managing monofiliment

[Kurt P]

Does anyone have any tips on best way to handle all the snips and tangles of leader/tippet I tend to accumulate during a day on the water? I generate enough on my own, but also like to pick up pieces I find on shore or dredge up when nymphing. I wind up balling the pieces up and stuffing them into various pockets, but these balls always get in my way and I'm embarrased to say that sometimes I find out they've fallen out of my pocket and must be littering the riverbank somewhere. I saw one product on Cabellas a while ago that was supposed to wind the line up inside a cylinder, but the customer reviews were pretty poor and I'd bought enough silly fly fishing gadgets that month.
Thanks in advance for your tips,
Kurt

[medfly]

i stuff them into a designated pocket which gets emptied at some point, or if you want to spend money, i think fishpond makes this small plastic/rubber jar thingy which can hold the clippings, nice to see someone else thinking about all the mono that can be littering the shores after decades of use, but gotta say i am still guilty about letting clippings fall to the ground, trying to be more cognizant of it these days

[mikel]

Kurt....when I find a big gob of line to deal with I just try to wind it all together and hit it with a flame and melt it all together...I keep a ziplock in my vest for my own trash and add little bits of picked up leader in it too...it's a pain in the neck, but better than leaving it on the bank. Some places have so much trash that it just defeats me though...:\\

-Mike

[590Mike]

I carry a large ziplock bag in winter it goes in a jacket pocket. In the summer it usually goes in the outside bottom pouch of my bag ( wood river bag). Once in a while there is a bonus to cleaning up after some of these beach parties,even though it really pisses me off as this is supposed to be the "green generation" . Anyhow while picking up the water and beer bottles someone left a new set of Bahama Joes sunglasses and case the warranty card was still in the case. As soon as I got home the wife loved them.
Thanks for cleaning up and I'm gonna keep doing it too.

[Kurt P]

Thanks for the tips guys. I tried Mikel's suggestion about melting the monofilament and it converted a good-sized bird's nest into a compact little glob. Nice trick. I hope it doesn't create some weird toxic emmisions. I've stashed a ziplock and bic lighter in my vest for the next trip out. If I fish the Feather I'd better bring a blow torch--I've pulled some unbelievably huge tangles of line out of that river!
Good Fishing,
Kurt

[Terry Thomas]

Kurt,
Another alternative is a product from C & F called the Thermo meter/ Waste Line Holder. As the name implies, it is a thermometer with coils on the side that can be used to wind unwanted line. We had one angler come in a buy three for some of his fishing buddies.
T.