[kmagnuss]

Hey guys. I just started fly fishing this past month. Picked up an old Ibbotson rod and Shakespere (sp) reel on eBay. Using some 3wf floating line with I think 6x leader and tippet.
Anyway...I've been fishing some local ponds and just having a great time. It's like I'm a little kid again.
Caught a mess of bluegills, a couple carp, and I had what I think was a decent smallmouth which broke my line unfortunately. It's not exactly hard to do with 3lb test tippet.

I have a question...what's a good technique to go from all the slack I have made in the line by stripping it in, to being able to use the reel's drag to help fight the monster bluegills?

Thanks everyone.

[Frank Whiton]

Here is a technique that has worked for me. Lets assume you are holding the rod in your right hand and you are reeling with the left hand. We have two parts of the loose line to deal with. The line coming from the guides and the line coming from the reel. First, take the line from the guide and place it under your forefinger. You can trap the line between the grip and your finger. There is a certain amount of feel involved and too much pressure will break your leader. You can now control the amount of loose line going under your forefinger to the guides. Now take the loose line going to the reel and put it up over your little pinky on your rod hand. This allows you to put some tension on the line going to the reel. Use you left hand to wind on the loose line and your little pinky finger on the rod hand to apply a little pressure to the line as it is wound onto the reel. So now you are winding the reel, controlling the line going to the fish and putting pressure on the line you are winding on the reel. A little practice and it works like a charm. When catching larger fish this method is not necessary unless you get a lot of loose line. If the fish is large enough to take out your line, the loose line is just feed to the fish until you are on the reel.

[BigCliff]

Welcome to the group! Those must be some monster bluegills to need drag to fight them. BTW, I think you'll find that 4x tippet will work just fine to catch those bluegills, you'll also be able to pull your fly free of more snags without snapping it off.

[kmagnuss]

Originally Posted by BigCliff

Welcome to the group! Those must be some monster bluegills to need drag to fight them. BTW, I think you'll find that 4x tippet will work just fine to catch those bluegills, you'll also be able to pull your fly free of more snags without snapping it off.

Ha ha...I wish the gills were big enough to require drag. It was the one 'assumed' smallmouth that I had on...had being the key word. The couple of carp I caught I didn't have the slack problem with because I was basically just sticking a fly in front of their faces.