Furled Leader Tips

[Steve Smith]

I’m a furled leader fan for fishing dry flys… especially Blue Sky furled leaders. I don’t care for the furled leader for any fly meant to fish wet, but I can grease a furled leader and not slap it on the water’s surface. It just allows me to present a softer landing and float the fly high in the film. However, my biggest problem with the Blue Sky leaders is the tippet loop either spins shut or frays out or both. Blue Sky recommends a short piece of mono tied to the tippet loop for a loop to loop connection for the tippet to protect the fragile loop. That short loop to loop connector works, but it defeats the high floating capabilities of the leader and creates slap on the water’s surface. Feather Craft sells their brand furled leader with a tippet ring already woven in, but I prefer the Blue Sky leader design [Tippet rings are tiny stainless steel rings that can be used to connect a tippet to a leader]. Using the Feather Craft design, I took a length of 6 pound test Fire Line and sewed a tippet ring into place inside the furled leader’s tippet loop. Then I sealed the sewn ring in place with a light coat of Loon’s Knot Sense UV glue. Now, no extra weight, no line slap, and the tippet loop should last as long as the furled leader.

One other tip on furled leaders is how to get reverse twist out of the leader after pulling loose from a hang-up. If you get the leader hung, the stretched leader will reverse twist up into a nasty wad. First make sure you don’t have any wind knots formed, then just dry cast the leader a few times. The reverse twist will unwind itself. However, if you have the starting of a wind knot, dry casting will set that knot

[Flysmallie]

Interesting comments Steve. I've wanted to try a furled leader for some time now but haven't. Is it really that much better for fishing a dry?

Why not use them for a wet fly?

[Steve Smith]

I literally soak my furled leader threads in floatant so only the tippet would sink with an unweighted fly. I guess if the leader wasn't treated it might do fine. To be honest, I never tried it. That's not to say I don't fish a wooly with my furled leader... it's jusy not going to drift any deeper than the tippet length because the treated leader acts like a float. If I am fishing Taneycomo, I use a mono leader unless I'm dry fly fishing. I use a loop to loop connection line to leader, so switching between the furled and Mono only takes a few seconds.