December 8, 2014

Move Your Feet






































It's a battle of scaled monsters and steel...   You stand there, for what seems like hours, in the same spot constantly casting to the same fish, and trying to mend across three different currents to get that perfect drift.   "I have to catch that fish"  9 times out of 10 your fly drags.  But that doesn't matter, that one good drift keeps you pinned to the same position. "If I get everything just perfect, that fish will eat my fly."    But the truth is, if you would have moved your feet, and took five steps downstream, it would have taken two currents out of your drift  and reduced your mends down to one.  And it wouldn't have taken 45 minutes for that fish to eat your fly.  It is one of the most common and overlooked mistakes in fly fishing.  And I catch myself doing it all the time, especially when I'm fishing a new stretch of water.

Most of the time, it starts before your fly even hits the water with the sight of a rising fish.  Tunnel vision sets in.  Instead of reading the water, your first reaction is "I have to cast to that fish."  You might even get a refusal on your first cast, which only makes things worse.  Now you have to try every fly pattern in your box.  (Of course, it wasn't your convoluted presentation that got rejected)
And before you know it, you can't move and you're fishing a size 22 dry fly.


First cast after I moved my feet.