Casting styles change with the water. The same stroke that lays a dry line with perfect s-curves in a soft flat is useless in pocket water. As the river picks up speed, so must our casting. Effective drifts are shorter, so we cast more. Mixed surface currents greedily...
A backcast loop unfolds, parallel to the rolling current. The tapered fly line straightens and joins the rod tip on its forward path. It punches through the wet air with a second loop — a horseshoe arc with all the power and energy needed to drive a bushy Royal Wulff...
Summer is my favorite time of the year to throw dry flies. While I do spend many spring trips casting dries during the major hatches of the East, I also enjoy excellent nymphing action all through those wet months. So I fish a lot of dry dropper from April to June....
** NOTE ** This is part of a Troutbitten series on three styles of dry dropper. Here are links to all articles in the series: Three Styles of Dry Dropper (Overview) #1 Bobber Dry Dropper #2 Light Dry Dropper #3 Tight Line Dry Dropper -- -- -- My buddy, Steve, hates...
Trust. A fly fisher’s relationship with his or her confidence flies is rooted in the belief that one pattern will get the job done over the others. Our best patterns have caught so many trout that we trust they’ll work again. But that trust is earned over time, and...
Playing it safe saves flies. It even saves time. But it catches fewer trout. And whether drifting nymphs across a rock garden, punching hairwing dries into hazardous hidey-holes or slinging streamers into bankside slots, it pays to take risks because the rewards follow . . .
I started tying my own leaders when the small streams I fished required something different than what I could find in the fly shop. I needed a short, punchy leader to carry a #12 Royal Wulff back into the brush and yet somehow land with enough slack for a short dead...
Many fly anglers are entertained and enamored with the fly line itself. They make loops and curls that hang and fall, watching the line swing and glide through the air. Drawing those shapes and curves is artistic, but it doesn’t do much for good fishing. More than one...
Watching a trout take your fly — it’s one of the most exciting aspects of this game. All fly anglers talk about it. Streamer guys love watching the transient swirl just before a hulking brown crushes the fly. Dry fly guys patiently tie strands of visible flash into...
It was the summer before college — before the real world started, they said. Although, college life never proved to be anything like the rest of the world. I was working for a printing company, spending three hot months in a delivery truck, shuttling press orders to the docks and doorsteps of western Pennsylvania corporations.
As I drove repetitive miles across the Keystone state, I was most attentive in the valleys. From my tall perch behind the worn-out steering wheel, I peered over each bridge crossing, wondering and dreaming about trout. I knew of Western Pennsylvania’s struggles to harbor wild trout. I knew about its troubled past with acid mine drainage, but I’d seen marked improvement in water quality over my young life. And I’d explored enough to expect surprises — trout can be anywhere . . .