Fight Big Fish with the Butt Section of the Fly Rod Not the Tip
If you fly fish long enough and pay your dues, it’s just a matter of time until you hook into a giant fish and experience defeat.
I’ve always loved the saying, “It’s always the big ones that get away”, like it provides anglers a viable excuse for losing battles with big fish. I’ll admit there are times when we’re at complete mercy of big fish, and defeat is 99% inevitable, but most battles are lost due to angler error, specifically by fighting big fish incorrectly with the fly rod.
For many anglers, every time they lose a big fish, a portion of their fish-fighting confidence disappears with it, and they become more paranoid with each unsuccessful encounter. Overtime, this paranoia and lack of confidence distorts their fish fighting instincts, and they begin to play big fish too conservatively, thinking if they put more pressure on the fish, the tippet will break or the hook will pull free. What they end up doing most of the time is fighting the fish with their rod tip instead of fighting the fish with the mid-section and butt section of the rod. This seriously limits an anglers ability to apply power and steer the fish during a fight, because all the power comes from the butt and mid-section of the rod, not the tip. It also will keep the leverage in the fish’s court, which will take it far longer for you to tire out a big fish. Fight times can be doubled, sometimes even tripled, and that’s bad news for a trophy specimen if the battle is taking place during the year when oxygen levels are low (you can play a fish to death). Furthermore, the longer the fight is prolonged, the better the chance something could go wrong, resulting in a fish being lost during the fight (teeth wearing through tippet, fish raking you across rocks and breaking line, fish snapping you off in a snag, ect).
Fight a big fish the right way
First, set your drag precisely before you wet a line. Doing so, you’ll be confident if you begin applying too much pressure on a big fish, your reel will smoothly let out fly line. Second, when applying side pressure (to flex the mid and butt sections
Easy Bug Sampling For Trout Fishermen Video
Ever have one of those days where you just can’t figure out what the trout are eating?
Selective trout can make you crazy but there is a way to figure out for sure what they’re keyed in on. Taking a stream sample is quick and easy and it really gives you a leg up on the fish. With a bug seine you can sample nymphs from the bottom, emergers from the film and spinners or adults from the surface. Match the size, color and profile of your fly to the insects you find and you’ll be into fish.
Paint strainers make great bug seines. They’re cheap and easy to store in your pack or boat. Stretch one over your net and you’re in business. You can get yours HERE.
CHECK OUT THIS VIDEO AND LEARN TO SAMPLE BUGS ON YOUR WATER.
Read More »Bring Enough Line Holder
By Louis Cahill
I got to feeling nostalgic the other day and it bit me in the ass.
Last week Jason Tucker and I slipped out for a little small stream fly fishing. Our destination was a little mountain gem I have fished for more than twenty years. As pretty a stream as you’ll find anywhere and full of wild trout. Like most streams this size, it offers an average fish size of eight to ten inches. While those little guys are beautiful, fun, and no pushovers, anyone who has devoted serious time to this stream knows there are much bigger fish lurking there. Every now and then a skilled angler will tangle with fish over twenty inches. You have to be good and lucky but they’re there.
Those of you who follow closely know that I am still recovering from multiple surgeries and am really just getting my boots wet for the first time in well over a year. I’m still not too sure on my feet and have just been enjoying getting out with friends and not putting much pressure on myself to perform, which is honestly pretty awesome. I had a new line I wanted to try out and, not being sure how I’d like it, I scrounged around for an empty reel to put it on, rather than strip off my trusted four weight line.
I came across an old classic click and pawl reel I haven’t fished in decades. I got to thinking about all the fish I’d put on that reel in the years I fished it hard. Back when I was fishing exclusively homemade bamboo rods, I used old classic reels like this one, many of them handed down. This was the first one I bought for myself. Maybe my first significant fly gear purchase. It’s a great old reel. An Orvis Battenkill from the old days, with plenty of life left in it. A simple trout reel with click and pawl drag. Plenty of reel for eight to ten inch fish, right? I’m guessing you can see where this is headed.
“A TROUT REEL IS JUST A LINE HOLDER.”
I’m sure you’ve heard that plenty of times. Maybe you’ve even said it.
Read More »Regarding The River
WHAT CAN I TELL YOU ABOUT HER? THE ONE THAT I LOVE.
The one with whom I have left my heart. Dark and lovely. Moody and sullen, she gives little away. Sometimes capricious, never predictable, she keeps me in wonder, in awe. She keeps me for herself. She heeds no man. Selfish, she takes what she wants and wastes not the time to covet. She seeks out the low places, the dark and shady places. She keeps their secrets. I look into her face and I see only the sky.
She knows me. She washes over me, runs through me. She thrills me, frightens me. She gives me peace, makes me whole. She asked nothing from me and she receives it. I have given her my life and she has returned it. I enter her and she remains inside me when I go. She owns me and of her, I know almost nothing. She carves the earth in her image. She carves my soul.
I see her, sometimes when I least expect her. She takes
Read More »Farm Waters
By Ethan Smith
If we want clean water we need to pay farmers to clean it up.
What? Yes, let’s pay farmers a premium over the current farm subsidy program to help keep our rivers clean! That sounds crazy right? Well it isn’t, let me explain.
The farm bill and its subsidies are currently clean water’s worst enemy. The farm subsidies began with their heart in the right place. They help save American farmers by guaranteeing their crops with insurance. So if something bad happens on the farm like a flood, the farmer still gets paid. I can support that as a concept, however every piece of legislation has some unintended consequences especially when there is finance involved.
In this case the unintended consequences of the farm bill and it’s crop guarantees is rivers with excessive silt contamination and high nutrient loading, leading to toxic algae blooms, poor fish habitat and crappy fishing.
So how does the farm bill lead to these poor fishing conditions?
Let’s say a farmer has some land in a floodplain that floods one out of three years. It wouldn’t make sense for him to plant that land under normal free market conditions because the profits from the two years of successful growth would be wiped out by his losses every third year when it floods. So in theory, he would most likely leave them as wetlands. But in our warped incentive world he doesn’t care because every third year when that part of his land floods he collects insurance money from the government and gets paid anyway. So he doesn’t have to worry about flooding. Either way he makes money.
So that farmer plows under anything and everything he can plant. More land equals more money for him because there is no risk to him planting a wetland with crops even if it floods. It’s a win win situation. Drive over any bridge and there is a good chance that there is farm land adjacent planted with crops that is clearly in the flood plain, the farm subsidy at work.
So how can we change this?
Read More »Technical tips from Southern NZ
By Chris Dore
Whilst I enjoy chasing big fish in the backcountry here in New Zealand, there isn’t actually much to it: Find a fish. Put your fly in front of him, and strike.
It’s the smaller, hatch-driven streams that offer the challenge for me, the technical presentations their finicky trout require and often ‘outside of the box’ thinking. Straight line presentations rarely succeed and so slack line casts, chosen to beat drag and deliver your fly naturally (or not) are mandatory.
Today, Simon Chu and I visited a rather technical stream in the deep south known for its wary browns. It was a fun day shared with a good mate but we certainly needed to bring our A game. In the end we hooked 2 dozen fish between us on a range of lightweight nymphs and film flies.
HERE ARE A FEW TRICKS WHICH HELPED US TODAY:
– Make every presentation count. Each cast needs to be
Read More »Catch Trophy Brown Trout By Stacking The Odds In Your Favor
THIS FISH HAS BEEN ALL OVER THE INTERNET. NOW I’M GOING TO TELL YOU EXACTLY HOW TO CATCH ONE LIKE IT FOR YOURSELF.
Once in a while the “perfect storm” really is perfect.
My buddy Dan and I were throwing around some dates for a fishing trip the other day and when those dates started falling in November he said, “As you know, fall will be all about finding big brown trout.”
Brown trout are addictive like almost no other freshwater fish. I can’t tell you how many anglers have told me, “I just want to catch a big brown.” We all want that but if you are serious about turning that want into real-life experience, you’ll need to work for it and you’ll still have to be lucky.
Brown trout are tough customers. Moody, smart and reclusive, they put trout anglers to the test. Especially the big ones. There are two ways to get one. Either you can be lucky and just stumble into it, which is awesome and I highly recommend it, or you can do the leg work and put in the time.
Your best bet is the combination of good timing, the right conditions, the right place and a great presentation. That and persistence will get you what you’re looking for. Here are some guidelines to start with.
LOCATION
You must first be in the presence of big brown trout to catch big brown trout. Finding the right place usually starts with a tip, a fly shop conversation or a photo or article you found on the Internet. Some places are well known for holding big Browns. Reputation alone, however, is not enough to go on.
Once you identify the river where you think you can catch that big boy, you have to start narrowing it down. Brown trout are notorious homebodies, spending most of their lives in one run or even under one rock. There are certain events and times when they will venture out and, to catch them, you either have to know where they are or where they’re going, and when.
I talked to one angler who hunts for big Browns on a local tailwater, and catches them. He has a brilliant, and time consuming, method that works well. He learned from experience that these fish would only eat during high water flows. He goes to the river on low flows with binoculars rather than a rod. He finds big Browns and marks their location on his GPS and returns on high water to catch them.
You can increase your odds by getting after fish in smaller water when they are moving to spawn. Don’t target fish on redds. That’s short sighted and bad for the future populations, but there’s nothing wrong with targeting fish on the move. (Read all about that here.)
My point is, you have to make a plan and do the research.
TIMING AND CONDITIONS
You have to strike when the time is right. By identifying the times and conditions when big brown trout are most likely to be active and aggressive, you raise your odds immensely.
Fall is the peak of brown trout aggression. Browns are fall spawners. The height of their spawning season is around
Read More »Is Fly-Fishing a Cult?
I’m starting to wonder if I have joined a cult.
I picked up a copy of “The Mission” magazine at IFTD. It’s a nice looking book. Good printing, nicely bound, free, everything I like in a magazine. I’ll be honest, I haven’t read it past the cover but that’s what got my attention. The subtitle of the book is “The Cult of Fly Fishing.”
I was intrigued by that. I instinctively felt like that was a fair assessment. As I flipped through the pages I noticed the grandiose way the images portrayed anglers and their quarry. It did look suspicious. In a lot of ways fly fishers act kind of cultish, and the deeper you get into it the more cultish it becomes. I think I may have fallen into this, and even contributed to it.
Let’s be honest, we are an odd lot. There is an awful lot of dogma surrounding fly fishing that has very little to do with catching fish. I tried a test. When I found myself in a group of avid fly anglers, I tried listening to the conversation as if I were an outsider, knowing nothing about the subject. I determined that we sound bat shit crazy to the uninitiated.
I became concerned, so I did a google search for “Identifying a cult.” I found this check list.
6 tips for spotting a cult.
Pressure
There is always some kind of pressure to join. This often involves the idea that your belief system in invalid and that you are missing out on some kind of enlightenment or deeper spiritual experience. “CHECK.”
Brainwashing
Once recruited, members are subject to an organized program of thought reform, or what most people refer to as brainwashing. “CHECK.”
Divine Leaders
Cults usually have charismatic leaders who proclaim themselves as having special powers or special insight. And, of course, divinity. “DOUBLE CHECK.”
Read More »Alice’s Angle: November
By:Alice Tesar
A couple of tips for successful fishing in November.
A frequent customer stopped into the fly shop early September announcing that he had been greatly enjoying “Adult Summer.” Adult Summer is more commonly referred to as the nation’s fall season. Children are back in school for 6-8 hours a day and parents, in this man’s case, can have a bit of flexibility over their lunch breaks. So sip your coffee slowly, eat a hearty hash breakfast, drop the kiddos at school, and continue to take advantage of Adult Summer into the winter months.
The most wonderful part of November fishing is that the fish don’t begin eating until later in the morning. I like to get on the water just after the sun has danced across the water. Air temperature should be 45-55 degrees Fahrenheit before you get on the river. Freezing nights push the fish into deep pools and slow water to conserve energy. It’s only as things warm up in the day that they become more active and hungry. Streamers, with various actions stripped through deep pools require a clean presentation but can effectively get the aggressive Brown Trout riled up. Please, avoid harassing them around redds. As for fall mayfly hatches, you should be looking for Blue Winged Olives and Mahogany Duns.
The Mahogany is one of my favorite hatches to fish, if not for its sporadic occurrence then for how the Trout eat them. Trout feast on Mahogany Duns the same way you might approach Thanksgiving Dinner, hungrily but not aggressive or snappy. After all, it is a holiday of gratitude. The slow water of a dry summer causes the Duns to drift long distances, so Trout analyze their eats and don’t snap at every surface twitch. Hit the river an hour
Read More »Bugs, Bugs Everywhere, And Not A Fish To Be Seen
HAVE YOU EVER THROWN A PARTY, SENT OUT THE INVITATIONS, BOUGHT THE ONION DIP, AND IN THE END IT’S JUST YOU AND YOUR ONION DIP?
Now imagine the river is the party, the bugs are the onion dip, and the trout are your ungrateful, good for nothing, no-show friends. If you spend enough time on rivers, you have either seen or will see a situation where the hatch is out in force, yet not a single one of our finned friends is so much as poking a nose up to say hello. It is usually at this point your buddy starts with his blubbering about, “This is crazy man, all these bugs and not fish…I just can’t believe it dude…trout are cruel mistresses…I hate you Dad, ” and other such nonsense. My advice is
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