With a monofilament rig, you do not use a fly line at all. You cast small beadhead nymphs and use the weight of the fly or flies to pull light nylon monofilament and/or fluorocarbon along behind it. You may have a fly line buried deeper in the reel in case you want to use it for casting different types of flies. (George Daniel photo)
September 13, 2024
By George Daniel
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Today nothing’s safe from the polarization mentality currently plaguing our culture. You name it—politics, religion, gender, sports, sex, education, and just about anything else you can think of is affected. Even within fly fishing, people are gravitating toward opposing camps. I know this to be true because of my weekly inbox of fan mail from fly fishers across the country. And by fan mail, I mean my strongest critics accusing me of being the “modern-day Lucifer of fly fishing” because I dare to discuss the most profane tactic known today in fly fishing . . . monofilament rigs. These are tactics so dirty and repulsive that “our fly-fishing pioneers would turn over in their graves if they knew what you were preaching to your students.”
Such debates are nothing new. When I was in my early 20s I read Modern Streamers for Trophy Trout: New Techniques, Tactics, and Patterns (Countryman Press, 2004) by Bob Linsenman and Kelly Galloup
In those days, fly-fishing forums were the hotbeds of online angling interaction. I read countless comments from haters, claiming that fishing articulated streamers is no different than fishing a Rapala, or you might as well just use a spinning rod. Basically, the method worked so well that it was cheating.
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But you know what? Bob’s and Kelly’s streamer concepts revolutionized the streamer approach, developing both improved patterns and superior fishing tactics for targeting and connecting with trophy predatory fish. Time has passed since those days, and the haters either died off or started using the new flies. Most of the angling public simply realized this modern approach was too good to be ignored.
The line between fly fishing and spin fishing continues to narrow as fly fishing continues to borrow tools and tactics from the conventional fishing world. This essay is not to debate whether fishing with monofilament is right or wrong, but to share my ideas on why and when it works, along with tips for working with thinner line. I fully understand the arguments against mono rigs, but I do enjoy using modern advancements in fly fishing. At the very least, I like keep my options open.
Debating the ethics of mono rigs is just about as useful as any political debate—meaning not in the slightest. Who has the right to say whether a particular form or style of fishing is actually “fly fishing”? Certainly not me. If you act legally and without doing harm to the resource, go have fun. Take it or leave it, but I can see why more anglers are using mono rigs . . . they work!
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Thin to Win What is a mono rig? My definition involves replacing the fly line with a 35- to 40-foot section of nylon monofilament. Fluorocarbon is another option, but it’s more expensive and, unlike mono, it’s not available in such a variety of bright colors. I prefer bright mono just as I prefer bright fly lines, for the same reason: Clear or green mono is challenging to see on the water. My tippet is smaller-diameter nylon monofilament or fluorocarbon. I prefer the abrasion resistance of fluorocarbon for fishing streamers and nymphs.
Over the last few years I’ve adopted the “thin for the win” concept, not just for nymphing, but for streamers and even for some dry-fly situations. The idea is simple. Smaller-diameter lines and leaders create less surface drag and provide more natural presentations. While fishing dry flies, we’ve all seen how switching from one tippet diameter to a finer one often makes for a better drift and fools more fish. It’s the same principle whether your fly is on the surface or down deep. A thinner line has less surface area and is less affected by the current.
I know it’s challenging to think about casting flies without a traditional fly line, but with modern Euro rods, you’ll be amazed how little mass you need. I think today’s thin mono rigs are revolutionizing the sport in the same way that ultralight spinning tackle previously influenced the gear-fishing world. And playing fish on light tackle is fun!
I should point out that thin mono rigs are not my first choice when I’m targeting big fish or when I’m fishing large fly patterns. If I’m after 3- or 4-pound smallmouth bass, casting a 6-inch articulated streamer for big brown trout, or making 60-foot casts with a grasshopper pattern on a Western river, a heavier fly rod, line, and leader are better tools. However, for casting small to medium-sized nymphs for trout, mono rigs work great.
I am commonly asked, “How thin is too thin?” That’s a good question, and I think a logical response is: Always make sure the monofilament material replacing your fly line is several pounds stronger than your tippet. You want your rig’s weakest point to be the tippet, not the handling and fishing line.
You can use any fly rod with a mono rig, but actions with softer tips are best when casting light flies and thin rigs. Most fly rods are designed to cast a fly line, and trying to cast an ultralight nymphing rig with a fast-action rod creates frustration and likely an injured wrist.
A softer-action rod—for example a 2- or 3-weight, 10- or 11-foot Euro rod—is better when casting a light rig. These light-action rods can load with little mass, which makes casting ultralight rigs an easy task. Examples of rods in this category include the Orvis 10-foot 3-weight Helios , Echo Carbon XL 10-foot 3-weight , and Sage ESN 10-foot 6-inch 3-weight .
A full-cage reel is helpful when fishing thin mono rigs—these reels capture the thin line coming off the spool and prevent the monofilament from falling between the frame and the spool. Today these are often called Euro reels, but they have been around since the days of the 1912 Hardy Perfect or the old Pflueger Medalist. Examples of modern reels in this category include the Orvis Hydros Euro , Sage ESN , and Cheeky Sighter .
Reducing drag has always been a goal of trout fishers. One way to reduce drag is to use thinner line throughout your nymphing system. Thinner-diameter leaders and tippet help when dry-fly fishing as well. (George Daniel photo) Hand-Twist Retrieve One of the biggest challenges when fishing with monofilament is using your line hand to manipulate the thin mono. This is challenging for everyone at first. My suggestion is to start with thicker mono and progressively work down into smaller diameters.
Line management with thin mono is like any other fly-fishing skill—it takes time to develop. I practice line control while watching TV by stripping thin mono or using a hand-twist retrieve. With a little practice you’ll be surprised how well you’re able to manage mono with your line hand.
I don’t fish thin mono rigs during extreme cold snaps, when grabbing even a fly line is a challenge. I use thicker mono or a competition nymph line instead. But in warm weather I immediately switch to a thinner line system.
I use mono rigs with presentations and in water requiring slow line management. If I’m stripping streamers fast , thin mono is too challenging to grab, pull, release, and grab again. Mono rigs are challenging with any retrieve that involves grabbing and letting go of the line rapidly. This is why I use the hand-twist retrieve, which allows constant contact—once you grasp the line you never let go during the retrieve. The hand-twist requires practice but is one of the reasons I don’t have line management issues when fishing thin mono. It’s a retrieve worth learning. [Watch the video “Euro Jigging” on the Fly Fisherman YouTube channel or see it with “A Seductive Dance: How to Euro Jig Streamers” on flyfisherman.com for a detailed demonstration of the hand-twist retrieve.]
The most difficult part of managing mono is finding the mono after any cast. This is why I use the O-ring technique while casting any line, but especially mono. When you shoot line, form an “O” by touching the tip of your index finger to the tip of your thumb, and allow the line to fly through this circle as if it were an extra stripping guide. When the fly hits the target, you don’t need to find the line—it’s already in your hand. Lefty Kreh taught this technique for decades, especially for long casts at specific targets in salt water.
With mono rigs, the O-ring reduces running line tangles and gives you the ability to immediately start moving the fly the moment it’s in front of the target—all without taking your eyes off the fish. Whether in fresh or salt water, this technique always keeps the mono in your hand, allowing a seamless transition between casting and retrieving line.
Casting Light Flies Over the last few years my nymphs continue to get lighter and lighter. The early stages of Euro tactics involved chucking (and ducking) a lot of weight into the river, allow the heavy mass to anchor itself to the stream bottom, then dragging the heavy flies to move them. It’s still a viable tactic in certain conditions, but this dated version of Euro nymphing is no different than dragging a dry fly on the surface. Except for a handful of situations when intentionally dragging patterns creates more strikes—like during a caddis or salmonfly hatch—an active presentation usually repels more fish than it attracts.
A natural drift—with the fly moving the same direction and speed as the current—is more often a better approach, since this is how many aquatic insects move. To achieve this natural drift, it’s important to use lighter nymphs. By lighter, I mean the nymph should have enough weight to drop quickly into the strike zone, but still be light enough so the current will drift the nymph naturally downstream.
If you must add tension on the line to keep the nymphs moving or to keep them from hanging up, you’re likely using too much weight. This is why I usually fish just one small tungsten bead nymph in the slow to medium currents of my home waters. My most common choice is a size 16 hook with a 2.3 to 2.8mm tungsten bead.
I think some anglers get the wrong impression about the proper depths for nymphing. You don’t have to drag the bottom. Trout are not suckers—they don’t have subterminal mouths for feeding on the stream bottom. Of course, trout do occasionally feed like suckers, but much of their diet consists of insects drifting in the current in front of or above them.
This means your flies shouldn’t always be right on the stream bottom. Even when the trout are inactive, about 5 inches off the bottom is about right for drifting nymphs. If you’re constantly hanging up on the bottom and losing rigs, you’re likely fishing too deep or with a pattern that is too heavy. A big advantage of the thin-mono-light-nymph system is that nymph patterns will drift naturally and stay in the strike zone, but rarely snag the stream bottom. I consider it a bad day if I lose more than several nymphs during an outing.
When you are casting with a fly line, the mass of the line carries a relatively light or weightless fly. With a monofilament rig, you are using the weight of the fly to cast, and it pulls nearly weightless line along behind it. The thinner the mono you use, the easier it is to deliver small flies to a target. Thinner mono makes casting lightweight nymphs easier, not harder.
Thinner mono reduces drag, so it makes casting easier. It’s also more sensitive than thicker mono, for superior strike detection. Thicker mono has more mass and therefore tends to “insulate” you more from your tactile connection with the fish. This makes strike detection more difficult. The thinner the mono, the more obvious the strike will be.
While teaching nymphing tactics to my students, I’ve often had to remind them to set the hook when the line or sighter paused. I could see the strike, but my students failed to feel it. Most often, this was because they couldn’t—their Euro-style leaders were simply too thick.
There’s no guessing when a strike occurs while fishing thin mono systems: You either feel the strike or see a distinct jump in the line. In the past I’ve heard it said that a good nymph fisher can register 60 percent of strikes. With light mono rigs I would say it’s closer to 95 percent.
My nymphing formula is simple. I want my mono system to be thin and seamless, so there are no tapered sections and very few knotted connections. I start with 35 to 40 feet of green or yellow Pierre Sempe nylon ranging from 0.14 to 0.18mm. This soft nylon is highly visible and sensitive for fishing light nymphs. I connect this to the loop on my 3-weight fly line using a five- to seven-turn clinch knot. My fly line never sees the light of day when I’m nymphing with the mono rig, but stays on the reel in the event I need to need to cast a fly line. I’m always prepared for dry-fly fishing.
Then I use a three- or four-turn surgeon’s knot to attach a section of fluorocarbon tippet at least 3 feet long. Instead of traditional sighter materials, I now apply Scientific Anglers Indicator Markers to my tippet or nylon monofilament material to create a sighter. I use this sighter more as a depth gauge tool than for strike detection. If I’m frequently snagging bottom, I hold the sighter a little higher. If I’m not getting deep enough or occasionally feeling the bottom, I hold the sighter a little lower.
I want my mono system to be smooth, so knots are not hanging in the guides, which is why I use a long single section of mono instead of a tapered and/or knotted leader.
When fish aren’t chasing streamers, a mono rig helps deliver small, dense streamers deep into their territory. (George Daniel photo) Mono Streamers As previously mentioned, when I’m throwing big articulated streamers, or fish are chasing streamers in the shallows where I need to strip quickly, I use a fly line. When the trout are not chasing, you need to bring the fight to the fish.
A monofilament line allows a heavy streamer to drop quickly to the bottom. I use this approach when targeting large fish hunkered in the depths, as an effective way to keep my streamer moving slow and deep.
If switching gears to fish streamers, I store my thin nymphing rig on a spare spool or an Orvis Dropper Rig cartridge, and then attach my streamer mono rig to the fly line’s loop. My rigging philosophy for streamer fishing is similar to what I use for nymphing, with only a few tweaks.
With streamers, I prefer a monofilament with less stretch for better hook penetration. Streamer hooks are made of heavier wire than nymph hooks, and require greater force to penetrate. Softer nylon like Pierre Sempe stretches too much, causing a loss of energy during the hook-set. This stretch is not critical when you’re using ultrathin dry fly or nymph hooks, but you’ll notice it when streamer fishing.
For streamers, I use a section of 8- to 20-pound-test Maxima HV (High Visibility). It’s chartreuse and has little stretch. Maxima Chameleon is even stiffer, but many anglers have difficulty seeing it on the water. My tippet ranges from 4- to 15-pound-test fluorocarbon. I use the Scientific Anglers Indicator Markers with my streamer rigs, too, but again mostly to gauge depth. Strikes on streamers are often aggressive and easy to feel.
Deal with the Devil I must admit that mono rigs are my least favorite method of fly fishing. I often use mono rigs due to their effectiveness, but I still prefer the art and beauty of stretching out the fly line when conditions allow. There’s something beautiful and calming about directing a rope of fly line toward a rising trout or a tailing bonefish.
This is why I don’t teach mono rigs to my Penn State fly-fishing students who are enrolled in the basic fly-fishing course. I want them to be successful, but I also want them to learn the art of fly casting, along with the countless tactical advantages of using a weighted fly line versus a thin mono rig. Some beginning anglers may find mono rigs so effective that they stop improving their traditional fly-fishing skills. I teach fly-casting principles first, and the related fishing methods. I discuss mono rigs only once I know my students can properly cast a traditional fly line and make a variety of presentations.
For me, the joy of fly fishing is the multiple approaches our sport affords for catching fish. The mono rig is an amazing tool, but it’s only one of many. The more you learn about all methods, the more success and enjoyment you’ll experience when fly fishing. I don’t think mono rigs are proof we’ve sold our souls. They just offer another method for fishing pressured or challenging waters. Mono rigs are helpful for anyone wanting to catch a few more fish, but if you don’t want to fish that way, no one is going to force you.
George Daniel is the author of Nymph Fishing: New Angles, Tactics, and Techniques (Stackpole, 2018). He is a Fly Fisherman contributing editor and owner of Livin’ on the Fly , an educational/guide company in Pennsylvania. He was a coach for both the U.S. Youth Fly Fishing Team and Fly Fishing Team USA and is now the director of the Joe Humphreys Fly Fishing Program at Penn State University.
