Lighten Up

PMD’s and Yellow Sally’s were coming off. We were fishing to pods of risers. It was the first true dry fly hatch I had fished this year and it took some adjusting to. Having fished streamers with 2x all winter, punctuated by working on my strip set for a trip to the salt, my hands were heavy.

Big fish were looking up and I broke off the first three I hooked. A variety of excuses and rationalizations could be made but the lesson was clear. I needed to better protect the 4x tippet I was fishing. So I switched to 3x. This was a band-aid for being heavy handed and reefing on fish like it was a tug of war contest. But I also believe in fishing the heaviest tippet you can get away with. It worked.