If you’re like us, and enjoy spey fishing for trout, you may have found it difficult to find the right spey line to match today’s trout-worthy switch and small spey rods.
The development of shorter skagit-style heads such as the Airflo Skagit Switch or Rio Max Short have made loading modern switch and short spey rods a breeze and have therefore made it into most trout-spey enthusiast’s arsenals (including ours!).
However, so far all skagit style heads designed for short two-handers have been just that, heads! In other words, a skagit head connected to a running line with a loop to loop connection. That’s great when swinging flies 30 plus feet away, but most trout anglers know that it’s not uncommon to catch trout at even shorter distances, causing the connection between skagit head and running line to rattle through your guides as you fish your fly.
That is, until now. Airflo’s new Streamer Switch is a fully integrated, skagit style, spey line, meaning the running line transitions smoothly into the skagit head. In other words, no more loops to hang up in the rod guides as you strip your fly past a piece of structure. The head section is also shorter than previous ‘switch’ lines to help better match today’s shorter switch rods.
Last summer, we were fortunate to cast some of the first prototypes of the Streamer Switch at Alaska West, and have been waiting impatiently for their release ever since. We plan on coming at you with a full review soon, but for now, we just couldn’t keep the secret any longer!
They have also brought out a line called the switch floater which seems to be an integrated rage head for shorter switch rods. I have tried the 270gr 4wt on a sage one 4116 with a 10ft trout polyleader. Just a brilliant line on this rod! Will try the streamer line next and look forward to your review
Also Stay tuned for Rio’s new Trout Max Short, an 11 foot belly developed specifically for trout fishing applications. We’ll do a shoot out this summer:)