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Troutbitten Josh Darling Rod and Reel 99 (1)

ALL ARTICLES

VIDEO: Real Dead Drifts — Up Top and Underneath

Jun 16, 2022 | Tactics, Videos

A dead drift is the most common presentation in fly fishing for trout, because it imitates their most common food forms. We want a dead drift on both a dry fly and a nymph. But what is it?

It’s a one-seam drift that travels at the speed of the current without tension from the attached tippet. That’s hard to achieve, but it is possible by first understanding what a dead drift looks like, both on the surface with a dry fly and below the surface with a nymph . . .

Podcast: What’s the Deal With Junk Flies? — S3-Ep12

Jun 12, 2022 | Announcements, The Troutbitten Podcast, Troutbitten Fly Box

Junk flies are never a sure thing. They are simply another option to help solve the daily puzzle on the river.

You can’t just put any kind of bright, flashy materials on a hook and fool trout. There’s a reason why trout eat these flies. And there’s a reason why these patterns shine for so long and then fall off at the end of a season. There’s also a huge difference between the way stocked trout respond to some junk flies vs the way wild trout respond . . .

What Does It Take to Catch a Big Trout?

Jun 10, 2022 | Remix

For many years, I believed that it takes nothing special to catch a big trout. I argued with friends about this over beers, during baseball games, on drives to the river and through text messages at 1:00 am. My contention was always that big trout don’t require anything extraordinary to seal the deal. They need a quality drift, a good presentation, and if they are hungry they will eat it. I frequently pushed back against the notion that big wild trout were caught only with exceptional skill.

So for all who’ve heard me make this argument, I’d like to offer this revision: I still believe that large trout don’t need more than a good presentation. But what is GOOD may actually be pretty special. Meaning, it’s rare to find the skill level necessary to consistently get good drifts and put them over trout (large or small).

Here’s more . . .

STORIES

slowfloat

Jan 5, 2015 | Stories

Good thing we don't just go fishing to catch fish, because there wasn't a whole lot of that going on yesterday. Burke and I teamed up for a Sunday float, and we tried to make the Steelers' playoff loss quickly drift away into a fading memory by rowing through some...

Last Cast – 2014

Dec 31, 2014 | Stories

The light of the last day of the year began to fade, and I reminisced a bit. It’s been an incredible year for me, full of life lessons that I probably needed to work on for some time now.

Here’s to living the next year vividly . . .

Float

Dec 20, 2014 | Stories

Burke and I floated today. It's almost late enough in the season to call it a winter run, but not quite. Need snow for that, and I'd say real winter hasn't started yet. Action was about what we expected for this river at this time of the year, which is to say, it was...

TACTICS

Fishing Light

May 27, 2020 | Tactics, Tips

You’ve probably been wading upstream on a favorite trout stream and seen another angler’s lost tackle. Maybe the whole mess was in the streamside trees, with split shot and bobber attached, or a misguided F13 Rapala with rusted hooks. Maybe you’ve snagged a pile of monofilament stuck in waterlogged branches and lodged against a rock. And when you’ve seen all that mess, maybe you were stunned by how heavy the tackle was. Are you with me? . . .

Be a Mobile Angler

May 21, 2020 | Tactics, Tips

Wading is not just what happens between locations. And it’s not only about moving across the stream from one pocket to the next. Instead, wading happens continuously.

Many anglers wade to a spot in the river and set up, calf, knee or waist deep, seemingly relieved to have arrived safely. Then they proceed to fish far too much water without moving their feet again. When the fish don’t respond, these anglers finally pick up their feet. Maybe they grab a wading staff and begrudgingly take the steps necessary to reach new water and repeat the process.

This method of start and stop, of arriving and relocating, is a poor choice. Instead, the strategy of constant motion is what wins out . . .

Beyond Euro Nymphing

May 17, 2020 | Nymphing, Tactics, The Mono Rig

Euro nymphing is an elegant, tight line solution. But don’t limit yourself. Why not use the tight line tools (leaders and tactics) for more than just euro nymphing?

Use it for fishing a tight-line style of indicators. Use it for dry dropper or even straight dries. And use it for streamers, both big and small.

Refining these tactics is the natural progression of anglers who fish hard, are thoughtful about the tactics and don’t like limitations. I know many good fly fishers who have all come out the other side with the same set of tools. Because fishing a contact system like the Mono Rig eventually teaches you all that is possible . . .