For Publishing in the January 2025 BVFF Hackle Bender

Dave’s Strategy Session

by Dave Shuldes: shuldesd@gmail.com

The Back End of the Game

Among the many delights of fly fishing strategy are choosing where and when to fish, presentation of the fly, and landing a fish once hooked. Gear preparation is critical and it all starts with the front end – fly rod, line type, tippet selection, fly patterns, etc. The back end – reel, drag setting, and backing condition – is rarely on my priority list. Too often I consider the reel to mostly be a “line holder”, an oversight I recently came to regret.

On the front end I generally match the tippet to the size of fly – 6X for hook sizes 22 and smaller, 5X for sizes 16-20, 4X for sizes 10-14, 3X for size 8 or larger. I use nylon tippet for dries and fluorocarbon for nymphs and streamers. Anticipated size and weight of fish are another factor, but I rarely plan ahead on playing fish larger than 20 inches. A shout out to Cortland Ultra-Premium Fluorocarbon tippet as I find it has proven to have less risk of breaking off in smaller diameters – 5X and 4X in particular. I used to be big on use of 9-foot tapered leaders but these days the Airflo Polyleader in its various models, from the 6.5 and 8 ft. floating versions to the various sink rates, has allowed me to tie a single strand of tippet from the tippet ring to the fly. Less knots make for less potential weak points! This has improved my success in landing fish.

The “back end” has fewer nuances to it but it can become essential. As an example, I was fishing an alpine lake in the Pioneer mountains this past fall, targeting Arctic Grayling with good success. I was fishing a variation of a prince nymph pattern in size 10 with a red collar, 3mm olive tungsten bead, brown olive ice dub, olive goose biots and Krystal Flash in the tail. With this set up a floating line and leader was working well. The heavy beaded fly with 8 feet of 4X tippet was all I needed to gain plenty of depth. 16-18 inch grayling were finding it frequently and these fish were easy to play to the net.

Then, with my line already cast out, a long torpedo of a rainbow suddenly emerged into view, swimming directly toward me along the near shoreline. I carefully maneuvered my fly to be visible in front of the fish. Once it saw the fly there was no hesitation. Something I love about alpine lake’s clear water is we can often see it all happen right in front of us!

The initial run after the hook set took the fish a good 20 yards away where it leapt into the air. At that moment I had a memorable, spectacular look at the specimen. Next was a run toward the center of the relatively shallow lake like I have never experienced before. The line was quickly out into the backing and I started to tighten the drag. Here’s a tough decision… how much drag is too much? What setting will allow too much line to escape vs. creating too much torque, resulting in a broken knot or hook release? The tippet strength rating was definitely less than the fish weight, I thought, so I erred on the light side, relying on my backing length to hold out.

Then my lack of preparation came into play. With more than 50% of the backing off the reel, it reached a spot deep in the arbor where the backing had overlapped on itself. The increased resistance was just sudden enough and strong enough that the fish was able to pull itself away from the hook. My heart was beating a mile a minute and I was out of breath. I slowly reeled back in… leader, tippet, knots and fly were all still intact.

I later checked stocking records for that particular lake and learned that Troutlodge Triploid Rainbows had been stocked there 8 years prior in 2016. Whew… I’ll never forget this long-time resident who took advantage of my oversight in not checking my backing for a smooth release. Could I have salvaged a landing with a tighter drag setting? I’ll never know… but I’ve replayed it many times in my mind. That’s the experience of fly fishing. The fish that win the game can be the most memorable. In the meantime, I’ve been through my reels and re-wound the backing, and I’ll now be doing that with my main reel of intended use before each trip!