great cast one in ten to twenty (8'-10' leader)? I did the latter last week and had a follow from one of the stream's larger residents. Somewhere in the next fifteen minutes I lost the fly to bankside vegetation. It was a very rewarding 15 minutes from a technical casting sense, but maybe I should have landed a fly within my level of skill (and on the water, not the reeds) rather than trying to drop it within a few inches of a fish..

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i think your absolutly right in the length of the leader, it is so much about equip/ ability/ and conditions.If we are fishing dry fly on a small stream ( and lets face it what else would we be doing) then i dont think the fish gives a fig about the length of leader on the water, it just wants good presentation and no drag.

My total length of tippet is two lengths of 18'' nylon, thats 2.5'-3' of tippet on a 3.5' furled leader. The fly seems to go in the direction I am looking, it turns over ,and the fish seem to rise and bite the fly. So that seems a good result all round.
As for loosing flies in bankside vegatation, I often let the fly fall into the grass and pop it back on the water. As long as trout lie hard next to the bank I will do this and if I dont loose a few flies a year to herbage...... well i aint trying hard enough. The main thing is I get a couple of extra trout that casting to avoid the bank would either be short of the food lane, or create drag too quickly,, and therefore these fellows would carry on being ignored.
Lets face it at the end of the season its about the trout you caught not the flies you lost!

Which brings my to the back to front (right way round) fly. I thought by putting hackle and bulk at the business end it may shorten the odds of flies getting landing in the flora from getting snagged in there.( as well as all the other advantages of this fine fly style). Why are you carrying the wrong Gink? why would you want to sink a fly? I dont want to question your ethics but............

I Use a furled leader on the small streams, courtesy of Mr, T, (Steven) 5ft, furled leader and 4ft of tippet! Works a treat and providing you grease it up, it won't sink! Never tried a silk leader! But I've just acquired another silk line! It came on a reel I purchased from eBay. The silk line is dark brown in colour and it looks in perfect condition (Anyone have an idea of make) I've made a loop in the end of the line and whipped over it with tying thread! But do I varnish the thread or maybe put a spot of super glue on it? Help!

Thanks

M

I would be tempted to dip it in a flexible varnish: I can see superglue cracking fairly fast..

I still don't see a convincing reason for using furled or silk leaders: what is the thought behind adding an extra piece of rigging and making the set-up slightly more complex?

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marmalade,

I believe it is based mainly on increasing turnover, for perhaps heavily weighted nymphs, or bushy air-resistant flies, or turning over very long leaders. Most people use very short tippets (3-5') attached to the furled/silk leader, but it is said that it can turn over much longer tippets. When I used to fish stillwaters I used a 5' Airflo braided leader, and attached 12'-15' of level 5lb tippet, and that turned over (most of the time!). Though I'm not sure if it is much better than say a properly constructed hand tied leader such as those of Phil's.

Cheers