George,

I think 50 yards of high quality 20 pound braided Dacron
(SA/Cortland/Gudebrod) is about right for most normal trout fishing
situations.

Most people tell me they have never seen their backing. This is just a
function of where they fish. There are places where the backing is seen
regularly on a good day of fishing.

I was once (1986) almost spooled ( 75 yards of 20# Micron ) on the Henry's
Fork at the Railroad Ranch by a 20" plus hot Rainbow. I was using my new
Sage 9' # 4 LL with a new Orvis CFO III (with counter balance) and a new
Cortland 444 peach floater. I was using 6x tippet (Aeon?) with #16 PMD
thorax tie that I bought at Mike Lawson's fly shop. At that I chased the
fish about 100 yards down stream till it got tired. It was as close to the
speed of a bonefish as it gets. Smoken'..............


If you want to land a big fish on 6x tippet you should:

Have a softer rod with a soft tip.

Use a smaller line size rod like a 9' # 4 weight.(less line drag)

Have a reel with a very light smooth drag like a Galvan or a 'racket
reel' (click & pawl) like a Hardy or old Orvis CFO.

Use a fresh leader to 4x. Tie some fresh matching 5x tippet to it and
then tie some fresh 6x to that. (triple surgeons)

Retie your fly on occasion.

Maybe cut your fly line down to as far as you can cast.(less line drag)

Use 12# braided Dacron.(less line drag)

Hold you mouth right and pray.

** This is only important on lakes and spring creeks with hot wild Rainbow
trout that are feeding on #16 to #22 'bugs' on top.

Some places they commonly use 7x but I don't like to myself.

--
Bill Kiene

Kiene's Fly Shop
Sacramento, CA, USA

Web site: www.kiene.com


"George Cleveland" wrote in message
...

How much line has anyone here ever had off their reel while using a
5x or 6x tippet and ended up successfully landing a fish?

The reason I am askingis that I just got done switching lines around
from one small reel to another. I went out in the front yard and
stripped off all the line (AirFlo 3/4 Delta Taper) and backing (30lb
test Greenspot [its all I had on hand when I put it on the original
reel]). I came up with about 75' of backing plus the 90' of flyline. I
was a little taken aback by the apparent paucity of backing when the
thought occured to me that since this particular rod is rarely hooked
up to a leader that tests more than 4lb. (5x) what would be the
effective maximum amount of line and backing that could be removed by
a fish until the weight and drag of the line itself would cause the
tippet to part. So what do you think. I know rod action would have a
lot to do with it but it seems to me that there must rapidly come a
time with light tippets when any extra backing becomes superfluous.


g.c.