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Care of the Line

The best and simplest treatment for a hard enameled line is an occasional rubbing with the line dressing the line manufacturers make for the purpose.

Vacuum lines should be frequently dressed with deer fat or mutton tallow. This is sold in flat tin boxes and the best way to apply it is to run the line through it, taking care that the line does not rub against the sharp edge of the box. Then rub it down thoroughly with a pigskin line greaser or an old leather glove. This treatment is used primarily to make the line float for dry fly fishing but it also serves to keep the line supple and in good condition. After being long in use a vacuum dressed line can be returned to the factory for re-enameling at a nominal charge, which is one of the advantages of having an American-made line.

Tournament casters add to the fat treatment a coat­ing of powdered graphite which they polish until it shines like the proverbial " nigger's heel." This en­ables the caster to make long " shoots " but is " mussy " and makes the line unduly conspicuous in the water and is of no value in fishing.

Sand is bad for an enameled line. The line should be dried after being used and all sand removed. A line should not be kept on the reel any longer than necessary. After a day's fishing I strip all line from the reel and leave reel and line on a chair and rewind it on just before leaving for the stream.

Between trips and during the winter the line should be removed from the reel and either coiled in a large, loose hank and thrown in a drawer or stored on a large line dryer or grooved hoop made for storing a line. Treated thus, one's line will be free from kinks when he keeps his tryst with the fishes the following spring.

Related terms include texas fly fishing and fly fishing.