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.

It looks beautiful, right?  But where was the wide stream for me to wade into?  Where were the deep pools of water hiding trout?  How was I going to catch any fish in these fast moving foot wide streams and tiny pockets of water?  If I attempted to cast at all I would spend less time with my line in the water than I would getting my line unstuck from between two boulders.  And this is how I was introduced to high sticking.

This is how I would describe high sticking.  Remember, this is the viewpoint of a novice.  The general idea is to drop your fly in the water upstream of the fish so that as it floats downstream in the flow of the water it appears natural to the fish.  Rather than casting yards of your line across the water you're only flicking a few feet of your line.  You keep your rod high in the air (hence the name) to keep as much of your line out of the water as possible and try to watch for a bite.  Less line should be easier to cast, right?  And since it the fly will be closer to you it should be easier to see the trout take the fly, right?  It sounds simple.

It's not that simple.  To begin with it's actually much harder to place your fly where you want it.  Less line means less weight.  And with less weight your line response is much greater than you're used to if you've been playing around with 30 to 40 feet of line in your backyard.  Every little twitch of your rod sends your line moving, usually in the wrong direction. And in this case the wrong direction was between two boulders or into the trees above me.  I found out that getting your line unstuck from between two boulders is greatly preferable to stretching up to untangle your line from a tree limb.  I was much less concerned with hitting the water when I was reaching down to the rocks than when I was reaching to a limb that’s fifteen feet above the water and three feet over the edge of a boulder.

Next, because of the turbulence of the water over the rocks it’s not very easy to see if a trout is taking your fly, especially for someone new to fly fishing.  In this fast flowing water you must have an indicator on your line.  And that same turbulence makes your indicator jump around a lot.  It's hard to tell if it's moving from a trout taking your fly or just moving with the water.  I’m used to fishing with worms and landing a fish when you feel the tug on your line.  And when fishing for trout in the past I’ve always been able to see the fish approach the fly before taking a bite.  Let’s just say I tended to be more than a little trigger-happy watching that little orange ball bounce around on the ripples.

Despite learning all of this on the fly (pun intended) I was able to land a couple of trout.  And while crawling around boulders with a nine foot stick in your hand wasn’t the easiest thing in the world it was actually pretty fun.  We even found a spot later on in the trip where we were able to do some actual casting as well.

I know that this description of high sticking is not enough for anyone to take in and try it on their own with any reasonable amount of success.  But from what I’ve read and seen online it is actually supposed to be easier to hook a fish because of the way that you are holding your rod.  So here are a couple of links to more "professional" descriptions and a nice video that give the subject a lot more justice than I can.   And if you want to try and Google “high sticking,” make sure you put in "fishing" or "fly fishing" as well or you'll end up with more links to hockey than to fly fishing. 

Fishing Tips 101 - Seems a bit dry but is very thorough.
Leland Fly Fishing Outfitters - A little more readable, but not as much detail.
Red's Fly Shop - Seeing it really helps.