[P2] A Recipe for a Consistent Trout Spey Cast

Learning a Spey cast is a journey, as anglers try to improve their cast.  After gaining proficiency at the elements of the cast it is time to begin the process of improving the cast, which will require some attention to detail.  In this blog entry, I describe my journey to consistency and my own personal approach to improving consistency.  I do this to provide other anglers with motivation and ideas for how to make their casting more consistent.

Rick Williams, my casting coach, noted that my line wasn't laying out straight, which was something I had noticed but didn't worry about.  Rick explained it meant my rod tip wasn't traveling a straight path.  I wasn't sure why that was nor how it might be fixed, but I began to notice it.

On a fishing trip to the Salmon River near Stanley, ID, a beautiful place to fish, my buddy Joe took a video of my cast.  In the video, you can see I indicate the cast hooked to the left.  The cause is my hands are too far outside my body and then pulled back into my body during the cast.  This results in an odd casting plane and a rod tip that doesn't track straight.  The odd plane causes a loss of power, but my hands were working well enough I had plenty of power for this cast.  My bottom hand is pulling to the left faster than my top hand, causing the rod tip to travel to the right compared with the direction of the line, resulting in a hook.

Before I started using a trout Spey, there were only a few days a year to work on the kinks, which was not enough time.  After I started using a trout Spey, I was fishing with it several times a week, providing plenty of time to fix my cast.  Now, how do I use that time to make my cast consistent.

I began with trying to straighten out my cast.  If I didn't set up consistently every time then it seemed reasonable that my cast would not be consistent.  Here is how I tackled it.  I was fishing Pyramid Lake on a bluebird day -- no clouds, not a scintilla of breeze, clear water, and lockjaw Lahanton Cutthroat Trout.  Boring.  

The rest of the narrative will be talking from the point of view of casts with the right hand in the top position on the grip.  If I was going to check my cast for straight then it made sense to be certain of the target line.  To be consistent, I decided to explicitly point my right foot at a target on the far bank. I put my left foot a few inches behind that to lock my hips and eliminate rotation.  Now my body and brain know exactly where I am aiming.

After I made the cast, I lined up the butt of the rod with my right foot so that the tip of my rod was pointed at the intended target.  The cast actually went about 20 degrees left of my target line.  Hmmm.  That surprised me.  I tried it again and the same result.  My hands were still coming from the outside and across my body.  This meant my alignment would be poor, my D-loop would not have time to form well, and I was losing power as my fire direction was different than the direction of the loop energy.  OK then.  I had something to work on.

After a couple of hours of working at the consistency of my alignment, my cast began to straighten out.  More remarkably, my loop tightened up, my line speed increased, and I had more distance.  Just like that my casting outcome was much better because my alignment was better.  

Over the next few weeks, I made a number of small changes and my casting continued to improve.  I'll not go through all of those details but rather will describe my current process for cast consistency.

*  Do not hurry.  Many Spey casting problems are caused by going too fast.  All the good casters I've spoken with deliberately slow down when they are starting to struggle.  

*  Consistent Stance: Right foot point at the target to make sure the brain and body are in harmony.  Move left foot slightly behind to prevent turning.  

*  Keeping the hands in the box.  Some wag once said Ed Ward could cast in a phone booth.  This is key to consistency as the more precise the motions, the easier it is to keep them consistent.  I'll discuss anchor set consistency shortly but now the challenge is to sweep consistently while keeping my hands in the box.  At the end of the sweep, my hands need to be in a good firing position -- there are several videos and books to help and a few recommendations can be found here.  Breaking this down into parts:

1. Make sure the rod tip is on the water after the anchor set every single time.  Not on the water one time and a foot above the water next time.  Every single time it is on the water at the end of the anchor set.
2. The top hand should grip the rod handle lightly if at all and the bottom hand should be holding the knob.  As a reminder, this is my checklist and yours may be different.  The rod must be held lightly to allow the hands and rod to work together to make a good cast.  
3. The hands are crossed at the end of the anchor set.  Tom Larimer has a different set of ideas worthy of consideration.  I'll describe my approach but be aware that Larimer has some ideas for fixing the problem of a blown anchor that can hound a caster using these shorter lines.  Whatever your approach make sure to be in the position consistently every time.
4. I focus on starting my sweep with my right hand, the left-hand remains in place until the rod passes the middle of my body.  This is a marker for me.  As my right-hand aligns with my foot -- the point at which my rod has passed my target line -- my left-hand motion of push out and help with the rod tip path begins.  
5. My elbow stays tight to my body but I lift it up as needed for the casting demands.  My elbow does not fly away from my body.  
6. At this point, my left-hand and right-hand are moving smoothly into the firing position.  My left hand will be in the middle of the body and right hand is in the phone booth close to my shoulder.
7. If everything has gone well, an easy pull with the bottom hand will shoot line out at a remarkable speed.  It takes a while to get used to this much line speed with so little effort by the bottom hand.  

*Check the outcome.  Were there problems with the cast?  Was it noisy?  Did you blow the anchor?  Was it straight?  Was it low energy?  If there were problems, try to understand what went wrong and work correction into your casting routine.

Videos of your cast will help diagnose and correct faults.  Part of the self-diagnosis is to learn the common problems and their causes in order to find your markers to make consistent casts.  As your consistency increases, your results improve and you will be able to recover from a casting funk more quickly.

I hope this helps.  Good luck out there.  

[P2] Two-Handed Casting for Stillwater

The Agony and The Ecstasy would be a good title for a Spey Casting movie, as an aspiring Spey Caster must overcome the mechanical challenges of making a cast and the configuration challenges of matching the line to the rod's capability, all in the context of some fishing scenario.  Some of these issues were discussed in a pair of blogs posted here and here.  It can be frustrating putting that first Spey system together and sometimes even the shops get it wrong.  It can also be frustrating to put a cast together because of all the parts and their interdependence.  But when it all comes together and you launch that cast straight, true, and fast to the target the ecstasy is unbelievable, making the agony of learning it worthwhile.

I'll also note that a coach can be of great assistance to help you get started.   Clubs, local fly shops, Spey Claves are all possibilities for finding help to get going.

A 22" Toad picked off with my 3-wt Meiser Trout Spey

There are innumerable resources (books and videos among them) to help an angler learn the art of Spey casting.  The people making them know much more than I do about Spey casting and if I made another one (ignoring the fact I'm not capable) it would not add to the discussion in a significant way. Rather than that, I'll identify resources that helped me and explain what lessons I took from them in my journey to become a better Spey caster.  

For experienced single-handed casters, learning to apply power with the bottom hand rather than the top hand is one of the greatest challenges.  This short video of my buddy illustrates the problem of pushing with the top hand -- when I took the video, my buddy thought his bottom hand was applying this power.

   

Needs More Bottom Hand Power

On stillwater, especially for beginners to two-handed casting, the Skagit Cast is a good starting place, which is what will be covered in this post.

The four parts of the Skagit Cast are the lift, anchor set, sweep, and fire, which are performed smoothly one after another.  If some of these terms are strange, one of my blogs explains the terminology of Spey casting.

• Lift:  Breaks the tension of the line on the water and raises sink tips and heavy flies, as needed, to prepare for the anchor set.
• Anchor Set:  The anchor must be set a rod length from the caster at an angle from 30 to 60 degrees depending upon the target line of the cast.  
• Sweep:  This motion loads the rod and makes a large D-loop to load the road for the cast.
• Fire:  This motion is a small pull with the bottom hand to load the road and launch the fly.  All Spey casts get to the same firing position.  

As we are talking about a trout Spey, we will let Joe Rotter provide a demonstration for us.  His web content (videos and blogs) provide useful information.  Joe doesn't talk about the lift but it is clear in his video.  His key piece of advice is slow down, which is a critical success factor for Spey casting.  Slowing down may be more important than applying power with the bottom hand for being a successful two-handed caster.

Dec Hogan explains the lift motion and tells us why it is important.  Moving water will make this different than the lift is on still water as the water current moving away provides an assist for the lift, which will not be the case in still water.  In a future blog, this will be discussed in more detail.

Simon Gawesworth demonstrates a Snap-T anchor set.  There is much to say about this and in this short blog, we won't be able to cover it.  In another section about consistency, we will come back to it. For now, notice the anchor is set about a one-rod length away from the caster and an angle of about 45 degrees to the intended target line.  For stillwater, I've modified this anchor set.  In moving water the cast changes the direction of the fly from Simon's left shoulder to in front of him.  In stillwater we often cast right back in the same direction.  This difference changes the anchor set motion, which will be covered in another blog.

Bob Gillespie provides some of the best advice you will ever see when he discusses the climbing curve on the sweep.  In a future blog, I will discuss consistency in more detail but for now, it is important to always start with the rod tip on the water and then gradually lift the tip (e.g. climbing curve) until the tip is in the firing position.
The sweep is executed in one plane and the fire in another plane as Ed Ward explains in the first minute of his video, which is a handy way to look at it.  The entirety of this video is a good explanation of the Skagit cast versus other forms of casting.

Simon Gawesworth (again) explains the firing position starting at about 830 in this video.  Critical in the firing position is to get the bottom hand away from your body so it has room to pull the butt of the rod for the cast.  If it is too close to the body then the caster is forced to push the rod away, and the result will be a high effort for a weak cast.

Useful References:
Jon Hazlett from Ashland Fly Shop (Youtube Videos)
Joe Rotter from Red's Fly Shop (Youtube Videos)
Tom Larimer (Youtube Videos)
Spey Casting by Simon Gawesworth does a great job of describing the dynamic activity of Spey Casting in book format.  Particularly valuable are his tips for troubleshooting problems with your casting.  

Two-Handed Spey Casting Techniques by Al Buhr another useful book reference for a Spey caster's library.  It is pricey but can be found used at a more reasonable price.

[P1] Why Use a Trout Spey on Stillwater

"Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after."
- Henry David Thoreau

By nature, people are curious and problem solvers.  Fly fishing provides us with the opportunity to satisfy our curiosity and to solve problems, which is a reason I was drawn to it.  My curiosity led me to a degree in math and physics, which then led me into aerospace where designing things that had never been built before was a way of life.  Then I retired.  What to do with the curiosity and engineering skills I have developed?  Fly fishing was my choice.  I think to one degree or another this describes all fly fishers -- they are curious about their quarry and they enjoy the challenge of catching that quarry with a fly rod.  

Two Ruby Mountain Fly Fishers at Pyramid Lake's Pelican Rock

As an example, I was fishing in Pyramid Lake when a character next to me was catching nearly all the fish.  As I often quip, the best place to fish Pyramid Lake is on either side of me but this was ridiculous.  He was using a typical Pyramid Lake rig -- sinking line, weighted leech on the bottom, and a Pyramid Lake Beetle on a 9" stinger about 18" above the beech.  I was tossing a balanced leech about 8' under an indicator with my 6-wt switch rod.   

My first thought was how can I duplicate that fishing technique with a small Spey.  Well, it is not so easy.  To be honest, I don't have a solution as I write this, but when I work it out there will be a blog entry.  I do know that all the knots common to swinging flies with two-handed rods, for which the gear was designed, does not work well on lakes.  We need something different.  The integrated lines that could work are designed for a single-handed rod and thus don't have the tapers necessary for Spey casting.  So it goes.  What this all provides for me is an opportunity to scratch my creative/engineering urges by finding a suitable solution to this problem.  

For those who might not know, Pyramid Lake is home to trophy-sized Lahontan Cutthroat and in fact is the only place you can catch these magnificent fish that weigh over 20 pounds.  Pyramid Lake, located in the northwest corner of Nevada about 40 miles north of Reno, has a sand and gravel bottom with few snags.  Creative people have invented an entire ecosystem of techniques, flies, and even ladders with chairs on them for fishing this unique lake, illustrating the point.

Spey techniques, which can be used with either single-handed or two-handed rods, can provide the angler with more tools to tackle the various fishing situations we encounter.  Pyramid Lake is one.  Small reservoirs and ponds, with trophy-sized trout, are another. 

I may have buried my lead but that's OK.  Spey casting provides useful capabilities for stillwater situations.  Anglers who use them will be more successful.

• Spey casting keeps everything in front of the angler.  Commonly this is expressed as being able to cast with obstructions behind the angler.  This is true but they may not always be things on a bank.  In smaller ponds when fishing with other anglers, one must check behind them before casting in the traditional way to avoid hooking somebody, which interferes with the joy of fishing.  With a Spey cast, no worries, as all is in front of the angler.  No worries except for somebody else hooking you.  

Two Ruby Mountain Fly Fishers in Small Reservoir

• Change of direction.  Spey casts were designed to swing flies in a river.  With this technique, one casts between 45 and 90 degrees to the bank and then lets the fly drift in the current back to the bank.  Once the fly is at the bank (on the dangle in the jargon) the next cast is made back out into the river.  But changing direction can be useful for the fly fisher in Stillwater.  I was fishing in Wildhorse one spring.  I was using a single-handed rod but I can execute Spey casts with it.  I was fishing a leech under an indicator when a big guy porpoising along caught my eye.  It was off moving along to the right side of my little pontoon boat.  I made a single motion Spey cast to change my direction and put the leech out in front of that fish and began to strip it.  Fortune smiled on me as that bad boy came and got it.  Without the Spey cast, I probably would not have caught that fish.  
• Length.  As I mentioned in the Curses of the Long Cast, casting long can be a curse of Spey casting.  But it is nice to have the distance when you see a trout rising a ways from your boat.  If that distance isn't available, then the fish may move on before you have your boat maneuvered to a place to make the cast.  
• Practice.  The closest salmon/steelhead swinging water for me is a five-hour drive.  Using a trout Spey for fishing my local waters gives me a way to maintain and improve my two-handed casting skills, keeping me ready for that trip to a big river. 
• Fun.  Ed Ward, one of the Skagit masters, talks about fishing goals.  First, you want to catch fish; then you want to catch lots of fish; then you want to catch bit fish; then you want to catch lots of big fish.  After this journey, Ed discovered it wasn't catching the fish he was after.  He now says he wants to be out fishing, as long as it is with a two-handed rod.  That is the deal that makes the challenge of mastering a two-handed rod worthwhile.  

[BL] Lines for Lake Fishing With Two-Handed Rods (Email to Joe Doucette)

In the blog introducing The Terms of Spey some criteria for choosing a line for your two-handed rod were discussed.  In a recent email to my buddy Joe, I discussed line selection and rigging for configuring a two-handed system for flip and strip presentations at Pyramid Lake.  The material is useful enough to add here.

H/T to Rio and Airflo from which I've captured content.

Cliff Helped Me Land This Nice Lahontan Cutthroat

At Pyramid Lake last week a guy fishing to my left, caught more fish than the rest of us along the beach combined.  He was fishing from a chair, using a single-handed rig with a full sinking line, a weighted leach on the bottom, and about 18" above that a white Pyramid Lake Beetle.  We were fishing below the Marina where there is no distinct drop-off and he was tossing his line out there a good piece and bumping the bottom coming back in.  I fished that place with my boat and a locator, as luck would have it, back in September and have a sense of the bottom.  It is around 13' deep where he was fishing and we can't easily get that deep with fixed indicators.  Slip n Strike indicators tend to slip quite a bit when one tries to throw it that far, making them not a good option.  Plus these tools fish at a fixed depth and with his rig he was fishing about a foot above the bottom wherever his flies were.  I wondered if there was a way to do this with a two-handed rod and line system.

    After a few days of exploring this question, I had a duh moment.  I was looking everywhere for integrated sinking head Spey lines.  The ONLY sinking Spey heads I found were for loop-to-loop connections with running line and for our lake fishing that is not acceptable.  Finally, I asked Bob Meiser for his recommendation and he suggested the single-handed Rio InTouch Outbound line.  I made a short search on the Rio website and there they were.  Well, duh.

    Sinking Scandi Profile:  The Rio InTouch Deep series is what we want.  No tip required.  I'd use a short PolyLeader 5'-7'appropriate to target fish.  Trout (e.g. 12 lbs) for local waters and Steelhead (e.g. 24 lbs) for Pyramid.  To that, I would tie a 3-4' piece of 0x or 1x tippet and tie the stinger above that about 18".  I've tested some of this but not the entire rig.  I do think it would work fine.

Image from Rio website (click to enlarge)

    Sinking Skagit Profile:  The Rio InTouch Outbound series will do the trick.  Because of this taper, I'm pretty sure they would snatch a sinking tip to maybe T-11, depending upon the length of the rod, the weight of the line, and the ability of the caster.  There is a lot of fluidity in this rig.  I'd want to work with it a bit and plan to build one of these for Pyramid Lake.  I will do that on my Meiser Pyramid Lake rod, which I won't have until early next year.

Image from Rio website (click to enlarge)

     Note:  Both of these lines are designed for a single-handed rod and it is important to match the grain window to the Spey rod.  Also, the line weight distribution is not the best for a Spey cast; they will do it but not happily.  But these lines will throw a fly a long distance with a two-hand overhead cast.

Links:
    Rio InTouch Deep sinks at 3-4"/sec.  Also in the series are Deeps 5, 6,& 7.  Clearly a nice selection for building something to drag streamers and such around our lakes.  These are not going to lift big, heavy bugs nor tips.  Don't bother with that but they will take any normal leech or thing we tie in fly class down to a decent depth.

    Rio InTouch Outbound:  All the different configurations are mentioned in the comment section.  This is a Skagit Taper but I'd not recommend beginning casters use 10' sinking tips on it.  

    Airflo Polyleader:   As near as I can tell, Airflo has an edge on the number of different PolyLeader configurations as compared with Rio's Versitip.  I haven't really explored this yet, having used mostly PolyLeaders when I'm headed in this direction.  Both are used in lieu of tapered leaders and provide more flexibility for configuring swinging fly rigs or lake dredging rigs.  I'm still investigating all of this and can hardly wait for ice off to return to this effort.

Image from Airflo USA website (click to enlarge)

    The other challenge is to match the grain weight of the single-handed line to the grain weight of our rods.  For single-handed rods, they should come right across -- a 5-wt line fits a 5-wt rod.  For two-handed rods, one must match the grain weights.  It varies by rods.  Sometimes one adds 2 to the two-handed rod weight and sometimes one adds 3 to the two-handed rod weight.  It depends upon the rod's grain window and taper, and caster skill and preference.  Go heavier with new casters or people who like the feel of deep loading.  An experienced caster who pays attention can figure out what they want.

[BL] The Curses of the Long Cast

Joe Rotter, Chief Blogger for Red's Fly Shop, talks about the curse of the long cast -- the ability to cast all the way across the river without catching fish.   The point he makes is the caster must know when and where to throw big bombs.  No doubt the big cast will reach the fish if they are on the other side but if the fish are a few feet from an angler's boots few will be caught in the flow on the other side of the river.

Cattle Guard at Pyramid Lake

Before talking about another Curse of the Long Cast, it is worth noting Rotter's curse applies to stillwater fishing as well.  Pyramid Lake is a few miles across and nobody will be casting across it anytime soon but casting there is about reaching the seams from the banks.  While fishing Cattle Guard we were bombing casts as far as we could as the Lahontan Cutthroat Trout (LCT) had moved to deeper water, as the water was clear and the lake glass flat with no wind.

Dusk began to fall and a light breeze came up and we kept bombing, despite the fact we had only a couple of grabs all day.  In desperation, as it was nearly dark, I started casting short and in a few casts caught a 27" LCT.   Were they tighter to the bank than we were fishing?  Don't know.  Could be.  Or they could have moved in as it became dark.  For sure I would not have caught that fish if I kept bombing casts.

What about the other curse?  Making long, smooth, two-handed casts is satisfying and encourages anglers to cast further.  The far bank on a river may limit a Spey caster's desire to cast longer by the practicality such a cast is in a tree or shrub on the far side.  With lakes that are miles wide, there is no limit on the length of the cast.  Absent discipline, anglers will suffer the curse of trying to cast further than their ability to do it.

Little will destroy a Spey caster's form and timing more quickly than trying to cast too far.  When fishing is slow, don't give in to the temptation of filling time by seeing how far you can cast.  Rather, work at the consistency of your casting and distance will follow.  Another blog will cover this topic.

[P2} Configuring a Trout Spey for Stillwater

So you are ready for a Trout Spey but wonder how to configure it.  A blog about Spey terminology gives a few clues about the method of configuring a Trout Spey.  This post develops an example of the configuration process (as I do it) for a Trout Spey.  I'll use the Redington Hydrogen Trout Spey for the example as I own one and use it for trout fishing on local reservoirs.

Selecting Trout Spey Weight

The first question is how big are the fish we hope to catch.  South Fork Reservoir, located near Elko, NV in the NE corner of the state is a common destination for local fly fishers.  The water record for a rainbow is 9-lbs, 2-oz.  Divide that by 2 and the maximum sized Trout Spey would be a 4-wt but most fish will be smaller and a 3-wt Trout Spey will be the right size for the majority of fish caught.

Estimating Grain Window

That settles that.  Next is to find a line configuration that works with the 3-wt Redington Trout Spey.  According to their website, "Recommended Skagit Grains: 250-275 Scandi Grains: 200-225".  We need to be a bit careful in our selection and let's start with an estimation of the grain window for this rod.  Most rods cast Scandi lines well when they are a little above the grain window, making 180 grains a good estimate for the low end of the window.  Similarly, rods perform well with Skagit lines that are near the midpoint of the grain window and so we can estimate 320 grains for the high end.  From 180 grains (low end) to 250 grains (middle) is 70 grains.  The top end was calculated by adding 70 grains to 250 grains.  That is the end of the math.

For selecting our line we will keep it between 180 and 320 grains.

Selecting The Line

When fishing on lakes, reservoirs, and ponds anglers will often strip most of the line into the rod.  Therefore, a shorter, integrated line is a good selection.  About integrated lines, one can purchase Spey line components (e.g. running line, head, and tip if any) and connect them together.  These are loop-to-loop connections that must be stripped into the rod when stripping most of the line into the rod.  By experience, I know this doesn't work well.  An integrated line is delivered in one piece and doesn't have the knots.  The disadvantage of integrated lines is they are less flexible.  But for lakes and reservoirs, the benefits of an integrated line outweigh this drawback.

As the rod is 11'3" the optimal length for a line will be 2 to 2.5 times the length of the rod or 22 to 27 feet.  Now we will select lines with the constraints of length and grain weight.

Many companies make good lines but for this exercise, we select a line from Rio.

Scandi Line

Needing no tip, the Scandi Line is simpler to select.  Looking at the Rio Website we see a line called the In Touch Trout Spey, which has a 22' head.  It is a bit short but it will cast OK.  The 2-wt comes in at 230 grains, which is a bit above the manufacturer's recommended grain window, but only a little.  It would be best to test cast this line before buying it.  The 3-wt comes in at 265 grains and it should also work, especially as the line is relatively short compared with the rod length.  I chose the 3-wt for the Hyrdrogen and it casts just fine.

Skagit Line

Skagit Lines require a tip.  The total weight of the Skagit head and Tip must fit within the grain window of the rod.  Rio recommends a T8 tip with their lighter lines.  Now, what is a T8 tip you might ask?  The T stands for titanium casing, which makes them sink more quickly.  But we want a floating tip.  That is OK those are made with floating material even though they have a T-designation.  The 8 indicates the number of grains per foot the tip weighs.  In this case, Rio tips come in 10' lengths and so it would be 80 grains.
With a grain window for the head up to 320, we can select a Skagit head up to 240 grains (320-80).  Rio's 2-wt Skagit head comes in at 225 grains and the 3-wt at 275 grains.  To be honest, I have tried a Skagit head on this rod nor have I read any of the reviews.  But if I were to buy a Skagit line from Rio it would the 225 grain head (2-wt) with a 10' T8 tip.
The total length of this line system is 15' for the head plus 10' for the tip -- a total of 25', which is a nice length for the line.
If I were seriously looking to purchase a Skagit head for this rod, I'd look to see what heads and tips are offered by other suppliers.

Chucker Line

The Rio Chucker Line also looks interesting.  It has a 25' head, a good length and offers 2-wt (225 gr) and 3-wt (275 grain) options.
Either of these lines should work well, which brings up a pair of interesting points.  First, this exercise illustrates the importance of using the grain windows to select the heads.  Second, given options for weight how do we select among them.  As a rule of thumb, beginning to intermediate casters will select the greater weight and more advanced casters will select the lighter weight.  Thus, if you are new to Spey Casting or aren't very experienced at it then the 3-wt Chucker line is a good choice.

Rod Balance

Lastly, one wants the rod to balance properly with the reel on it.  That means with the rod set up and the line in casting position, the rod will balance when your hand holds it at the point it will be when making a cast.  As I have the 3-wt rod I can tell you it balances well for me with a 7.5 oz reel.  The reel is a Redington Rise 9/10 with weight specified at 6.5 Oz but on the scale with the backing added it is 7.63 Oz.  Redington's Behemoth 7/8 Reel, which has adequate capacity for the line, should balance the rod.

There you are.  A Hydrogen 3-wt Trout Spey with the Behemoth 7/8 Reel will cast well with the Rio InTouch Trout Spey at 265 grains.  For my testing,  I used Redington's Rise 9/10 reel, which has far more line capacity than I need but the weight was what I needed.  

Summary

As you can see, the process of configuring your Spey is more complex than the one of picking a weight and match a line to that weight for a single-handed rod.  But fishing with a Trout Spey is just plain fun and worth the effort.  I'd encourage anglers to work with a local fly shop if they can.  If that's not possible find a guide or someone who can help you work through this maze a time or two.  If all else fails, leave a comment and I will do what I can to help. 

[P 1] The Terms of Spey

As a fly fisherman, I made a choice.  I’m more interested in the process of the sport than the product of the sport.  There are easier ways to catch trout than with a fly rod.

- Tom Larimer answering his question of why we should care about Trout Spey

[P1] refers to Part 1 of an outline or table of contents associated with a broad overview at a later time.  Stay tuned.

Big King on the Kitimat in BC, Canada

Introduction

When I found fly fishing in my 60s the vocabulary of the sport was overwhelming.  Tippet.  Leader.  Line Weights.  Rod Tapers.  Knots.  On and on it goes.  It took a while to navigate all of the vocabulary to figure out what it was I needed for different fishing scenarios.  But it is also true that an hour of casting instruction and a morning on the water with an experienced fly fisher is all someone needs to start catching fish with a fly rod.  Thus, it isn't very difficult to learn to fly fish but one can spend the rest of their life mastering this sport.  That is the fascination for me and it is what Tom Larimer was talking about.  

The terms of Spey we will examine are Spey, Skagit, Skandi, and anchor.  This discovery will start from the point of view of casting, and move to the rods and lines, which are the objects used to cast.  

Spey Casting

Traditional fly fishers are familiar with two forms of casting.  In the first one, plain old casting, the angler makes a backcast and then a forward cast.  If done properly the fly and the fly line remain in the air until the fly hits the water in front of the angler at (hopefully) the chosen spot.  The other one, which drives novice anglers crazy, is the roll cast in which a bit of line sits on the water while the angler makes a casting motion and the line launches to the target.

This short video demonstrates a roll cast and connects it with Spey casting.  A roll cast is useful for launching a fly to the trout when obstruction behind an angler prevents the use of the normal fly cast.  That is, a roll cast for fly fishers interested in the process is another means of delivering the fly, which can be used when the traditional fly cast does not work.

All Spey casts are a type of roll cast called a dynamic roll cast, designed to cast the fly further than possible with a traditional rod.  Spey casting and its associated gear were designed to reach places in a river that can't be reached otherwise.  Because an angler can cast further, they don't need to wade as far out into a river to reach spots, adding an element of safety.   The cast is called dynamic because the lines, rods, and techniques allow an angler to make a longer (e.g. more dynamic) cast than is possible with the traditional single-handed rod.

The word anchor is added to the vocabulary to talk about Spey casts.  An anchor is the position of the end of the fly line at the beginning of a forward cast.  With traditional fly casting the end of the fly line is in the air and hence it is an airborne anchor.  That makes sense, right?  For a traditional roll cast, the anchor will be beside or slightly in front of the angler and it is called a waterborne anchor.  Thus, there are two types of anchors in fly fishing and these are airborne for traditional fly casting and waterborne for roll casting.

Now we have Spey casts that fall into two broad categories of anchors, one is called sustained anchor and the other is called splash and go, terms descriptive of the casts.

Spey casts of all types have three components: the lift, the anchor set, and the fire.  The lift breaks the tension of the water in the line and starts the line moving.  The anchor set, which will define the type of cast, is used to place the anchor in position for the cast, and then the angler fires (e.g, executes a forward cast).  Two examples of sustained anchor Spey casts are the Double Spey and the Snap T.  The Snake Roll and Single Spey are examples of splash and go casts.  In this type of Spey cast, the line is aerialized, the tip of the line (e.g. anchor) is set in the right place, and then the angler executes the cast.

A Spey rod is not necessary for Spey casting -- any of these casts can be performed with a single-handed rod.  OPST makes a line of short heads specifically for one-handed Spey casting and has posted a number of YouTube videos demonstrating this product.  A single-handed rod can make Spey casts with standard fly lines.

The purpose here is to develop the terms of Spey but in a later blog, there will be some instruction, particularly the adaptation of these tools from moving water to stillwater.

Skagit, Skandi, and Spey Lines

We will discuss what these lines are, what they are used for, but first, we will discuss how to match the line to the fly or Spey rod and to do that we need to understand the parts of a fly line system.  The word system implies there are components to the line and indeed that is the case with Spey casting, which is another reason for the complexity of this subject.  To accomplish this we will start at the fly reel spool and work our way out to the fly.  The first thing that goes onto the reel is backing which provides an additional line in case an angler is lucky enough to hook a monster -- going into the backing is a thrilling moment.  Attached to the backing is running line or shooting line, both of which are finer than the head (next piece) and allow an angler to make longer casts.  Whether it is shooting line or running line it is attached to the head of the fly line.  For some types of lines or system,s a tipi is attached but this will not always be the case.  The head is the critical component for matching lines to rods.

Matching a two-handed line to a two-handed rod is an early puzzle that anglers new to two-handed casting encounter.  With a single-handed rod it is simple: put a 5-wt line on a 5-wt rod.  It is not that simple with Spey Lines.  Why is that?

All fly rods cast the weight of the line and rods are designed to cast a certain amount of weight.  With the single handed rod the higher the number the more weight it can cast.  Thus a 7-wt rod can cast a heavier line than a 5-wt line can.  But each rod also needs a certain amount of weight to load it properly.  Thus there is a window of weights that enable a rod to work well.

For a single-handed rod this is made simple as a standard 30' is measured and the weight of that 30' determines whether it is a 3-wt, 4-wt, 5-wt and so forth line.  Thus, the grain window and grain weight is encapsulated in the single number -- the weight of the fly rod and weight of the line.

But it is more complicated for a two-handed rod because heads can be as short as 10' or as long as 100'.  There are emerging systems for matching a line to a rod with a single number but that is not as definite as for a single-handed rod.  Better for the angler is to understand the system and that requires four pieces of data -- the length of the head, the weight of the head, the taper of the head, and the grain window of the rod.  It is not as bad as it sounds but it is a bit more complicated than it is for a single-handed rod.  In the section on rods, we will pick up this discussion.

Simone Gawesworth's Rule of Three provides rough equivalence between the weight of lines for a two-handed rod and a single-handed rod.  To convert a Spey line to a singled handed line weight add 3.  Thus, a 3-wt Trout Spey would be roughly equivalent to a 6-wt single handed rod.  Your 8-wt single-handed line should work on a 5-wt rod.

In his videos on the casts, Jon Hazelett mentions Scandi and Skagit lines.   Skagit Lines, named for the river in Washington, were designed to cast heavy flies on sink tips in a river with very little room behind the angler.  To meet these needs the heads are short 3-3x the rod length and must be used with some type of tip.  Skandi Lines, short for Scandinavia, are a bit longer and are designed to cast lighter flies, including dry flies.  Traditional Spey Lines casting started with line 80-100' in length that are cast all at one time.

Skagit Lines are a bit easier to cast that either a Scandi or a Spey Line.  Because they are designed to lift heavy flies and work with sink tips, they are an element of a very flexible fishing system.  I'll write more about this in a later blog entry.  Traditional Spey lines are more difficult to cast and a bit of a specialty.  This blog will concentrate on systems with Skagit and Scandi lines.

On Bob Meiser's website, you will find a good discussion of matching lines to rods (here and here), and how grain windows fit into the puzzle.

Spey, Switch and Trout Rods

These are generally characterized by weight, which will be covered shortly, and length.  There is no standard definition for these rods, leaving sales and marketing people to define them.  That is that.  

Spey rods are the longer rods (13-20 ft) that handle the heavier lines (8+ two-handed rod weight).  Switch rods, as the name implies, allow an angler to switch between two-handed and one-handed casting.  It should be noted that some switch rods are more Spey like and others are more single-handed like.  But, Switch rods are generally 10.5-12.5 ft in length and use line weights from 5 to 8.  Trout Spey rods are the smallest of the bunch and are 9.5 to 12 feet in length and use 2-5 wt lines.  

It should be noted that your skill and style as a two-handed caster will determine the best line configuration for the rod.  As one advances as an angler, the other pieces of data mentioned in the line segment will become more important in the configuration of systems.  

Configuring Your System

We are finally ready to talk about choosing your first Spey system, which won't be very difficult given what you now know.  If at all possible, I would recommend buying it from a local fly shop.  It is always best to work knowledgeable person nearby if you can do it.  If not, then a fly club or a guide would be of great assistance.  

The first question is how big are the fish you plan to catch?  In my area (NE corner of NV), the Ruby Marshes have trout 10-12 lbs, the local reservoirs of trout 2-5 pounds, and a Pyramid Lake cutthroat can go 20 lbs.  The first step is easy, divide the weight of the fish by 3 to get the size of the rod.  For the ruby Marshes a 3/4 weight would be a good choice; for the local reservoirs a 2/3 weight would be a good choice; for Pyramid Lake, a 6/7 weight is a good choice.  In the summer, I sometimes fish for salmon in Canada and have run into them to 30 lbs and for that, I use a 9 wt rod.  

See, that was pretty easy.  

If your rod is 2 to 5/6 weight a Trout Spey would be a good selection and if in the high end you might consider a Switch Rod.  If your rod is 5 to 8 weight then you will want a switch rod and if it is 8 weight and up you will want a Spey rod.    

Picking a line.  There are line selectors available at some of the line suppliers and also a Google with your rod and line recommendations will turn up ideas.  But generally, if you plan to fish deep or throw an indicator, or if you want flexibility in how deep you fish, pick a Skagit Line appropriate to the weight of your rod.  I would try to select a line that is 2-2.5 times the length of the rod.  If the fish might be spooky or if you plan to fish dry flies then a Scandi line is your choice and it should be 2.5-3 times the length of the rod.  

If you've selected a Skagit Line then there are tips to be selected to match the capability of the line.  That is too much to cover here but there are websites that will help with the selection of the tips.  There is one thing to be aware of, which can be difficult to check, the total weight of the Skagit Head plus the tip must fit within the grain window of the rod.  Often people ignore this and wind up with a head-tip combination that is too heavy for the rod, which makes casting more difficult and risks breaking the rod.  If you aren't sure how to match this up, find someone who knows and talk with them.  

Finally, you will need a reel to carry the line and there are three things to consider:  #1.  The reel needs enough capacity to hold the backing, running line, and head;  #2.  The reel must be sturdy enough for the gamefish you plan to catch.  I have had a big salmon bend a cheaper reel and that is terrible on a once-in-a-lifetime trip;  #3.  The reel needs to balance the rod.  What this means is when you hold the rod where you grip it with the top had to cast it should balance.  Neither the rod end nor the tip end should dip down.  This reduces fatigue and improves casting performance.

Good Luck.  I hope this advice helps.