Shooting Lines

Shooting Lines in-stock, no sales tax - $50 orders ship free in USA.

Jim Green introduced monofilament as a running/shooting line for distance fly casting in 1946 at the Golden Gate Casting Club.  That revolutionized fly casting. Suddenly fly casters could reach what before were unobtainable distances because the small diameter monofilament greatly reduced friction between itself and the rod guides. These shooting lines were attached to high density shooting heads.  Lines of this design are still used today by such legendary distance casters as 13 time World Champion, Steve Rajeff.  As a matter of fact, monofilament is still the choice as shooting line for the majority of tournament distance casters today.  Monofilament does have one problem however, after it has been wound on a reel for a while it tends to take on the shape of the reel spool, and to coil much like the Slinky kids toy.  This is called memory.  In the early 1960's Amnesia shooting line was developed by the Sunset company.  It was was developed specifically as shooting line, and could be stretched to instantly loose all memory which greatly reduced the possibility of tangles. This shooting line remained popular for more than forty years. Amnesia is no longer available, but monofilament shooting lines are still evolving.  Rio SlickShooter with its oval cross section is very popular.  Frog Hair Shooting Line is bombarded with gamma rays during manufacturing to make it slicker and more tangle free.  The latest monofilament shooting lines to hit the market are hollow so that they float and not only reduce friction in your rod guides, but also reduce friction when contacting the water. Such a line is Guideline Shooter, which has gained much lasting support from local steelhead guides. The newest friction cutting shooting line is Varivas AIRS, a monofilament line which had a ridged exterior cause by six hollow interior air chambers. It is incredibly slick and could add many feet to your casts. Although the new monofilaments in both solid and hollow configurations are extremely popular, tangle-free, braided, monofilament shooting lines have also found favor. We've tested Airflo Miracle Braid extensively. This is a braided monofilament, which has a solid core. Theoretically, because the braided line has intermittent contact with your rod guides it reduces friction more than lines which have constant contact with the guides. Miracle Braid can be rough on your hands however.
Shooting heads and shooting lines quickly migrated from the tournament scene to fishing water.  Anglers found that they could cast much further with this new system.  Suddenly shooting heads were available in many different densities from high floating to deep sinking.  Anglers took these new lines to large rivers for salmon & steelhead and to the saltwater or anywhere long casts were needed.  The Cortland Line Company introduced fine diameter coated fly lines which became popular as shooting lines with anglers during the 1970's.  Larry Schoenborn, while he owned  Larry's Sport Centers, sold hundreds of these lines in the Portland, Oregon area between 1973 and 1980.  These coated fly line type shooting lines remain popular today, having been proven by hundreds of anglers multiplied by hundreds of days of on the water. Scientific Anglers built their Sharkskin Shooting Line with a textured surface in the coating to mimic the friction free assets of braided monofilament shooting line. It does work and Sharkskin may have the least amount of memory of any shooting line. But, because of the rough surface it is somewhat abrasive on your hands. Another new shooting line that also has friction reducing ridges on its surface is the Airflo Ridge Line. This line is more supple than monofilament and handles really well. Since the friction reducing ridges run lengthwise of the line they are pretty easy on your hands.  Rio Powerflex Core Shooting Line is the latest development in a coated type of shooting line. It is exceptionally slick and tangle free because it is built on a monofilament core. Instead of using ridges of other patterns in the coating to reduce friction, Rio built the surface of their shooting lines exceptionally smooth, and they are the easiest on your hands. Last summer, Patty and I were fortunate to catch very many Dorados using Rio shooting heads and Powerflex Core shooting lines. We will use this system while fishing the Sea of Cortez again this year.
Many fly fishers using two-hand rods are switching to shooting head type fly lines, and there is much discussion about which shooting lines work best in that environment. All of the shooting lines mentioned above are adaptable to steelhead/salmon rivers. The interchangeability of shooting head spey lines allows an angler to instantly adapt to changing weather/water conditions without carrying extra reel spools.
Airflo Ridge, Scientific Anglers Sharkskin and Rio Powerflex core shooting lines all have seamless loops for attaching shooting heads.
Lately there has been renewed interest in shooting lines. As you can see, there are a wide variety of materials available. Designs are constantly evolving and competition between companies is fierce. We're always experimenting and because of it we're always on the cutting edge.

The perfect compliment to any shooting head, Ridge technology comes to the fore on our running lines.

Reduced surface friction not only increases distance, but also helps reduce tangles - loose coils of line slide over each other easily to eliminate snarl ups.

A low stretch Power core and an oversized ‘Flexi loop’ complete what we consider to be the ultimate running line for shooting heads.  Color is bright orange.

Rio Shooting Lines

There are a number of reasons for using shooting heads and shooting lines.  Traditionally shooting lines are used to cut down on friction in the rod guides while performing long casts.  A floating or sinking head is used to load the rod, the cast is made and the head pulls the fine diameter shooting line behind it.  First used for tournament distance casting, this system quickly migrated to salt water, and Pacific salmon fishing.  Since then it has been used for many fly fishing applications.  The newest arena where shooting heads and shooting lines are making an impact is in Spey fishing.  Spey line shooting heads have been popular for a number of years in Scandinavia. 

Many west coast steelhead anglers have also found Scandinavian style shooting heads to be very practical for fishing their rivers.  The original Skagit style lines were shooting heads.  The latest fad is to replace the running lines on Rio's Skagit Spey and WindCutter lines with Rio PowerFlex Core Shooting Line, because it is slicker and more tangle free than the original running line.  Also one reel can be loaded with backing and a shooting line, and many heads can be interchanged on to it.  This system creates less bulk than packing around several extra reel spools.

A super hard, slick finish oval-shaped nylon shooting line.  Has no memory after being stretched before fishing each day.  Has an extremely low coefficient of friction for long distance casts.
 

Length: 115 feet

 Scientific Anglers Sharkskin Shooting Line

This shooting line incorporates all of the great characteristics of standard Sharkskin technology plus some very cool features. An 8 inch welded loop allows an angler to slip a spool or reel through for easy switching out of shooting heads. A very slight taper from .032 up to .040 is provided for extra durability. A drab colored 5 foot tip allows for easy differentiation between head and shooting line.

Our personal on-the-water tests reveal that Sharkskin textures in this line results in some real advantages for the angler. This line is amazingly supple and has no memory at all. It comes off the reel spool straight every time. It virtually refuses to tangle while casting and shooting line. It is amazingly friction free in the guides, but because of the textured surface is very easy to hang on to. We were worried that the textured surface might be abrasive to our hands while stripping in to recast. Actually the texture seems to retain a film of water to reduce friction in the hands. Models are available in .032 diameter yellow color and .035 diameter orange color.