spey casting

[Albertafisher]

Originally Posted by braggadoe

you'll need to get a 8 or 9 weight spey rod to match the lines. it will be overkill for alberta, but great to practice/learn with and perfect for salmon/steelhead.

My buddy practices spey casting on Wabamun lake with his 625g line and does quite well for pike. Ddafoe, if you have the opportunity, learning spey casting on still water is much easier than learning on moving water. Plus at Wabamun you have chances good of hooking a 20lb+ pike on the fly, so I would recommend learning at a place like that. Learning on moving water (although possible) can be a bit more frustrating because placing your anchor can be tricky.

The video series/youtube channels that helped me learn the basics of overhand and underhand spey casting were: Andrew Moy and Bill Lowe
As well, this video will show you a multitude of casts that you can achieve with a spey rod. But the basic ones I recommend starting off with are the single spey, double spey, snap T, and perry poke. Those four will cover your river right and river left.

[ddafoe]

Thanks for the help everyone! I figure once I get the casting down my primary target will be pike on the bow and reddeer river, down by tolman and morrin bridges.

[ddafoe]

Originally Posted by ddafoe

Thanks for the help everyone! I figure once I get the casting down my primary target will be pike on the bow and reddeer river, down by tolman and morrin bridges.

And then hopefully steelhead on the bulkley

[brettk.]

Originally Posted by ddafoe

And then hopefully steelhead on the bulkley

I will be moving to Terrace at the end of the month, new house is Skeena waterfront, feel free to drop me a line if your ever in the neighbourhood.

[CDone]

Originally Posted by brettk.

My apologies for the miss information, CDone is right, scandi and skagit do have a place in single handed rods, but rod lenght is all important. Typically you would look for a shooting head between 3 to 4 times rod lenght. This does not include any sink tip lenghts you may add to the line combo. So a 9' rod = somwhere in the neighbour hood of a 27' head. This is to allow proper loading of the rod. You would up size line for the 2 handed rods, 7 weight single will load effectivley with a 200-300 grain line but the 2 handed rod in 7 wt would require more like 400-650 grains to have proper loading. Good thread, I am becoming more interested in these single handed spey/skagit set ups.

I think the trap we all fall into is looking at those stupid AFTMA numbers on your fly rod. Not all 7wts, 6,5,4, ect wts are created equally. Some 5wts will cast a 7wt line quite well, while other 5wts will cast like a dog, the only real way to figure it out is to try different lines and see what works.

There is a push for North American line and rod manufactures to move to the grain weighting system like a lot of the European manufactures do for rod/line matching, it will definitely make it easier and hopefully much more consistent across the board.

Colin

[Albertafisher]

Originally Posted by CDone

There is a push for North American line and rod manufactures to move to the grain weighting system like a lot of the European manufactures do for rod/line matching, it will definitely make it easier and hopefully much more consistent across the board.

Colin

I hope they make grain recognition more pronounced in single handed rods. Saying 5wt can sometimes be too vague. That would make life much easier.

[ddafoe]

Originally Posted by brettk.

I will be moving to Terrace at the end of the month, new house is Skeena waterfront, feel free to drop me a line if your ever in the neighbourhood.

sounds good to me.

[grinr]

Originally Posted by CDone

There is a push for North American line and rod manufactures to move to the grain weighting system like a lot of the European manufactures do for rod/line matching, it will definitely make it easier and hopefully much more consistent across the board.

Colin

I really don't see it making any significant difference?I could care less if they want to call an AFTMA Standard 140gr 5wt a 130-150?
1)I already know that the 5wt designation is not carved in stone,it's some rod designer's opinion of what he thinks is the optimal load for that particular rod,and that opinion may differ from one caster to another?
2)Again,that can vary from one angler to another,casting style,fishing short or long distance,how much line one carries beyond the guides when false casting,and so on.Personally speaking,I'm more prone to underlining a rod,being accustomed to shooting for 80-90' swinging salmon wets or trout streamers and carrying a fair bit more than the AFTMA Standard 30' beyond the tip,ie;lining an 8wt rod with WF7.Conversely,if most of your trout fishing is small stream/short game where you rarely cast beyond 30-40' and even more rarely false cast 30',it's completely reasonable to overline a 5wt for example with a 6wt line IMHO.

I honestly think that changing from AFTMA and labelling a blank as a 130-150 instead of a 5wt would only cause more frustration and confusion for most casual anglers??Call a 5wt a 5wt,line it with 5wt line,and that's gonna work just fine for most people in most situations.As they gain experience and know what they want out of a rod/line combo,they can tweak it to match the conditions.
I vote for leaving the system thats worked for millions of anglers for many(?) decades as is,why try to fix what aint broken?

[ddafoe]

my new setups this year, including the new spey rig thanks to braggadoe.outdoorsmen1.jpg

[braggadoe]

right on!! watch the videos. get it rigged up, head down to the river, and start booming out huge casts with super tight loops.


the chicks dig it!!!