Seeking A Good Trouting Line ~ SHJ Casts the Cortland 444 Classic

     On the home water we’re calling 2016 ‘TheYear of the Mayflies’. Jack wanted to take us fishing. So I had the pleasure of sampling the river with a couple buddies, Evening Hatch guides, Jack Mitchell & Jeff Cottrell. Jack rowed while Jeff & I hunted the water with Black Quill dryflies.

Most of our casts were to rises within a 15 to 50 foot range, maybe the occasional cast to 60 feet.  We like a lot of the same things & we talk while fishing. Jeff & I were commenting about how we didn’t like the way the radical weight forward lines we were using presented dry & soft-hackle flies, & complaining about double-taper lines disappearing from the market, & how crazy techno-talk line marketing & labeling has become. Jeff said he was waiting for some lines Cortland wanted him to try out, & said he’d give me one to try when they arrived.

Jeff 'Jefe' Cottrell with UC Redband

I used to own a Cortland Leon Chandler, 6wt, ‘S’ glass rod. It was light as a feather, a beautiful translucent tobacco color, with a graceful semi-parabolic action appropriate to the pace of observant trouting – best 6wt I’ve ever casted – & trading it off when graphite was coming in, thinking I needed to ‘move up’, was one of the stupidest things I’ve ever done.

Cortland Line Company, of Cortland, New York, has been around for a long time. The company revolutionized fly lines, setting the stage for modern lines when it introduced the first coated fly line, the Cortland 333. Though they were first, to the company’s credit, Cortland has never succumbed to the confusing over-specialized hype marketing tactics many of their competitors now practice. And though the quality & durability is as good as any make of line I’ve abused, the Cortland lines remain among the most moderately priced.   

The lines arrived & Jeff brought me a weight-forward, 6weight, floating, 444. To a shopper seeking a trouting line, the writing on the box is completely understandable. Reading down from the top, here’s what’s written on the front of the box: World Famous Fly Line – Extremely supple, glass smooth finish and outstanding durability. Welded loop. – Cortland 444 Classic – Modern Trout – WF6F – Moss/30 YDS./27 M. All you need to know, within reason.             

I wound the line onto my reel. The ‘Moss’ is a pleasant, understated, light olive color. As the label promises, the line is supple & glass smooth. I took it fishing.

Casting, I found the Cortland 444 stays supple in cold water, while easy to hand. Its slick surface allows it to shoot through the guides without sound, & be picked up from the water with minimum commotion. The line floated high throughout a three-hour session. Being a line meant for trout fishing, working the distances commonly worked on most trout streams, the forward taper is designed with presentation foremost in mind. It is not the radical apple-on-a-string front taper that gives a bit more distance yet plops on the water in a heap at the working end of a cast. The taper is conservative, with a fairly long front taper ensuring a delicate presentation, while the fairly (comparatively) long rear belly serves to load the rod for good roll casts & various tosses. It mends well. At shorter distances, say, up to 40 feet, those distances most commonly fished on small to medium sized trout streams, the 444 feels & performs a lot like a double-taper, & with little effort. It is a forgiving taper. With a little more effort I was able to haul a 60 foot cast, no problem. Though the back of the box claims ‘tight loops’ (tight loops are considered cool lately, & all line manufacturers are claiming them), I found that the 444 forms a more open loop than the more radical weight-forward lines being offered for fast-action rods. But I consider that a positive attribute, ensuring less fouling when casting multiple fly rigs, or jig (beadhead) & bobber set-ups.            

The Cortland 444 Modern Trout was designed to be an all-around trout line for meeting the size trout streams that most of us fish most of the time – & I am impressed at how well it fills the bill for that purpose. Though, so far, I’ve only fished it on a graphite rod, I suspect the 444 might be a good choice for lining glass & bamboo. Because of its great roll-casting abilities, I also suspect that this configuration might be a good choice for lining light switch rods of trouting weights, particularly glass versions like the Echo #3 two-hander, the head configuration resembling a sort of mini-version of a long-belly Spey. I’ll be trying it. Meantime, I think anybody seeking to cut through the bullshit choosing an all-around, floating trout line, will be more than satisfied with the Cortland 444 Classic.

~Steve