Fishing droppers "newzealand style"

[alba]

Just a disscussion point, anyone fish there droppers like this? Any disadvantages to it, ie if your fishing a dry with you point fly attached to it this way will it make the dry sit different in the water?

I fish my droppers like this quite alot, especially on windy days, had good success aswell.

[Harpo]

Yeah I use it a lot, find it a really good way of "searching" the water, especially in a no rise situation. Also find it easier than using a dropper (mainly coz i'm crap at tieing them!)
And if you want to just fish a dry you take of the Nymph and your ready to go.
I only use it with emerger style dry flies, Klinks, DHE's etc and the extra weight of the Nymph hanging from the hook bend makes the emerger sit really low in the water which is what you want.

I find it the best way to detect fish taking the Nymph as the the dry sinks very obviously.
Just watch how heavy your Nypmh is or you'll sink your dry.

I'm sure it'll work a treat on the river that you've been posting about

[Wildfisher]

I use it all the time. Usually a klink with a nymph below it. Have caught some very nice fish both home and away.  Does the nymph affect the dry?  - yes a bit and there is a obviously  a limit to the size / weight of the nymph.

One tip I got from Haresear. Tie the dropper on with a uni knot, that way yo can take it off, put it back on very quickly. I use that all the time now. In fact I now use the uni knot almost exclusively.

[alba]

cheers harpo, I never started doing this till one blustery day on kinardochy last season when my droppers kept knoting up and tangling in the wind. So I changed to this method and connected with fish all day!

Its reletavley light nymphs ill be fishing on my wee water anyway

cheers

[alba]

I use it all the time. Usually a klink with a nymph below it. Have caught some very nice fish both home and away.  Does the nymph affect the dry?  - yes a bit and there is a obviously  a limit to the size / weight of the nymph.

One tip I got from Haresear. Tie the dropper on with a uni knot, that way yo can take it off, put it back on very quickly. I use that all the time now. In fact I now use the uni knot almost exclusively.

cheers ill give that a try

[sedge]

I fished New Zealand style quite a lot last season and took some nice fish, it's just a really nice and simple technique. I even unexpectedly hooked and lost a large sea trout in the middle of a blazing hot august day.

I usually fish a Klinkhammer as the dry and a PTN as the dropper, although  I'm yet to take a fish on the klink, would be interested to know if anyone has ?

Alex

[Harpo]

I'm yet to take a fish on the klink, would be interested to know if anyone has ?

Alex

Hi Alex,

Yeah i've taken a lot on the Klink, probably 60% Nymph/40% Klink. Tell you what though you get a shock when something does take the Nymph

[haresear]

One thing i noticed about fishing a dropper on the Muiry burn (wee troots) is that there is some times too much slack  between nymph and dropper is not as sensitive as straight to the dry fly. I noticed a few times my tippet reacting yet the dry didnt move, but as ive pointed out bandies are fast!


Col

That can happen Col and the trick as you will know from your experience to either use something that gets down a wee bit faster and gets the line tight to the dry, or do as you no doubt do. Watch the floating tippet if visible and fish Frank Sawyer style. if the tippet straightens or dips, hit it.

Alex

[haresear]

What size of Klink in conjuntion with the size of nymph do you use and is the nymph weighted? Also, what`s your distance between the two flies?

It's a question of balance only gained by trial and error.

Firstly, the nymph is always weighted to some degree. That may be just an underbody of copper wire or it could be a beadhead or tungsten head.

The dry has to be able to support the nymph, but the crucial factor is not so much the relationship in size between the two flies, but the relationship of weight (the nymph) to the dry (the surface area).

A klink has a parachute hackle, so let's say we are using a #12 klink, as we might do at March brown time. It will support a heavier nymph (the hackle having a large surface area) than a deer hair emerger of the same size (ok, admittedly this depends on how you dress them).

Like I said earlier, trial and error

Alex

[Otter Spotter]

Great thread this some excellent info. I am definitely going to give this method a try.
Forgive my ignorance but could someone tell me what a uni knot is? Thanks!