If you’re swinging wet flies in a rocky river like the Dean, your fly is occasionally going to hang up. Flies snagged on wood can be difficult or impossible to remove, but flies snagged on a rock can really frequently be freed without ever leaving your spot.
The belly of your swinging fly line pulls steadily on your fly. As your fly comes around during the swing, if it hangs up on a rock it’s probably going to be on the side of the rock away from you, and downriver. The problem is that the force of the river current pulling on the fly line keeps the fly in place on the rock. The key to a quick and easy hook exit is to remove that pressure on the belly of the line. Here’s how!
- When your fly hangs up in mid-swing, make a roll cast that lands the head on the outside of the spot your fly has hung. This is critical – if your head lands inside the fly, you’re not going to be able to pull it free. Note that if you’re swinging with a tight line, you may need to pull off a couple of strips of running line before you make your roll cast, in order to shoot some line and get your head outside the snagged fly.
- As the head floats downriver outside the spot of your snagged fly, pull off another couple of long strips of line. You need enough line out that your head can be swept below the spot of the snag, still outside the fly.
- Once your head gets downriver of the snag, lift your rod hard, like doing a vertical hook set. Your running line will come tight against your head, and since your head is downriver of the fly, the force of the river will release the tension on the fly and pull it downriver. Voila – you’re free!
- Reel up some line (remember you stripped off a bunch). Take a step down so you don’t bury your fly into that same rock again. Keep fishing.
SAFETY ALERT: No fly is worth going for a swim in sketchy fast water. If your fly is snagged up in mellow shallow water and this method fails, fair enough – walk down and grab it. If it’s hung up in the meat of the swing, or if you have any doubt whatsoever about being able to retrieve it safely, just break it off and re-tie. You’ll be safer, and you’re much better off from a fishing standpoint to not tromp through the water you’re about to fish on a fly retrieval mission.
Dumb Question #151: What do you mean by “outside” or “inside”? I’m thinking that if the fly is hung up, there’s upstream or downstream; or, on my side of the fly or the far side of the fly, but I don’t understand outside vs inside! Thanks! Good tip, by the way.
Great tip on retrieving a stranded soldier! I thought I’d ad my two cents because this is a discussion I seam to have with guide clients all the time.
The “Down Stream Loop” method described above works really well in fast water. -Like most of the runs on the Dean. However, it has two drawbacks. First, if there is a steelhead resting downstream of your snagged fly it will more than likely be freaked out by the bright green candy cane of fly line coming at it. Second, if your fly finds the bottom in slow water, the loop method risks wrapping your sink-tip in the rocks making the situation worse.
In my experience, when an angler is struggling to free their fly, they simply haven’t stripped in enough slack to pull the fly free. Half the time just giving a few extra strips with pop the fly off the rock. If not, I try what I’ve come to call the “L” method of fly extraction. Once you’ve stripped really tight to the fly and are confident it won’t release, slowly raise your rod tip to 45 degrees off the water. At this point your rod should be very bent and pointed straight at your fly. Next, in one quick move push your rod tip forward two feet (towards the fly) -then quickly snap up three feet, much like your rod tip was drawing an L. The first move releases tension, the second move pops the fly free.
From my observations I would say this method works 80% of the time once you get the hang of it. I usually try it four or five times (maybe more with a nice intruder) before dropping line below the fly. All of this said, the “Downstream Loop” is indeed the most effective technique if the fly is really stuck.
-TL
Mark, not a dumb question at all!
By ‘outside’ I meant ‘further out into the river’, and by ‘inside’ I meant ‘closer to the bank’. Definitely could have been clearer!
Tom, fantastic next-level commentary as always. Thanks!