Knot Important

I came back from my first fly fishing trip ready to go again as soon as I could.  But it was a couple of months before I was able to arrange a chance to get away.  This time I wanted to go on my own.  I had only the one experience with fly fishing, but I figured that after six years of fishing for trout with a spinner rod I should be able to handle going fly fishing by myself.  I stopped to get a couple of new leaders and some other trinkets and then headed out of town.  A couple of hours later I was at Maramec Springs Park just outside of St James, MO.

When I got to the park I drove around for a few minutes to scope out a good spot to fish.  There were people fishing everywhere and I was buzzing to join them.  I parked.  I got my waders on.  I put my rod together.  I strung my line.  I put a new leader on the end of the line and started to tie a perfection loop on the end for a tippet.  Loop, wrap around, pull through, tighten and nothing.  It didn’t work.  I tried again.  Loop, wrap around, pull through, and tighten… still didn’t work.  

Getting Your Stick High

My first experience fishing with a fly rod was last August in Gatlinburg, TN.  I hadn’t had my gear for very long so I took time to spend a few hours practicing casting in my back yard before we left for the trip.  My brother had shown me a few basics the night I had received my gear so I was ready to give it a whirl on my own.  I set up a plastic lawn chair in one corner of the yard.  I went to the middle of the yard and with about 40 feet in front of and behind me I started casting.  I was able to lay that line right over the top of the chair.  I didn’t concern myself too much with putting the fly on top of the chair.  At this point I wanted to make sure that I had my line pointed in the right direction.  I have to admit that I was pretty impressed with myself.

We got to Gatlinburg and I was chomping at the bit.  I wanted to go fishing before we unpacked.  Of course that didn't happen.  We finally headed into the Smoky Mountains National Park, stopped at a likely place and got ourselves geared up.  As we walked down the trail you could hear the water rushing over the rocks.  Ahead I could see a break in the trees and the beginnings of a wooden bridge.  I was sure that the bridge stretched over across an expanse of water.  I couldn't wait to wade in and to start gracefully sending my line across the water.  We came out of the trees and my jaw dropped in shock as I looked at rocks and rocks and rocks.  And there was also some water.

Where Can the Beginner Go?

So I've actually been fly fishing less than a year.  I started trout fishing about 6 years ago when all the guys in my family decided to have an annual trout fishing trip.  I bought a cheap spinner rod at Bass Pro Shop and headed to the water with everyone else. I caught my limit that first year but only because my brother-in-law was right there showing me what to do. Each following year I caught less and less, but I was still having fun being with all of the guys on the trip. Last year I didn't catch any trout at all. I spent about an hour in the stream without having a fish come within a foot of my lure. But the cabin we were staying at had a pond. So I bought some worms and spent the rest of the trip catching bluegill. At least I was catching fish, right?  No, it just wasn't the same.


The one constant in all of these trips was the abundance of people fly fishing.  No matter where in the park I was, me and my spinner rod were surrounded by a dozen people with fly rods.  I really enjoyed watch them gracefully whip their line through the air and drop their fly exactly where they wanted it to be.  At least that's what it looked like to me.  So while my interest in fishing for trout was starting to wane, my interest in fly fishing grew every trip.


Then last year I was given a fly rod for my birthday.  A month after that we had a trip planned for Gatlinburg, TN.  And after three days of fishing I WAS HOOKED!  The irony is that in three days I only caught three fish and most of our fishing didn't involve casting.  We were high-sticking in small pockets of water.


I've managed to go fly fishing three more times since that first trip.  Some modest success and some abject failure.  You can get all the gear and learn how to get your fly in the general area you want it to be but that still doesn't get you closer to catching fish.  There's a lot of learning involved in fly fishing and it's not all about technique.  


Most of the training I've gotten has come from family.  But after a while you can't expect your family to hang by you helping you to catch fish.  They want to fish too!  And in looking for information online I didn't really find anything geared to a beginner.  And that's where this blog comes in.  


The goal of this blog is to help the new fly fisher find information that will help them not just to be able to cast the fly to where they want it, but to gain some understanding of how to catch fish.  I'm not claiming expert status.  I just want to try to pass along some of the information that has helped me and to (hopefully) explain some of the knowledge I've gained in a way that doesn't take intimate fishing knowledge to understand.


So here's tip No. 1.  Flies can be expensive.  But Orvis has a 20 fly pack of flies that would normally go for $45 that they sell for $10 with free shipping.  You can only buy one per home address, but it's still a great deal and it took less than a week to get to me.  If you can't follow the link below just do a search on SI76TK and you'll find it.


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