Techy Thursday - The Uni Knot

It’s a pretty simple name…the “Uni Knot”, and it’s simply a superb knot to master to bring your nymphs and lures to life. Many of us utilise the traditional clinch knot or improved clinch knot for tying on flies whereby the knot is clinched tight against the hook eye, but give the uni-knot a try.

The uni-knot allows your fly to swing, un-inhibited in a loop. For example in a dry dropper scenario, the nymph, tied with a traditional clinch not moves in a rigid manner with the tippet – where the tippets goes, they nymph follows, it’s like a dog on a very tight lead - little movement, whereas a fly tied with the uni-knot imparts a life-like flicking movement when drifting with the current. The fly is free to move around in its own loop offering a far more natural drift to the fish, the same is true when fishing Woolly Buggers. When retrieving lures with a weighted head, the uni-knot gives a fully repeated “head-down-bum-up” motion as opposed to a more rigid line of retrieval.

It's an easy knot to learn, and is made especially easy when using your teeth to grab that loose tag-end when it is pulled through the loop 5 or 6 times. Once strain is put on a uni-knot, it slides down the tippet to tighten against the hook eye. It is one of the stronger knots and works equally well on mono and fluorocarbon’s, both should be lubricated with saliva or water prior to tightening the loop, with can also be made either big, or very small for finesse situations. Don’t forget to trim that tag end to 2mm or less!