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ALL ARTICLES
Fifty Fly Fishing Tips: #33 — Fish the Edges
When a particularly large pair of dark phantoms abandoned the bank and skirted the perimeter of my position, I’d had enough. I turned my back to the main flow where I was catching trout.
VIDEO: The Lagging Curve Cast — Dead Drifts for Days (Fly Casting Skills)
The Lagging Curve is a beautiful way to provide slack to a dry fly, and it’s my favorite way to get perfect dead drifts to a dry fly in rivers. I fish a lagging curve at just about any angle, using both a forehand and backhand cast, and it provides slack to a dry fly for days.
The lagging curve is really the opposite of what most people mean by a curve cast. This is an underpowered curve and not a power curve.
The leader design matters a lot, and so does the casting stroke. I cover it all in the video . . .
PODCAST: Dry Fly Skills Series #5 — All About the Flies — S12, Ep5
The flies matter. But more than anything, it’s about matching the moment, the water type, the lifecycle of the bug – and even the wind conditions. For us, those conditions — those situations — dictate our next fly choice.
We don’t guess on patterns. Instead, we think about things, develop a theory and test it with the next fly choice and (hopefully) a great presentation.
STORIES
The Further You Walk, the More You Leave Behind
You’re alone, and it’s still not enough. You can feel the pressure of communities, of people and things. It’s coming from behind. You want to feel lonesome again. So you walk.
This place is yours again, if just for a while . . .
You’d walk twice as far if it got you here every time . . .
Thirty-Inch Liars
Every fisherman in the parking lot seems to have a thirty-inch fish story, don’t they?
You know what I hear when someone says a fish was “about two feet long?” I hear: “I didn’t measure the fish.”
Bass guys don’t put up with this stuff. My friend, Sawyer (a dedicated bass and musky guy), is dumbfounded by the cavalier way trout fishermen throw estimates around. In his world, if you didn’t measure it, you don’t put a number on it. They take it seriously. We trout fishermen embarrass ourselves with estimates.
Waiting On Luck
With the river at its peak, Dad and I spent a drizzly day with no one in sight at any hour, early or late. Alone together against the odds, we landed the occasional fish purely by accident. Yes, we targeted the backwaters. Sure, we fished deer hair sculpins, worm patterns and chartreuse things. But such are the measures suggested by those who peddle wishful thinking more than experience. Nothing was consistent in those roiling waters.
Regardless, Dad and I fished. And we hoped. We were waiting on luck . . .
TACTICS
Q&A: How Do You Measure Your Fishing Distance?
Knowing sizes, weights, diameters and distances improves our effectiveness dramatically. And ignoring these details is a little like a painter not knowing their colors or a photographer not knowing their shutter speeds. So how do we easily measure distance on the water?
The Tracer Streamer Concept
The tracer streamer keeps the visuals in your streamer game and catches a few trout while doing so. But getting the most of a two-streamer system requires a little forethought . . .
What Hand Should Turn the Fly Reel?
In the short term, reeling with the casting hand might lose fish. But in the long term, it encourages poor line maintenance principles.
In this article I give a lot of thought to the various inefficiencies and handicaps that hurt when reeling with the casting hand . . .
NYMPHING
Leaders, Hats, Stickers Back in the Troutbitten Shop (Spring Sale ’23)
Troutbitten leaders are back in the Shop. There are some unique features to Troutbitten leaders that make a big difference. These are hand tied leaders in four varieties: Harvey Dry Leader, Standard Mono Rig, Thin Mono Rig, and Micro-Thin Mono Rig. Standard Sighters are also available, and they include a Backing Barrel. The Full Mono Rig Kit contains each of the three Mono Rig leaders, three foam spools and a twenty-inch Rio Bi-Color extension.
All Troutbitten leaders come on a three-inch spool, making long leader changes a breeze . . .
Q&A: Blind Striking
I don’t guess, because I might ruin my best chance. I also do everything I can to be in contact or just slightly out of contact with the nymph, whether that’s on a tight line to my rod tip or under an indicator. And I trust my skills this way, more than I trust my instinct to set on nothing . . .
Mono Rigs and Euro Leaders — Micro Thin or Standard? (with VIDEO)
This is an absolute keystone to understanding all the information out there about long leader systems. I hope you enjoy it.
Just like the fly lines that these long leaders substitute for, the range and variety of leader formulas leads to a lot of confusion.
Mono Rigs, euro rigs, tight line or contact rigs: Yes, there’s a difference in those terms. But everything we’ll consider here applies to them all. Basically, if what is outside of your rod guides is the leader only (or even just a thin euro fly line), then it helps to understand how the leader build affects our possibilities for how we might fish . . .
STREAMERS
VIDEO | Fly Fishing the Mono Rig: Streamers — Episode 1
In collaboration with Wilds Media, the long-awaited Troutbitten video series featuring Streamers on the Mono Rig begins today.
Episode One is an overview of the tactics and an exploration of what is possible when fishing streamers with tight line tactics. The video also covers the Troutbitten Mono Rig and the functions of its three main components.
Streamer Presentations — The Tight Line Dance
On a tight line rig, things are different. We keep line off the water — so it’s the rod tip that dictates the actions of the fly. Direct contact with the fly lends us ultimate control over every variable. With line off the water, it’s the rod tip that charts the course, the actions and all the movements of the streamer. And that . . . is a very big deal . . .
Stop Trying to See Your Streamer
Watching your streamer is fun. It’s educational, and it helps to dial in great action on the fly. But if you’re not careful, you’ll start moving the fly so you can see it instead of moving the fly to attract a trout . . .
ANGLER TYPES IN PROFILE
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BIG TROUT
Modern Streamers: Too much motion? And are we moving them too fast?
Is a big, articulated streamer with marabou, flashabou, rubber legs, polar chenille, rabbit strip, hen hackle and a lazer dub collar actually moving too much? Are there too many elements in motion for a trout to reject? And might we do better with streamers that...
Anything at Anytime | Meet Honey Bunny
I approach from downstream, making daring casts into the brush pile, probing a dark network that's shaped by collected seasons of tangled roots and half trees. A heavy current crashes into the pile and is redirected outward, and I wade into the bottom part of that...
Holding a Trout — Their Heart in Your Hands
Fish pictures are the grand compromise of catch and release. An Instagram feed with a full gallery of trout is replacing the stringer of dead fish for bragging rights. And that’s a good thing. They look better alive anyway.
Would a trout be better off if we didn’t take its picture? Sure it would. Moreover, wouldn’t a trout be better off if we didn’t set a hook in its mouth and drag it through the water? Yup. So I think we have to be a little careful how self-righteous we get. Point is, we all draw the line somewhere, and I firmly believe that a quick picture, taken responsibly (I’ll get to that), won’t hurt a trout.
Most of the fishermen I know who’ve spent a great deal of time with their boots in the water have caught on to catch and release. The bare facts stare you in the face pretty quickly if you start keeping your limit on every trip. You soon realize that a good fisherman can thin out a stretch of water in short order, and a group of good fishermen can probably take down an entire watershed.
So we take pictures instead . . .
NIGHT FISHING
Night Shift – Into the Dark
You can't stand up to the night until you understand what's hiding in its shadows. -- Charles De Lint Last June I made a commitment. I promised myself that I would go deep into the night game and learn to catch the wildest trout in the darkest hours. Having spent a...
Night Shift – Breaking the Ice
I've been fishing in the dark two other times since my last Night Shift report, and on each of those trips I experienced limited zero success. I knew that winter night fishing was going to beat me up and test my resolve, however, it's been even slower than I...
Night Shift – Skunked
I've read a lot of fishing blogs, and I can't recall any accounts of a complete shut out. I've seen lots of hero poses with gorgeous slabs of wild trout spilling over wet, dripping hands with the flash of a fly rod reflecting in the sun. My RSS feed is filled with...
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