Most Skagit-style spey setups these days involve a separate running line – the thinner diameter line behind the head that isn’t involved in casting, but allows mending and line control and a ‘handle’ for you to pinch when you’re swinging your fly. We’ve written quite a bit about running lines here on the Deneki blog….
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running line
5 Ways to Avoid Tangles in Your Running Line
One of the most frustrating things about fishing with any kind of shooting head system (spey casting Skagit heads comes to mind) is the tangling that inevitably, occasionally, happens in your running line. You make what was otherwise a beautiful cast, it stops suddenly way short of its target, you say some bad words, and…
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RIO GripShooter Review
It looks like RIO has just changed the spey running line game with their new GripShooter line. It’s running line that combines Slickshooter with a PVC coated ‘handling’ section at one end. More details shortly – let’s start with the background. Background Spey and switch anglers who prefer mono running lines like them for a…
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Try a Mono Running Line on Your Switch Rod
If you’ve read many of the posts about spey fishing on our blog, you know that a lot of Deneki-folk prefer mono running lines on our two-handed rods. There’s a lot of personal preference in running line choice for sure. Mono running lines have some drawbacks – notably a bit of a learning curve in…
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Rotate Your Rod – Shooting Line
Last week we passed on a tip related to making longer spey casts with shooting heads – holding your loops in your top hand. For those of you who like to huck, we’re following that up today with another tidbit that helps with easier casts at longer distances. This one comes from the world of…
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Pinch Loops in Your Top Hand
Your fearless editor spent last week fishing two-handed rods for steelhead and chinook salmon at BC West on the Dean River. We had a stellar group of folks at the lodge, including Michael White, Simms and Idylwilde rep for the Southern Rockies. Whitey gave up another nice spey casting tip during the week, and we…
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Try Some Rubber Tape!
At Alaska West and BC West, lots of our anglers fish spey rods. Most of the time we’re spey casting, we’re using Skagit-style heads. Skagit heads require running line between the head and the backing, and for easy casting and line handling, lots of folks prefer using mono running lines. One problem with mono running…
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Loops vs. Coils Demonstration
Hopefully we sort out the ‘loops versus coils’ thing today! We’ve run a couple of posts in the past about holding your running line when you’re spey fishing, and one tip that we’ve mentioned is to hold loops, not coils of running line – two posts that mention the topic are this one with 3…
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Running Line – Holding Loops
If you’re making long casts with a spey rod and a Skagit-style line system, you need to deal with loops of running line. Skagit heads are short but casts can be long, and shooting 50 feet or more of running line happens all the time. Unfortunately you can’t just strip all that line in and…
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Running Line Roundup
Running line from above Photo: Cameron Miller As you’ve probably noticed, since we do a lot of spey fishing for king salmon and steelhead at Alaska West and BC West, we play around with spey tackle a lot. Our team and most of our guests use Skagit-style line systems most of the time, and these…
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