Fly fishing gear breaks down. Waders leak, boots fall apart and pack zippers fail. The stitching at the seams of all this stuff takes a lot of abuse, so how long can it hold up? How well is it built? The 100 Day Gear Review Series on Troutbitten takes a look at how...
**NOTE** This is Part Three in a Troutbitten Short Series about weights and measures. You can find the full series at the link below. READ: Troutbitten | Category | Know Your Weights and Measures Beginning anglers probably don’t give much thought to the overall...
**NOTE** This is Part Two in a Troutbitten Short Series about weights and measures. You can find the full series at the link below. READ: Troutbitten | Category | Know Your Weights and Measures I performed a single haul on the back cast, and the fly rod flexed a bit...
**NOTE** This is Part One in a Troutbitten Short Series about weights and measures. You can find the full series at the link below. READ: Troutbitten | Category | Know Your Weights and Measures Fishermen are bad with numbers. We’re notorious for embellishing the size...
Cover more water and catch more trout. It’s a common theme running through these Troutbitten pages and one that surely puts more fish in the net — if you’re committed to it. And while there’s certainly a danger of taking this concept of constant motion to counterproductive extremes, the core philosophy of showing your flies to more trout is hard to argue against.
There are a host of variables to consider, though. And walking upstream spraying casts in every direction is not the way to get things done.
Let’s talk about it . . .
One by one they came back to the gravel lot, all of them pleasantly water-weary and uniquely satisfied. Each had caught lots of trout — that part of the story was the same. But the hot flies were all different. Trout had come to dries, streamers and a variety of nymphs. All of the Troutbitten crew had found success, but each had come to it in a different way.
. . . I’m not suggesting to ignore the hatches. I’m saying that you could ignore the hatches and probably catch just as many trout as the next guy . . .
You might be a poor judge of ten feet. In fact, on the river, you probably are. Anglers are notorious for overestimating the lengths of things, right? Your buddy tells you about the big trout he caught, up around the bend. “It was probably twenty inches,” he says. But he didn’t measure it. So you nod and smile skeptically. Tell that same friend you’ll meet him three hundred yards upstream for lunch, and you could be walking around hungry at noon, until you finally find him a half mile upstream. Again, we’re bad at evaluating distance out there.
With that in mind, consider this . . .
Wild and wise trout demand from the angler a natural presentation of the fly. Trout are a difficult fish to fool. So the consistent fisherman learns to successfully drift flies that look like something the trout is used to eating — something that appears natural.
However, the most natural drift of the fly happens over a short portion of the drift. And usually, the angler who casts more often is more successful . . .
It shocks me how many good fishermen think they’re saving time by untangling a maze of monofilament and flies. They use forceps and fingernails. Some even carry needles specifically for the job of picking out would-be knots.
Most guys see their options as a pair of choices: either cut off the whole thing and re-rig with new lengths of tippet, or try to salvage it all by spending enough time working the messy knots and tangles free.
But I promise you, there’s a third option. And it’s much better than the other two . . .
My buddy, Smith, is stubborn. Whether traveling across the country or fishing our local rivers, he fishes the same handful of flies, year round. Smith can literally hold his selection of nymphs, wets, dries and streamers in one hand without them spilling over. With patterns that are fine-tuned from experience and a selection ruthlessly stripped down to the bare bones, his handful of hooks is the very definition of confidence flies.
Smith’s trust in those patterns is so spot on, you might assume that he rarely changes flies. But you’d be wrong. Ask Smith, and he’ll tell you he changes flies whenever it’s necessary.
Now, what does that mean? . . .