Non-tapered Leader?

[Mark Vickers]

A few days ago, I was reading a saltwater flyfishing magazine and saw two references to using straight monofilament as a leader. Essentially, instead of:
Flyline - Leader - Tippet - Fly

You just go:
Flyline - Monofilament - Fly

An ad for Ande suggested this as well as a tips article. It would greatly simplify things and be cheaper, but will it turn over flies very well? How would it work with lighter line vs. heavy line?

[Mad Mikey]

I can't tell you for sure but I suspect they are using short leaders on a sinking or sink tipped line where turn over is not as important as it would be fishing long leaders with a dry fly.
My steelhead set up for sink-tips has been one or two pieces of line and that's it.
Also, the salt water guys are not doing much false casting since they usually use shooting heads/lines and can punch it out with one good backcast and a double haul.

[Chromaflage]

Mad Mikey nailed it. For longer leaders, you want a taper to help turn the fly over, especially for tries and delecate presentations. For nymphing it's not all that important, as you're just chucking and lobbing, but even then tapered leader helps - to some extent helps minimize "wind knots" as well.

For shorter leaders and sinking tips, yup I use straight mono.

My .02

ORS

[Gizmo Man]

Generally, the small delicate flies need a tapered leader to transfer the power thru the line to turn the fly over at the end of the cast.

Large weighted flies or flies that are trolled where delicate casts are not needed lend themselves to straight mono.

To make a tapered leader use a 50-25-25 ratio. These are easy to make. If you want to end up with a 6# tippet, you use 25% 6#, 25% 8# and 50% 10 #.

I usually use a 9 or 10 foot rod with a matching leader length. So I just use the rod as my yard stick. I take half a rod of say 10# then half it and then take equal lengths of 8 and 6 to make the leader. Have been doing this for years and have not had any trouble with the flies or leader turning over.

Remember when using smaller (14, 16 and 18s) that the tippet is usually around 2 or 3# tippet.

When using sink tips or sinking lines, I usually run straight mono leader so that there are fewer knots to pick up weeds when retrieving.

Giz...

[greenbuttskunk]

quite often, I won't fish a tapered leader. Just straight mono. Uually it's when salmon fishing, or in salt water with a sink tip. like mentioned, it's not a technique to use if you are making alot of false casts. More appropriate for roll casting or the ol' chuck-n-duck.
GBS