Better than nothing, but I’m glad that my sight is still good enough
This definitely is not as easy to use as some of the videos for the product online would suggest. I had very mixed results depending on the fly size and how much material was around the hook.
I have tried several different versions of these magnetic gizmos, and this one is by far the most consistent. It has a strong magnet, and I’m pretty sure that it works better than all of the alternatives. That said, I could get it to consistently put the line through the hook eye on a 14 parachute Adam’s but struggled with any 16 flies, including the same parachute Adams, ant patterns, and various droppers. Sometimes, I threaded the hook, and often I missed completely… and this was in my kitchen, not in the middle of a stream. One of the pluses of this product, compared to the others that I have tried, is that the magnet was strong enough to hold the fly firmly in place so that even if I missed the eye completely, there wasn’t any issue with the fly falling to the ground.
I hope that other reviewers will provide feedback on flies that are working for them when using this product. I was hoping that it would speed things along, especially with 18 and 16 flies, but it doesn’t. Conversely, if it were this or having someone else on the stream with me to put flies on my line for me, this would be a lot better than nothing. I think I could make the product work well enough with lots of practice and a slimmed down set of fly options. As it turns out, and my neck of the woods, a 14 parachute Adam’s will catch fish most of the year, and I bet that I could figure out how to get a dropper two that would work fine and catch fish if it came to that. I think if you fish larger flies, this product will work well.
