"Conan The Librarian" wrote in message
...

When I visited western NC and the Smokies, I found that using a
short leader (less than rod length) worked best for dealing with the
overgrowth and tight quarters. When I met up with Wolfgang on an open
stretch of the Little River, he handed me a rod with about a 12'
leader (is that right, Wolfgang?) and told me to give that a try.

Yeah, I believe it was something like that.

To my eyes, my casts looked horrible; the leader landed in a pile
each time. But, the fish seemed more than happy to jump all over the
fly. Due to the slack, I missed some fish (and even had one fish that
I had "missed" somehow wind up on the end of my line after I finally
got all the slack in). But I had better luck when I followed
Wolfgang's advice and lengthened the leader on my own rig and stopped
worrying about how "pretty" my casts were.

I still struggle when I've got a leader much longer than the rod,
but I've been playing around with it more ever since that trip, and
when conditions permit, I'll definitely fish a longer leader.

A longer leader is definitely more difficult to handle, especially with
shorter, lighter, and/or slower rods. And there's no doubt that it is
sometimes unnecessary. But, it's pretty much like anything else in that
once you get used to it everything else feels wrong. Moreover, I've never
encountered a situation where a longer leader on the water in dry fly
fishing was a hindrance. In the air.....or the shrubbery.....is another
matter entirely.

Chuck Vance (now if I could just learn to throw slack line on
purpose)

The first rule of expert marksmanship is to identify the target after the
shot. Doubtless, there are applicable corollaries.

Wolfgang