Fly fishing with spinning gear

zack137z · Posted: Thu Nov 17, 2011 7:55 pm Post subject: Fly fishing with spinning gear

Alright, so around me the best river for trout is the Swift River south of Quabbin and I swear the damned things won't bite a Mepps/Vibrafox/Rooster tail, Thomas/Kraftmaster spoons or even trout dough powerbait on a hook. They seem to chase it for a few feet without biting then sit near the shore and silently ridicule me. Then my uncle told me about this "fly fishing" on my spinning rod, so I went to the awesome interweb to seek out information and I found pretty much this stuff:

http://www.openairlife.com/articles/fishing/83-fly-fishing-with-spinning-gear

I guess my question is, has anyone here tried this poor mans way of fly fishing? Thanks for any responses.

don51 · Posted: Fri Nov 18, 2011 1:10 pm Post subject:

The old float n fly. Been around forever! If you do not want to invest in a fly rod this will work in a pinch. If they are not hitting the metal then this allows an easy switch over to fly fishing with a very minimal investment. Bass Pro sells the floats Exclamation

dimes · Posted: Mon Nov 21, 2011 1:44 pm Post subject:

That's how I used to fish with flies as a kid - have a flyrod now. You can tie the flies either above or below the bubble. We used to have the bubble at the end of the line and 3 different flies on 1ft leaders tied off the main line above the bubble.
If I was to do it now, I'd probably have a rig set up like this: starting with nothing on the line I'd put the line(6lb mono) through a small swivel (not tied to it) then tie the end of the main line to the bubble or thread it through and onto another swivel. Now take some 4 or 5x tippet material (can be bought at any place that sells flyfishing gear) and tie a 3ft piece to the other side of the bubble either directly or via the 2nd swivel depending on what type of bubble you use. To the end of this tie what ever floating fly you want or a popper fly if you are targetting bluegills/bass. Now to the first swivel which should be free to slide up and down the main line you can tie a 1 to 2 ft piece of the same tippet material and to the end of that I'd tie a nymph of some sort - bead head caddis pupa or good old pheasant tail will work on most anything. So the nymph will work the first foot or two of the water column and will probably catch more fish than the popper on top as more often that not the fish is "called in" by the floating fly, but ends up hitting the underwater fly instead.

toolemera · Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 2:27 pm Post subject:

Though I'm just getting back into fishing now at age 59, I grew up on the NY state lakes and streams fishing trout... with Garcia Mitchell spinning gear.

For trout, a Mitchell 314 reel, ultralight Conolon rod. Trout fly and a small clear bobber with a few feet of transparent leader. It's all in using a rod with a very sensitive tip, what's called a salmon egg tip if you don't have an ultralight.

Essentially, the bobber provides the weight to get the fly out to where you want it to be. Let the rig drift to wherever. Use the tip gently to give the fly some life if the water is slack. If the water is running or there is a good breeze, you may not have to much beyond short gentle jerks to keep it all moving.

As for the poor man's option. Nah. The fish don't know the difference. Go out there with a light test line and an ultralight rod or salmon egg tip rod and enjoy. The reel is just to hold the line, whether it's a spinning, baitcast or fly reel.

There are more complex jigs that people put together and I'm sure they work. I tend to go for the most simple route to get to the fish.

happyhooker · Posted: Wed Feb 29, 2012 7:20 pm Post subject: fly fishing with a spinning rod

Zack

I have been using this rig for years and it works great. You can use this same rig using meal worms too. If you need a little more distance in your cast just put a little water in the float.

Good Luck
Ed

aka happyhooker