Phoenix Silk Flylines – a review from Australia

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Australia, benefits, casting, fly fishing, flyfishing, silk fly lines, user reviews

Part of the joy of making Phoenix Lines is the direct contact with our clients. The lines are hand crafted and, of necessity, take time to make.  It is therefore heartwarming, especially during the winter months, to receive reports from clients about their use of Phoenix flylines and their various adventures.  Here is one such report from Peter Elks in Australia, who has been using Phoenix since 2003, possibly longer.  We are hugely grateful to Peter for taking the time to write this and found it very readable indeed.

“I am still a huge fan of your lines as they really do outperform the moderns in categories that really do count when it comes to good fish coming to the bank.

It is very apparent in Australia that a great many flyfishers frequently overlook or simply don’t take the time to acknowledge the real benefits offered. Maybe it’s because many feel that modern technology overides everything from the past, and that modern must be better? So we stop both looking and thinking further!

The benefits of a Phoenix silk silk double taper are to my belief as follows —

Pick up and laydown is direct, accurate, slick and has less surface disturbance than plastic.
The way these lines float ensures they cast lesser shadows than modern lines.
The lines have practically zero memory yet are very supple.
The lines are naturally textured to assist in the aerodynamic efficiency and floatation qualities, yet they are soft and supple on the fingers.
Rollcasting and variations of such casts, such, as spey, are far superior to any other line I have ever used.
The tip diameter of the lines is considerably less than modern equivalents.
Low flash finish and a real time wind cheating ability due to the lines weight and diameter ratios gives additional edges over plastic .
Furthermore a greased line floats and an ungreased is a perfect intermediate yet both these qualities is stored on the one reel you fish with.

All these qualities then present a very fishy array of major benefits not found in modern lines and for me personally are the direct reason I’ve been able to outwit some truly well educated good trout in the past few years.”

Website:  www.phoenixclassics.com

Would like to know about care of a Silk Fly line:  Link

Do silk fly lines have any advantages?

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benefits, casting, flyfishing, Phoenix, silk, silk fly lines

In response to a request from a reader I have put together some thoughts on the relevancy of silk lines compared with modern lines.

The first thing to note is the diameter compared to the modern line (insert photo). A silk line is about 30 % thinner than its’ plastic equivalent with a correspondingly fine point.

When comparing size for size the silk has less wind resistance, and therefore cuts through the wind better. It causes less disturbance when landing on, and lifting off the water.

A silk line has very low stretch and so, when hooking a fish the hook sets more firmly and the ‘feel’ in playing the fish is greatly enhanced and the angler feels more in touch with the quarry.

The working life of a silk line can be a long time with the minimum of care and very little effort on the part of the angler. In general, once a sportsman changes to silk, he or she stays with them for the rest of their fly fishing life.