The bounce rig — sometimes called the Provo bounce rig, after the river it's associated with in Utah — is one of those setups that looks fussy on paper and then turns out to be simple once you've built one leader by hand. The idea is straightforward: weight ticks along the bottom of the river, which slows your flies down to match the current seam right at the streambed, and you control depth and drift speed by mending your indicator. Here's exactly how the leader goes together.

Building From the Butt Section Down

Start with 12 to 18 inches of standard monofilament butt section, and clinch-knot it down to a tippet ring. From that first tippet ring, run about 3 feet of 2X or heavier fluorocarbon to a second tippet ring — this is the section where your indicator attaches. The heavier line here isn't an accident: a thicker, heavier section gives an indicator something substantial to bite onto so it doesn't slip, and it also gives you roughly a 3-foot window to adjust depth by sliding the indicator up or down.

The Tag System for Two Flies

From that second tippet ring, run line roughly 1.5 times the depth of the water you're fishing, stepping down in diameter — starting around 4X or 5X and dropping a size or two as you go. Tie in a series of tags using triple surgeon's knots, where the running line from each knot becomes the start of the next section. The goal is three tags total so you can fish two flies. Tie your first fly on with a clinch knot at the first tag, your second fly at the next tag, and reserve the last, lowest tag for split shot.

Why Small, Multiple Split Shot Beats One Big One

Use three to five small pieces of split shot rather than one or two heavy ones. Small shot lets you fine-tune depth in smaller increments, but the bigger reason is drift behavior: multiple small shot bunched together create an anchor that rolls and "slinks" along the bottom the way a cluster of baby-head rocks would, instead of digging straight down and wedging into gaps the way a single heavy shot does. Fewer hang-ups, better bottom contact.

This is also why the leader is built to get weaker toward the bottom — the lowest tag, holding your split shot, is intentionally the weakest link. If you do hang up, you break off the shot and save both flies instead of losing the whole rig.

Gear

You'll want two nymph patterns for the tag system — our Hare's Ear Olive Nymph is a solid, buggy searching pattern that works well as one of the two flies on this rig. For the leader itself, the JHFLYCO Monofilament Tapered Leader gives you a reliable butt section and taper to build this system from rather than hand-tying every foot from spooled material.