Scientific Anglers’ Amplitude Smooth lines have earned plenty of kudos for being slick, durable and high-riding.  The Infinity taper is my favorite in the series because it’s all-purpose, half-size over-weighted, and that translates to fishing dry flies or nymphs, even smallish streamers.  It’s a fine mending and roll casting taper as well.  Few will argue that there’s a more versatile high performance line out there.

Now there’s an added wrinkle available on a specific version of Amplitude Smooth Infinity—a glow-in-the dark tip section.  I’ve been fishing a weight forward-#6-floating version for a few weeks, and I have to say that I’m surprisingly fond of it.  Luminescent fly lines are nothing new, and I fished a certain version from SA more than 10 years ago.  I actually thought an entirely luminescent line was distracting and gimmicky. The difference this time around is that the glow part is concentrated in several feet in just the tip section.

If the idea of a luminescent line is to show you where your casts are landing in low-light situations—mousing at night, evening spinner falls, etc.—doesn’t it stand to reason you’d want to pinpoint that feedback as much as possible?  And shouldn’t that be concentrated at the section of the line closest to the leader and fly or flies?  Of course.

Done right, and I think this line lands on just the right length and placement of glow, it’s like having tracer fire for your casts.  If nothing else, it’s catchy and entertaining.  At best it helps you dial down on that big brown slurping after dusk.

For those of you who worry about brightly colored fly lines anyway… the line glows in the dark.  Of course that’s not “stealthy.”  Does it hurt you chances?  I’m not a scientist, but I can tell you that I caught a number of rising fish that obviously didn’t seem bothered at all.  I think things like the drift, and accuracy, and not lining fish with any colored line, glow or not, matter 100 times more than line color.

You may choose this line for a specific reason, but I fish it as my all-day grasshopper- and streamer-throwing line. That’s how I charge it up.

That said, I’ll totally concede that this is a niche, and maybe even a bit schmaltzy, but I can’t help liking it and thinking it’s fun.

-KD