On Tippet Sizes for Big Flies

June 13, 2011 By: Marshall Cutchin

Eric Sharp offers some excellent advice for determining tippet size and even rod size for throwing big flies like brown drakes.  “The late Cal Gates, who found the Au Sable Lodge on that river’s Holy Waters stretch, used to say that if the leader would fit through the eye of the fly, it was the right size.  That theory works if you could cast the way Cal Gates could, but only about 5% of us are that skilled.”  In the Detroit Free Press.