Recently in Fly Fishing Techniques Category

If you are just beginning to fly fish for trout, "mending" can seem like one of the more daunting skills to learn. Phil Monahan demystifies it for you this week in "Mending: Upstream or Down?" on MidCurrent.

Excerpt: "MENDING is an aspect of fly-line control that many anglers have trouble with. Here's a very simple definition: mending is the process by which you counteract the effects of current on the fly line, thus enabling a longer dead drift."

Master tournament caster Steve Rajeff demonstrates the three common styles of spey casting, including traditional greased-line, Scandanavian, and Skagit.

Excerpt: "Over a hundred and fifty years ago in Scotland, there was a style developed just called traditional 'spey casting.' It's where we use a fixed line -- perhaps 80, 90 or 100 feet long -- and you lock it down and maintain that distance. You pick up the line, making a tremendous D loop behind, and cast out, changing direction."

"As water temperatures drop, fish generally migrate to deeper pools or to those areas of the stream where currents are the slowest or softest. Because most coldwater lies have slow currents, the flies we present will drift by at a very slow rate, and fish unfortunately get plenty of time to evaluate it." Rich Culver delivers excellent advice about why soft, "self-motivated" tying materials make more sense as the temperature drops. In Alaska's Capital Cities Weekly.

This week, Phil Monahan's "Fine Lines" column takes on the challenge of explaining how best to hook big trout on tiny flies. "I have such a hard time getting small hooks into fish-even small fish, especially when swinging emergers," says reader Joshua B. "I get frustrated feeling the tug, only to set the hook and pull the fly right out of the fish's mouth."

Excerpt: "This is a very common problem, and I threw the question out to some guide friends who regularly fish with tiny patterns. Jackson Hole-based guide, tier, and author Scott Sanchez notes that Joshua is facing more than one problem: "There sound like two issues: Small hooks and swinging flies."

"Finicky summer trout that often refuse a tiny, careful imitation of a midge or gnat will lower their standards in October. They'll aggressively attack some gigantic gaudy thing that as far as I know resembles no creature found in nature." Gary Thompson writes about his arm going numb from catching fish in the Poconos in the Philadelphia Daily News.

This week on "Fine Lines," Phil Monahan answers a MidCurrent reader's question about how best to prepare for a guided trip. Casting practice, communication, and dressing for the conditions, he notes, will make a good day with a pro even better. After all, you're paying for the company of an expert -- you should make the most of it.

"1. Practice casting. This is a no-brainer because the better you can cast the more likely you can put the fly where the guide asks you to put it. Frank Smethurst, who has guided from the Rockies to Baja California, wrote: "The three most important things that would make any guide trip on any waterway better would be casting, casting and casting. The toughest thing to hear before any day of guiding begins is 'It has been a couple of years since I have picked up one of these' while vaguely wiggling the rod.... All of the flies tied and articles read will never help as much as an hour spent airing out the line and throwing some yarn around at plates or hoops on the lawn."

"It's been raining for days, and pewter skies laden with clouds etch the horizon. Riparian valleys roar in harmony to the cadence of biblical rain while local rivers that once flowed like gin back in August now tumble like chocolate mocha over windfalls and scattered logjams." Alaska's Rich Culver points out that learning a few slack-line casts will help your fly sink into the zone and allow it to drift longer, avoiding the affects of current that cause your fly to drag and swing upwards. On CapitalCityWeekly.com.

In this week's "Fine Lines" column, Phil Monahan answers a reader request for advice on how to pick up and reposition long casts on big rivers. As Phil notes, "There is an easy way to do this, but you'll need to master a couple of simple tricks: the roll-cast pickup and the snap-T cast. It's a three-step process. First, a roll-cast pickup allows you to get the line to the surface, so you can move it upstream more easily. Then, the snap-T moves your line from downstream to upstream. And finally, another roll-cast pickup gets the line airborne, so you can make the presentation cast."

In this morning's Denver Post, Charlie Meyers interviews four Colorado experts on the techniques they use for reaching fish that have gone deep. Fly designer John Barr has two favorite fall flies, one of them " a large, top-water fly with a rabbit-strip tail, a marabou collar, large eyes and deer-hair head tied almost vertically for maximum water movement when stripped. 'You want to be able to spray water, push a gentle bow wake or everything in between,' Barr says of a pattern designed for calm conditions."

In his latest podcast, Tom Rosenbauer suggests that one of the best things you can do when trying to land big fish in fast water is to be sure you will be able to follow the fish downstream.

"We all have problems playing fish in fast water. I know that when you're steelhead fishing you figure that if you land one out of four or five steelhead hooked -- particularly when you are in fast water -- you're doing pretty well. And people when they first start steelhead fishing get all frustrated because they lose a lot of fish. These are hot fish, they're in fast water, and they jump and they run and they turn and twist and never give up."

One thing that many serious fly fishers keep quiet about is their passion for brook trout. It's not that they're embarrassed by the size of the fish. Quite the contrary. It's that catching beautiful fish in unmarked streams on small rods is often best enjoyed privately. Ken Allen offers advice for fall brook trout fishing this morning on MaineToday. "After admiring the colorful, 11-inch brookie with its fluorescent-orange flanks, three-dimensional red spots, vivid cerulean aureoles and ultra-distinct vermiculations, I released it. The trout shot away toward the undercut bank, where it would lie - hopefully - until my next visit."

In his new podcast, Tom explains the difference between braided-monofilament and furled leaders, and offers some expert insight on why you might want to stick with nylon in standard trout leader setups.

"I use nylon leaders for most of my trout fishing, because they float better than fluorocarbon, and most of the time I don't want my leader to sink too much. If I'm fishing a dry fly, I don't want it to pull the fly under. If I'm fishing a nymph, I want part of my leader to float so that the front of my fly line floats so I can see a fish strike. Also it's easier to get a drag-free float."

On braided vs. furled: "These leaders are constructed in different ways. Braided leaders are made up of many tiny filaments, and they're hollow inside -- the filaments are braided around a hollow core. Furled leaders are slightly different in that they're a solid core, made of a bunch of filaments that are twisted together."

"Fine Lines" columnist Phil Monahan takes on the first real "stumper" question from a MidCurrent reader. Read what Brian O'Keefe, Paul Schullery and other experts come up with as possible answers to a New Zealand angler's dropper-fly puzzle.

"Half-a-thousand feet later, we soaked our hot feet in the stream and breathed deeply of the fresh air, cooled by the willows and massive sentinel cottonwoods. The fly box came out, as did a 3-weight rod and a fist-sized reel older than both of us. Most of the flies -- the patterns anyway -- were generations old, a reminder that anglers who waded before us had the right ideas about what attracts a trout's attention...." Dave Buchanan clambers about mountain streams and beaver ponds and advises that an angler can learn as much about reading water from flipping short casts to pockewater as they can from big rivers. In the Grand Junction (Colorado) Sentinel.

In this new podcast, Tom describes several ways to turn a potential washout into gangbuster trout fishing.

"In dirty water, fish can sometimes feed quite heavily. And if you can, you want to catch a river on the rise. Whether it's from hydro-generation dam releases, or a sudden thunderstorm, or a period of heavy rain, when the water first goes up that dislodges nymphs and crayfish and washes earthworms into the stream. The baitfish get disoriented because they get pushed around by the faster current. Gamefish know this, and they really go on the prowl."

Field & Stream's Kirk Deeter demonstrates how a short upstream cast sets the stage for an easy cross-stream presentation -- a great way to avoid bushes and trees at your back.

This week on "Fine Lines," Phil Monahan suggests that you stop worrying about perfect fish measurements and start using the most obvious "yardstick" there is. (Hint: you may have to get your elbow wet.)

After noting the need for stealth, Tom goes on to tackle the various casts that are effective in small-stream fishing and makes some intelligent suggestions for flies, rods and leaders.

"There are some very useful casts in small-stream fishing. You often don't have a lot of backcast room. You don't need it, because your casts are going to be short anyway; you don't want to be casting forty feet in a tiny mountain stream, or you'll be casting around the next bend. My advice to you, if you want to do small stream fishing, is that you want to become one with the roll cast, the cross-body cast, and the backhand cast."

In his recent podcast, Tom Rosenbauer lists the top five errors fly fishers make when casting.

Excerpt: "Number one is too much false casting. The more your line stays in the air, the more likely you're going to screw up. When the line is on the water, you can't make a casting mistake. And really, it only takes two -- at the most, three -- false casts to lengthen your line, to dry off your fly, to reposition your casting angle. Any more than that is really wasted effort, and the more chance you're going to hit a tree, you're going to drop your backcast, the wind is going to catch your cast."

Fishing the North Dry Fork near De Beque, Colorodo, Joe Doggett is reminded that hasty fish strikes are not the height of fashion in lazy water. "The 5-weight fly line sailed overhead, piling in a miserable rubble amid the streamside brush. 'What happened?' I wailed. High Lonesome Ranch head guide Mark Weaver shook his head. 'You were too fast on the draw; you've got to give those big trout in slow water time to go back down with the fly.'" In the Houston Chronicle.

We'd all be just as happy making quartering upstream casts across unbroken currents and setting the hook with a semi-straight fly line. But sometimes complicated flows and difficult approaches make it impossible to achieve drag-free drifts. That's where the downstream presentation shines. This week on "Fine Lines" Phil Monahan tells us how to use the downstream drift effectively -- why a slack-line cast makes it possible, and what to be ready for when a trout takes your fly.

This week in MidCurrent's "Fine Lines," Phil Monahan pays tribute to Bill Tapply, who died on July 28 (see "Author William Tapply Dies"), by noting the late author's advice to anglers who are new to fishing spooky trout. Here are five simple ideas -- tenets, really -- that will help you fool wary fish in bright conditions and clear water.

"Step 1: Locate the Fish. If you can spot a fish or see rises, this is simple. If there are no visible trout, you need to focus on the most likely holding water. Tapply notes that the largest, wariest fish often hold in places that are hardest to cast to or where it's very difficult for an angler to get a good drift. This is no coincidence. Look for big trout in slower water, in shadows, and close to obstacles, such as weeds or wood."

"When fishing egg patterns, I use two different techniques, and I fish both methods using a full floating line. The first method is the standard 'high stick' nymph technique. I use a 9 to 10 foot leader, a few BB-sized split shot (depending on the flow and depth of the water I am fishing) and a single egg pattern." Rich Culver offers a couple of tips on using egg patterns during spawning season on Alaskan salmon rivers. In southwest Alaska's Capital City Weekly.

"Hoppers are also very angler friendly. Unlike one of the late summer's other great hatches, the tiny Tricorythodes mayfly, you don't need perfect vision simply to tie your fly on, much less actually see it on water. Most hopper patterns are tied on a No. 6 or 8 long-shank hook, which is huge for a dry fly." And don't forget that the "hopper-dropper" combination can make a great rig for hot summer days. Lawrence Pyne writes about the joys of summer hopper fishing in the Burlington Free Press.

In his latest podcast, Tom Rosenbauer tells everything he knows about sinking lines.

"I see the purpose of sinking lines as allowing you to retrieve a fly at a lower level, whether it's in a lake, or a river, or a pond, or the ocean. The problem with a floating line, even with a weighted fly like a big tung-head muddler or a conehead woolly bugger, is that after you make your first couple of strips the fly gets drawn to the surface."

"'As a father, you want your kids to do better than you did, in sports and everything else,'' Hanousek said. 'Similarly, as a hunter and a fisherman, my goal, over time, was to have my kids outfish and outhunt me. When that finally happened, when I saw my sons outfish me, I was joyful.'" Dennis Anderson writes about the three fly fishing generations of Hanouseks, whose senior member Dick Hanousek seems to have his priorities straight. Come to think of it, teaching your kids all of the things they'll need to know to outfish you suggests some pretty good guidelines: don't rush them, make it a good experience, and teach them to love being there. In the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune.

"Our guide scooped the fish up in his big net and plucked out the little fly that had fooled so many trout that afternoon: a pattern of Dye's own design called the Pearl Jam -- nothing but a slim body of pearl flash wrapped onto a curved hook with a tiny tungsten bead at the head, in size 22 (or was it 24?)." Morgan Lyle takes a trip to Colorado and discovers that tiny flies work just as well as they do in New York -- especially if you have a talented guide like Bob Dye spotting fish. In the Schenectady Daily Gazette.

Fly Talk's Kirk Deeter has been fly fishing for stripers in Maine this week and learning how to forget a bad habit -- namely struggling to get a fast-moving fish on the reel as soon as possible. Instead, he points out that keeping a nice arc in the rod should be the focus, and delivers some sound advice from guide Peter Fallon: "'Any fish that deserves to be fought on a reel will eventually find its way to the reel anyway.' True enough. Any fish that pulls hard enough to show you the benefit of a disc drag reel is going to take care of that slack issue for you..."

In many years of guiding and fishing, I've seen knots fail and not fail often enough to develop some prejudices. If anything, our opinions about knots are a lot like our notions about flies. We have reasons to trust knots -- even if they are not scientific -- and we tend to use the knots that we used the last time we caught a fish. In a fly fisher's leader the knot that draws the most scrutiny -- and therefore the most opinionating -- is the tippet-to-fly knot. The reason is obvious: it's the "weakest link," being tied in the thinnest part of the line or the section most exposed to abrasion. We're inclined to doubt the terminal knot more than any other, and any time our guide or resident micrometer-and-tensile-strength expert discovers a "better way," we rank it as brilliant science.

This week Phil Monahan offers his brief take on how to evaluate fly-to-tippet knots. He goes on to explain something that's never made it into most knot books: it's often the tier that makes a knot good or bad.

"I'll start at the beginning. We arrived on the river prepared to have a pleasant morning of no-brainer dry fly-fishing to a little size 16 tan caddisfly that had been predictably trickling out of the riffles first thing in the morning. The word was that all you needed was a size 16 or 18 Puterbaugh Foam Caddisfly imitation, and the trout were yours." Fishing the South Platte in Colorado, Ed Engle shows how even the most careful approach to fly selection and stream reading doesn't always solve a mystery. In the Boulder Daily Camera.

In his most recent podcast, Tom Rosenbauer lists the five most common mistakes anglers make with leaders and tippets. "Number one, not testing knots. I make this mistake all the time. I don't know how many times I've tied on a fly quickly, I've made a cast, a fish has struck, and I come back with a pigtail on the end of my line because I didn't pass the end of the clinch not through the loop, or I didn't tighten it properly or didn't test it."

"Feeling the sting, the brown swam back across to the back eddy and sulked. I only had to replace 24 inches of 7X and tie on another Size 22 Trico spinner. No sooner had I accomplished it had the trout drifted back across and began feeding again." Bill Ferris's story about finally catching a large brown reminds us that not all fish are put off by having a few flies tattoo their jaws. In the Cumberland County Pennsylvania Sentinel.

Anyone who's tried setting the hook on a fish with the assistance of sound alone will appreciate Dennis Anderson's description of paddling a small Wisconsin stream at night. "This small-stream traveling at night presents its own form of trout fishing, particularly so on a river marked by so many deadfalls. Casting 7-weight rods with heavy, short leaders, the undertaking, in boxer's terms, is less light-footed punching than stand-and-slug." In the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune.

Most of us think of terrestrials only when most of the early- to mid-summer hatches wane, making it easy to forget that unique opportunities can arrive in almost any warm weather. Case in point: a carpenter ant "hatch" that provided lots of action in Estes Park waters last week. As Mike Oatley notes: "Excess queens leave colonies, fly off and drop their wings, with the intent of starting a new colony. For a few days, maybe a week or so, these big, black ants are everywhere, and the trout gorge on them." In the Estes Park Trail-Gazette.

Tom Rosenbauer's latest podcast covers reading high- and low-water conditions in trout streams, saltwater tide conditions, food availability and current flows. "When the water is really low, you want to look for the main flow in the stream, the thalweg. If you trace the main flow of water through the stream. And you can find that line by looking for a debris line or foam line -- all the bubbles that trace a line down the thalweg. So the fish are going to be closer to that current because that's where the food is."

Rosenbauer's recent revision of his classic Orvis Guide to Prospecting for Trout goes into great detail on all aspects of trout hunting.

"Riffles are fly factories; mating mayflies seek them out as the place to lay their eggs, and the riffles are where many aquatic insects live most of their underwater lives, mostly clinging to rocks or burrowed in silt but sometimes drifting or swimming, at their peril." Morgan Lyle talks about the pluses of the babbling brook. From DailyGazette.com.

In his latest podcast, Rosenbauer describes several important considerations for those interested in fly fishing the saltwater surf. He advises looking for specific clues in currents, looking for the shallowest fish, and using a stripping basket.

Excerpt: "One thing that people have taught me about fishing the surf is looking for 'guzzles.' If you a see a spot where there is kind of a foam line that extends back into the surf after a wave breaks, that means there's additional turbulence or a pocket there, and often those areas around the guzzles will hold both baitfish and gamefish."

"Even on the darkest night, the angler's eyes become adapted enough after 30 minutes or so that newly hatched insects floating down the river can be seen 10 yards away." Eric Sharp offers several tips on fishing Michigan's Hexagenia hatches, which peak in late June and early July.

New on MidCurrent this week, Phil Monahan offers excellent advice about how to approach and fish wild trout in high-mountain streams. As Phil notes, it's all about stealth, short drifts, and working every part of the water.

EXCERPT: "Always work upstream, which gives you the advantage of approaching trout from the rear. Some folks take extreme stealth measures -- crawling on hands and knees up to each pool -- but if you simply crouch, avoid jerky movements, and keep your shadow off the water, you should be fine."

When Lefty Kreh's new magnum opus on fly casting arrived at the office late last fall, I could hardly believe what came out of the box. Fly Casting With Lefty Kreh was 456 pages, 1,110 color photos, and covered just about every cast you can imagine. It's the most encyclopedic coverage of fly casting techniques in print.

This week on MidCurrent Lefty shows how to deliver a slack-leader cast, step-by-step. A more subtle but in some ways simpler version of a stack cast, it's one of Lefty's favorite ways to start drag-free presentations without sacrificing accuracy.

Kirk Deeter shows how lifting a pile of fly line with the rod tip can help improve your timing on the stream. On FieldandStream.com.

"As with that 'good walk spoiled' sport [golf], you use your hands, forearms, biceps and back to really cast / drive far, but with close-range bass-fly action near lily pads it's a short cast (like a putt) that will turn the trick. If possible, you want that fly to plop on a lily pad, so that you can gently ease it off, and twitch it above the imagined bass." Steve Hickoff gives an excellent description of what fly fishing for bass is really all about on Fosters.com.

After noting that the Colorado runoff is likely to peak early this year, Ed Engle offers several excellent bits of advice for nymphing in high water, among them fishing the slower bank water, using high-contrast nymphs in off-color water, and looking for "velocity barriers." "Just stand on the bank, cast upstream and dead drift the fly the same way you would short line a nymph imitation when the water is lower. The only difference is that for high-water conditions you'll probably need a more heavily weighted fly or you'll have to add more weight to the leader." In the Boulder, Colorado Daily Camera.

Ever worry that if your partner in the bow of the drift boat gets more excited he's going to plant one in your ear? Thinking that taking your wife on a float trip could end your marriage? This week Phil Monahan offers some simple advice about casting from a drift boat, sifted from his time rowing clients on the Yellowstone. It starts, he says, with abstinence.

Beyond noting that "many people stand where they should be fishing and fish where they should be standing," Eric Sharp says it's hard to go wrong during this extended salmon season on the St. Mary's River. "Most years the St. Marys steelhead run would have petered out by June. This year, the big, migratory rainbows are still thick as fleas in the rapids on the Canadian side of the river, and they should be there at least another two weeks and maybe longer." In the Detroit Free Press.

50 to 90% of a trout's diet consists of subsurface food, depending on the species of fish and availability of hatches. And as any converted dry fly purist can tell you, nymph fishing demands at least as much study as drifting dries, if only because fishing beneath the surface offers so few clues from both the fly and the fish. In this week's MidCurrent video, John Smeraglio demonstrates a particularly effective to fish subsurface: using a single nymph with a strike indicator on a hinged leader. The video comes from Smeraglio and Hafele's new "Advanced Nymph Fishing" DVD, which contains almost 3 hours of detailed instruction on everything from setting up single and multi-nymph systems to modifying mending techniques for better results.

Buy "Advanced Nymph Fishing" on DVD.

Besides offering what are no doubt the first pictures of fly fishing doyenne Joan Wulff casting a tenkara rod, a new post on the Tenkara USA blog includes some intriguing thoughts from tenkara authority Dr. Hisao Ishigaki on how simple trout flies can be: "It should be noted that Dr. Ishigaki is a leading specialist in the field of 'Visual Training," which is used regularly by different groups of individuals, including professional athletes, and he used that to study the vision of fish, particularly mountain trout. Ever since then, he's been tying one fly pattern, which takes seconds to tie, and many times is tied using only black thread from a $1 store, and some rooster hackle."

Morgan Lyle also talks about the talk Dr. Ishigaki gave at the talk at the Catskill Fly Fishing Center and Museum Saturday, noting that even Ed Van Put is enamored of the technique: "About 10 years ago, Van Put was given a tenkara rod by a Japanese ambassador and 'just went ballistic with it,' he said. 'I started fishing with it every day, and I've used it every year since.'" (From DailyGazette.com.)

A free MidCurrent t-shirt goes to the first person who shows us an image of someone using (successfully) tenkara in saltwater.

Depending on whether you are a cynic or more of a sanguine type, you may see the South Korean sport of indoor fishing as either a bleak commentary or just a cultural curiosity. James Card writes about it The New York Times. "Picking a seat is as important as picking a fishing spot along a river. Not all the water in the pool is equal, as there are detectable currents from the water pump system. I glimpse shadows of fish hanging around the flowage. Already four anglers sit at different spots around the rectangle, staring at the glow-stick bobbers."

John Weiss learns nymph fishing from the pros and discovers that no matter how deadly the fly pattern, confidence is the essential ingredient. "When trout feed on the surface and I have the right fly, I love it. It's elegant -- the line shooting out in long looping arches and firing back, trout slurping the stylish fly, the hook set, the bend of the rod, the tug of the fish. Then there's nymphing." In the Rochester, Minnesota Post-Bulletin.

"The leader-butt diameter should be two-thirds of the diameter of the end of your fly line for best performance. The 5-weight fly line you may use for fishing small dry flies has a tip diameter of about .030 inch. The 9-foot, 6X leader you attach to it should then have a butt diameter of about .020 inch." MidCurrent editorial board member John Merwin writes for Field & Stream on how to make the basics choices for leaders and tippets.

"The life-like replication of a damsel nymph on it's way into the shallow water to emerge as an adult is obtained by short casts of the fly to about 10 feet from the shoreline. Allow the fly to sink a little and then retrieve it at a steady pace. The fly should travel at about 5 seconds per foot." R.J. Mere provides a good intro to fishing damselfly patterns on SeacoastOnline.com.

For more on damselflies, read Evelyn Spence's "Damselfly Days" on MidCurrent.

This week on MidCurrent we take a look inside the fly box of shop owner and saltwater fly innovator Gary Merriman. Merriman's name isn't immediately recognizable to many anglers. But his now-famous tarpon Toad fly gained him cult status among guides and anglers who've used it for the past fifteen years to fool tarpon.

Although he's been fly fishing the Keys since the early 1970s, it was Merriman's use in the early 1990s of neutral-buoyancy flies that swam -- rather than classic patterns which rose and fell in the water column -- that changed the sport for him and for the many anglers and guides who later picked up on the idea.

David Liepman profiles Donna O'Sullivan, who proves that height has nothing to do with a person's ability to spey cast (she's five feet tall). "After winning the first three annual contests, O'Sullivan has come up against some stiff competition in recent years. She came in second place in 2007, third in 2008 and lost to ex-San Franciscan Whitney Gould last month in the 2009 Spey-O-Rama." In the San Francisco Examiner.

Team USA Fly Fishing member Pete Erickson is practicing for the upcoming championships in Scotland by perfecting his stillwater techniques, including fishing with three-fly rigs and learning different retrieves for different depths. "To consistently catch fish, you have to constantly adapt to the changing situations on the water, which he said he learned from his fellow competitors, especially the Europeans. 'They know if a cloud comes over they need to switch lines,' he said." Roger Phillips in the Idaho Statesman.

The Fédération Internationale de Peche Sportive Mouche ("International Sport Flyfishing Federation") 2009 championships will be held in Drymen, Scotland this year from June 5 through 12.

Former Olympic skier and repeat tarpon tournament champion Andy Mill goes back to a sport he covered on television fifteen years ago: fly fishing for big grass carp in Florida's roadside canals. "Mill throws his line in a perfectly tight loop so that the fly alights beneath a broad, leafy ficus tree. The fly, a tiny cork ball painted cherries-jubilee red with Avon nail polish, bobs briefly on the canal's riffled surface. Suddenly, a wake foams up from nowhere and the fly disappears as Mill's rod bends into a semicircle." Susan Cocking in The Miami Herald.

By the way, Mill's new in-depth book on fly fishing for tarpon is due out from Wild River Press later this year. Reports from early readers say it will be quite a collection of insights.

It might be a stretch to say that pouring delicate designs in the foam of a latte cup will help you become a better caster, but latte artist and fly fisher David Schomer draws several similarities between mastering nano-bubble milk spirals and his other passion. "When pouring latte art there is a mimicking of this process swinging the pitcher side to side, waiting for the milk to 'load' up in the side of the pitcher before changing direction and swinging it to the other side. Typically new people oscillate the pitcher back and forth too quickly, trying to rush the process. The side to side motion needs to be more rhythmical, almost lazy, much like the casting of a fly line." On CoffeeGeek.com.

Rosenbauer's podcast focuses on how water flow effects trout fishing, especially early in the season.

Excerpt: "To understand flow, you first need to understand how trout use it. And trout love to be in areas that are adjacent to relatively fast current -- because that brings them the food -- but protected from the current. Studies have measured the flow in places that trout seem to prefer -- in the bottom of the river or the middle of the river -- and trout seem to like flows that are about one foot per second, about the speed of a slow walk. This is difficult for us to predict, because flow is going in three dimensions and it's invisible."

In his latest podcast author Tom Rosenbauer talks about the best patterns to use during early-season Baetis hatches.

Excerpt: "You may have heard of these little brownish-olive mayflies called 'olives,' or 'blue-winged olives.' Some people called them 'blue quills.' Baetis is the Latin name for the genus of these flies, so a lot of fly fishers use the term 'Baetis.' They're also called 'little olives' and 'pale olives' -- there's lots of different names for them, but the Baetis genus of mayflies are all kind of olive or olive-brownish in color. They range in size from a 16 to a 22 or even a 24. The most common ones early season are about an 18 or a 20. But the Baetis mayfly is the most common mayfly in the world."

Writer and Scott Fly Rod Pro Staff member Rich Culver offers advice on preparing to fly fish for salmon and char near southeast Alaskan coastal estuaries. Where the water can change 22 feet in depth, it's all about studying the tides. "Ebb tides are worth fishing, too, especially near the bottom of the tidal cycle. I've noted on many occasions that an ebb tide in the early morning hours usually leaves a generous number of fresh fish holding in the channels, and most will aggressively grab the first fly they see." In the Capital City Weekly.

If you interested in video on shoreline and estuary fishing, check out Jeff Putnam's instructional clip on MidCurrent.

"Give the thermometer a couple of shakes and these bugs respond accordingly. Thus the effect of the canyon also plays a major role in the march. Shielded from the sun, these swifter, cooler waters actually can cause the caddis to boogie backward a few steps." In the Denver Post, Charlie Meyers suggests ways to avoid the frustration attendant with chasing the year's first major hatch of caddisflies.

Question: What's the most common yet perplexing presentation challenge you'll face when stepping into a trout stream? Answer: Delivering your fly to fish behind a large rock or boulder.

As Phil Monahan points out in this week's MidCurrent "Fine Lines" answer, approaching from downstream, high-sticking to avoid drag, and covering the four key lines of drift are among the techniques likely improve your hook-up rate.

(Don't forget that if you have a fly fishing question you'd like answered, you can email it ask@midcurrent.com.)

We'll leave it to you to decide whether Tenkara -- which means "from heaven" or "from the sky" in Japanese -- has a chance of revolutionizing U.S. fly fishing the way two-handed techniques did thirty years ago, but there's no question that it provides an interesting, simpler alternative to fly fishing formulas that seem only to get more complex. The gear and methods are quite basic -- not counting anyone brave enough to construct their own furled lines and leaders. An 11- to 13-foot rod is used to deliver a fly on the end of a furled line/leader that is attached directly to the rod tip.

Tenkara has been practiced for hundreds of year in Japan, and started with bamboo rods, according to Tenkara USA, a new company started by Daniel W. Galhardo, a Golden Gate Angling and Casting Club director. As their Web site says: "The few elements between you and the fish, along with the sensitive rod, will transmit even the smallest vibrations directly to your hands. The tenkara techniques are very well suited for: fishing a dry-fly (virtually drag-free due to the supple line and little line in the water), dapping a fly on a pool or holding it on an eddy for a long time, Czech-nymphing, playing a soft-hackle wet fly, and playing the traditional reverse hackle flies." Tenkara USA is selling telescoping graphite rods (they collapse to 20 inches) that it hopes will appeal to small-stream and backpacking fly fishers. (Thanks to reader Andrew Steketee for this link.)

Read the full press release in the extended entry.

Kirk Deeter demonstrates how to avoid false casting and let the current do the work when doing repetitive drifts with a nymph rig. On Fly Talk.

This week on MidCurrent master one-handed and two-handed casting instructor Jeff Putnam takes us saltwater fly fishing on the boundary between shoreline and estuary. Putnam manages tricky currents and places his flies in the spots most likely to hold baitfish and predators, using the extra length of a switch rod to cast and control his line. Watch "Fly Fishing Shoreline Surf and Estuaries."

Ed Engle goes fishing with buddy John Gierach and has what most will recognize as typical pre-excitement fishing, where prospecting and persistence make the difference. "We dawdled at the coffee shop in Lyons, light heartedly complained about the bluebird skies and philosophized about the relative merits of reading the classics instead of modern western literature. In short, it was pretty much what we always do when we think the Blue-winged Olives will be coming off the Big Thompson River in the afternoon." In the Boulder Daily Camera.

"I took casting lessons on dry land in a park near my Alexandria, Va., home. 'You've got natural rhythm,' called out a homeless guy who was watching me. Everyone, it seems, is an expert on fly-fishing." In USA Today's new magazine OpenAir, newcomer Mindy Fetterman is convinced by a friend to take up fly fishing, and eventually finds herself in a hypnotic trance in the middle of Montana's Madison River.

Answering a number of recent questions to MidCurrent about freshwater fly selection, Phil Monahan gathered an impressive list of "Top Ten Fly" choices for this week's "Fly Lines" feature. Brian O'Keefe, Tom Rosenbauer, Buzz Bryson, John Merwin, William Tapply, Bryan Gregson, Zach Matthews, and even Phil himself revealed their favorite ten flies. Very interesting stuff, especially when you consider the range of experiences these "guides, writers and fish bums" have had.

Question: How do you organize your fresh water fly boxes? Do you have a Top-10 list of dry & wet flies that you'll always carry?

Answer: There are lots of ways to organize your flies: by season, by species, by kind of water, by fly style, by color, and so on. Experts will obviously disagree on both of Mark's questions, so here's a sampling of responses from guides, writers, and fish bums of every stripe.

Professor Michael Steinberg of the University of Alabama seems to have landed a formula for getting college students engaged in fly fishing: Teach them more than how to move a rod from 10 to 2 -- in other words conservation, entomology and the literature. "The class includes 17 students and filled up fast. His next offering in fall already has a waiting list." Robert Dewitt on TuscaloosaNews.com.

Kirk Deeter of Field & Stream says it's pretty simple to figure out the timing of your backcast: just imagine you have a cup of water and you're tossing it behind you. Another clever video from the crew who brought us the motorcycle reel tests.

If you haven't heard of or seen the Moffit Angling System by now, you've missed one of the year's more controversial innovations. The Moffit System uses hookless flies that can be looped on and off the leader above a barbless circle hook, with the intended result of hooking fish in the outer jaw instead of inside the mouth or in the gills. The inventor, Pat Moffit, came up with the idea while searching for a system that would help reduce fish mortality. Moffit is a retired environmental scientist and lifetime fly angler and fly tier and designed his system specifically to reduce damage and disfigurement to trout. Why is it controversial? Because at first glance it is similar to rigs that are sometimes used to snag fish, and because some state laws that define what is "acceptable" terminal tackle may prohibit its use. There are also fly fishers who feel the system is too great a departure from the classic idea of the sport. (Of course there are also anlgers who, a century after a raging debate between icons of the sport, question whether fishing with a nymph is "real" fly fishing.) On the other hand the system has received endorsements from fly fishing experts like John Randolph and John Merwin, who've both fished the system extensively. Probably the easiest way to judge whether the Moffit System might be worth a close look is to watch their video on how it works.

Behind the scenes Moffit has been completing their product catalog and is about to update their Web site with new steelhead and trout flies.

"For two or more decades, fly fishing has increasingly been marked by complexity, hyperbole, expense, intrusion of celebrities, stressful travel, greedy striving for ever-more and bigger trout, and anxiety." In the Boulder Daily Camera, Gordon Wickstrom take up the pencil to underline Ed Engle's call for the return to a less complex perspective on fly fishing.

This week Phil Monahan, former long-time editor of American Angler magazine, will begin responding to reader-submitted questions in a new section of our site and homepage called "Fine Lines." He starts with something very simple: how to unravel prepackaged leaders without creating a bird's nest.

But Phil intends to cover all aspects of fly-fishing -- from knots and rigging to angling tactics to fish biology. As he notes, "Over many years as a guide and editor, I have come in contact with a lot of experts -- people who know a heck of a lot more about these subjects than I do -- and I'll use these sources to formulate the best possible answers to your queries."

We're hoping visitors will flood us with questions, with this caveat: If you submit a question, try to make it as specific as possible. If you ask "How do I fish a nymph?" the subject is too large -- enough to fill a couple of books --and we'd end up just scratching the surface. The most useful questions will be extremely specific, allowing us to cover the topic completely. A question such as "What's the best way to fish a nymph behind a midstream boulder?" will let us really dig into the nitty-gritty details of rigging, positioning, and presentation -- stuff that you can immediately put to use on the water. To submit your question, simply email it to Phil at ask@midcurrent.com.

One of our favorite books on soft hackle flies (also known as "flymphs," "winged wets," and a variety other names) is in its second edition and shows little signs of aging. The Soft-Hackled Fly, the 1975 original, helped create a resurgence in what many fly fishers had dismissed as an arcane method of tying and presenting flies. Prior to this book, soft-hackles had lost favor to the more "scientific" imitations of dry flies and nymphs. Now few trout shops don't offer at least a few "spiders," "wingless wets" or "soft-hackle emergers." Nemes's revised 2006 book, The Soft-Hackled Fly and Tiny Soft Hackles: A Trout Fisherman's Guide (Stackpole, 221 pages) is an enriched version of the earlier book with more photos and more patterns -- he even tackles tiny midges and tricos -- but the same unforced writing style that makes the book a pleasure to read.

Nemes, predictably, is a purist. (He once responded to someone who asked "Do you ever tie your flies as beadheads?" with ""Why don't you just get a spinning rod?") But he demonstrates that all the careful attention to color, materials, and tying techniques that are so important to dry flies and nymphs matter just as much in what looks to be the very simple construction of soft hackles. Soft-hackles, you might say, are only as simple as you want them to be.

Jack Gartside began tying soft-hackles as a teenager in the 1950s after reading a Ray Bergman article in Outdoor Life magazine titled "Basic Wet Flies for Trout Fishing." He then did the thing that most of us do, which is to tie and fish ever-more-complicated imitations. But he later became attached again to impressionistic flies and even began including soft-hackle concepts in his saltwater patterns.

You can see a great selection of soft-hackle patterns on Hans Weilenmann's Flytier's site. For more on the history of soft-hackles, check out Flymph.com. And for more on the techniques used to effectively fish soft-hackles and other wet flies, read John Likakis's "Swinging Wet Flies" on MidCurrent.

The Soft-Hackled Fly and Tiny Soft Hackles: A Trout Fisherman's Guide on Amazon.

Field & Stream's John Merwin weighs in on a new hookless-fly rig that has recently caused disagreement among even the purists. Does it provide another way to reduce fish mortality, or does it rub against the collective zeitgeist of the sport? Merwin says, "The advantage lies not in hooking more fish but in doing less damage to those you want to release. The mechanics of Moffitt's system are such that it's virtually impossible to hook a fish in the tongue or gullet, inside the gills, or in the eye, as sometimes happens with conventional flies."

On Fly Talk, Tim Romano notes the uncanny success of some fly fishers who outfish the hardware guys when it comes to catching hawg largemouth -- among them, Conway Bowman. "Bowman states, 'I sat there the other day watching a number of bass boats compete by chucking huge jigs along this piece of water for a couple hours. I watched from shore, let them all leave and waded shallow throwing a small Meat Whistle and absolutely cleaned up.'"

Coincidentally, for the past two weeks MidCurrent has had an investigative reporter in the tiny Georgia hamlet of Crayville researching rumors that a group of fly fishers there repeatedly topped the Perry largemouth record (read Sowbelly: The Obsessive Quest for the World-Record Largemouth Bass) in the 1960s -- all on a fly that no one will reveal. Be sure to check back in early April, by which time we expect to have the full story and maybe even a picture of the fly.

It wasn't too long ago that fly fishing was being infiltrated by "blueliners." (Did MidCurrent coin that term? I can't remember.) Bluelining is an escape to the wild, a search for the secret stream, armed only with topo maps and the barest assortment of gear. Now the practice of fishing farm ditches, stagnant creeks and urban canals -- in many cases snubbing one's nose at the lack of seclusion -- has earned its own cache, according to Justin Scheck in today's Wall Street Journal. "Brownliners enjoy fly-fishing's primary perks -- the suspense of watching a fly disappear beneath the water's surface, the struggle of man against beast, the spinning of fish stories. If that doesn't come with fresh water and clean air, so be it." (Thanks to readers Charles Kreitler and Rob Willis for this link.)

There's much to be said for simplicity. Ed Engle prefers fly fishing and especially midging without use of fancy -- and even more effective -- techniques and rigs. "My most memorable fish have been the ones where there was as little between me and the trout as possible. That means no junk or gizmos attached to the leader other than a single small, unweighted fly that I've tied myself and the application of a no-nonsense aesthetically pleasing, but practical, cast. The icing on the cake is when the trout takes my artificial fly in precisely the same way that it has taken the naturals." In the Boulder Daily Camera.

A new podcast by Tom Rosenbauer includes his favorite techniques for using multi-fly rigs to catch trout.

Excerpt: "This is a new craze that is actually an old craze. Back in the nineteenth century, people used only wet flies on multi-fly rigs. They would use as many as fifteen flies on a leader, and they would throw this what they called 'cast' of flies out there and let them swing in the current. Some of the flies would swing under the surface of the water, and some would sort of dap just under the surface of the water. So they were imitating emerging flies and flies skimming across the surface. It was quite effective, but I don't think any of us what to deal with fifteen flies on a leader."

Read more about multi-fly, dropper, or tandem fly rigs on MidCurrent.

Fish for tarpon long enough and you begin to realize that there is no perfect set of gear, no magic technique, no absolute level of skill. In fact the most common pitfall for tarpon anglers is lack of consistency. When we received a copy of Bill Bishop's new book on tarpon fishing, we opened it hoping that we'd finally hear someone hammer that notion home. Bishop, who spends hundreds of days fly fishing for tarpon each year, didn't disappoint. His High Rollers (Headwater/Stackpole Books, February 2009, 152 pages) is a plain-spoken guide to being able to find, fight and land tarpon based on decades of trial and error.

A tarpon's initial take and jumps rivet us, and for many anglers, it's all that matters. But Bishop likes to land fish quick and remove the hook. This week we excerpt a portion of Bishop's description of the tarpon end-game, a little-considered topic that he covers extremely well.

High Rollers: Fly Fishing for Giant Tarpon on Amazon.

Think about this: the number one cause of drowning for whitewater rafters is foot entrapment. And while fly fishers are more likely to drown from simply doing something wrong -- usually by exhausting themselves in the effort to reach a riverbank -- there's plenty to be learned from the folks who end up "bandersnatched" by big water. Backpacking Light just published a good short video on the various valuable techniques for extricating yourself -- and others -- from a river safely.

Neal Osborn offers a rich resource for fly tiers who want to do take better photographs of their flies -- and for photographers who might wish they could tie better. His FlyArtStudio.com was first noticed by Cameron Mortenson of the Fiberglass Manifesto blog: "Check out Neal's Valentine Edition of Art-Fly which is a monthly slide show giving you a glimpse into the photography techniques Neal is experimenting with and flies he has been tying. I am impressed." Also be sure to check out Osborn's Photography articles, which offer interesting guidance on macro photography techniques.

Be careful where you kayak. That's the lesson learned by Carter Simcoe when he got the notion to paddle his kayak out for some fly fishing near one of Louisana's nearshore oil rigs. "Funny how a little static in the air can turn a fly rod into a lightning rod. I did the only thing I could think to do: snatch the rod and throw it overboard. It wasn't a moment too soon. The closest strike yet thudded nearby, rattling my chest and scorching the air with the smell of a large electrical short, like a blown transformer." On ESPN.com.

As Morgan Lyle notes, you can waste a lot of time in late winter waiting for the first Quill Gordons to come off on eastern streams. Try dark, slim-bodied stonefly nymphs or very small soft hackles to imitate midges and you may forget all about the large mayflies of spring. "The most common winter stoneflies are slim and dark, in size 14 or so. They really get moving around in February, and by March, it's common to see them walking around on the snow alongside the stream." In the Schenectady, New York Daily Gazette.

In a new podcast, author Tom Rosenbauer offers several bits of advice on preparing for success on your first bonefishing trip, including recommendations on casting, seeing fish, and strip-striking.

Excerpt: "The first thing you've got to be able to do is cast forty feet. And you've got to be able to pick up line and cast quickly and accurately. I know you can probably get the line out there forty feet, but I mean forty feet reliably and accurately. You don't really need long casts for most bonefishing. Occasionally a 60- or 70-foot cast is going to get you out of trouble, but most bonefish are caught between 30 or 40 feet from the boat or from the wading angler. But you really have to practice your casting."

"Well, until man is redeemed, he will always take a fly rod too far back ... Then, since it is natural for man to try to attain power without recovering grace, he whips the line back and forth making it whistle each way, and sometimes even snapping off the fly from the leader, but the power that was going to transport the little fly across the river somehow gets diverted into building a bird's nest of line, leader and fly that falls out of the air into the water about ten feet in front of the fisherman." As Norman Maclean's Presbyterian-minister father said in A River Runs Through It, it's "closer to twelve than to two," but for the most part the ten-to-two rule is a pretty reliable simplification for teaching new fly casters the sport. In the Concord New Hampshire Monitor, John Corrigan writes about how casting strokes have been changed by the introduction of new materials and the instructors who adopted their use.

Intimidated by the idea of fishing tiny flies but still want to fish year-round in waters where the only bugs to come off between November and February are size 22s? Tom Rosenbauer offers some excellent advice for beginning midge fishers in his latest podcast.

Excerpt: "There's really no excuse to be scared of fishing these tiny flies. Everybody says 'I can't see those flies when they're on the water.' Well, I've got a surprise for you: most people who fish tiny midges can't see them on the water. What you need to do is just compensate for that. When you fishing a tiny fly, fifty feet away, that's a size 22, there aren't many people who can see that fly. So what do they do? They work on their casting accuracy. They throw the fly out there and hope it's not dragging, and they watch, and if a fish rises anywhere near where the fly is they gently set the hook."

Big waters demand powerful line control and greater reach -- things two-handed rods have delivered in spades for steelheaders. So perhaps it was inevitable that trout anglers would end up adding a further twist to the tradition by figuring out how to make two-handed rods a fixture of trout fishing. Fact is, longer rods offer an immediate distance boost and enable longer drifts -- ideal for folks hunting up big trout in tailwaters or large Western rivers. This week, in his article "Long Shots," Zach Matthews offers highly specific instructions for how to turn a two-handed rod into a magic wand for big trout.

Excerpt: "Imagine yourself in a very common position. The fish you had been targeting close to the bank have wised up. They've left the safe holding water you are standing in, and they've moved to midchannel -- too far to reach and still get a drift with a standard cast. You know the trout are still feeding, if only you can drift a nymph to them. Here's where a two-hander shines."

Spend lots of time on a body of water and you may eventually be lucky enough to come across what I call a "pseudo-hatch:" when unusual conditions trigger the sudden abundance of food for fish and a frenzy of feeding. (I discovered an event like this in Key West in the 1980s, when on a low tide early in the morning oxygen-deprived pipefish and other small bait fish covered the surface of a large basin, sending tarpon into a rampage.)

One little-known but locally famous pseudo-hatch, the shad kill, occurs in Arkansas's White River system, turning monster trout stupid. When the temperature of lakes behind the rivers' dams drops into the mid- to low 40s, dead and dying shad will be sucked through the turbines and spat out into the tailwaters below. Big trout immediately clue into the event and begin eating the shad bodies throughout the water column, although as Steve Dally of Mountain River Fly Shop in Cotter tells us, "the real appeal is when shad bodies litter the surface bringing up the trout for 'dry fly' action." According to Dally, baitfish patterns like Jim Mengle's shad gurgler, Davy Wotton's floating shad, and crease flies are the most productive during these events.

Since this is largely a boat-based fishery, guides are suddenly at a premium when the shad kill starts. But the kill can be expected to continue on and off through February and even early March depending on conditions.

So if you have a hankering to do something different this winter and think you might be able to find your way to Arkansas, check out the coverage on the Mountain River Journal Weblog, which includes some interesting photos by guide Jimmy "T" Traylor. Or if you don't need more convincing, check in at the Mountain River Fly Shop Web site to find out if they have any guides available.

"Nymph-fishing is close work. Fishing without an indicator, I'm forced to make sure that my rod tip is as close as I can get to directly above the fly and little or no line is lying on the water. I have a straighter, tighter connection to the fly." Morgan Lyle notes that while indicators can be an indispensable part of many nymphing techniques, sometimes proximity to the fly and the fish makes all the difference. In the Schenectady, New York Daily Gazette.

If you can stand frozen anchor lines and arranging your own shuttle, drifting Montana's Upper Missouri River in winter can be a great experience. Ryan Casne, who'd drop everything to float the Missouri in cold weather, ties and uses flies that resemble the tiny crustaceans that proliferate in big tailwaters. "While dexterously threading a 5X tippet through the eye of a homemade nymph, Casne advises me, 'Think pink.' His patterns for winter resemble tiny fresh water shrimp, or scuds, or even smaller silvery nymphs, all adorned in flamboyant pink." Chad Trettin on Helenair.com.

Pocketwater is a puzzle to most fly fishers, both because of its zig-zagging currents and because wading and positioning is so often a challenge. In this latest addition to MidCurrent's video collection, LaFontaine gives tips on fly size and casting strokes, and offers excellent small-water advice, like false-casting to the side so that water coming off the fly doesn't spook the fish.

Excerpt: "You're making short casts. And your equipment has to be tailored to that casting style. You have a six- to seven-foot leader, tapered 3- or 4X, and generic flies: generic mayflies, generic caddisflies, generic attractors. So that's all sounds pretty easy. But there's a lesson here that everyone should know. Not only the beginner but maybe even the experienced angler should come and refresh his memory on a stream like this."

More fly fishing videos on MidCurrent.

Tom Rosenbauer's latest podcast offers excellent advice on not only what to do when you find trout in the coldest conditions, but also how to increase your odds by looking for the right type of water in the first place.

Excerpt: "In thirty-two years of fishing, I have yet to catch a fish in the Battenkill in winter. There are just certain rivers where the fish don't feed actively, or they hole up in places that are difficult to find. Some rivers just aren't great for winter fly fishing. The best ones are rivers that stay constant in temperature all year round. I think what happens is that, in a tailwater river below a bottom-release dam, or in a spring creek where the water stays cold in summer even though it's hot outside, the fish get acclimated to the cooler water temperatures and they're more likely to feed during the winter time. Also these types of streams tend to have invertebrates -- small crustaceans like scuds and sowbugs -- and small mayflies and midges that are active in the winter time."

"In the same context, the high-stick Euro system, particularly when combined with longer rods, places demands beyond the physical range of most fly-fishermen. 'I lift weights, but even then I feel pain and fatigue after an hour or so.'" Check out George Daniel's advice on the role of various "Euro-style" nymphing techniques in Charlie Meyers's piece on the upcoming Fly Fishing Show in Denver. Daniels, one of the most successful fly fishing competitors of his era, clears the air about when it comes to European-style nymphing and its effectiveness in various situations and for different levels of angling skill.

Jerome Cramer's 1989 Time magazine article on the intricacies and oddities of fly fishing is still one of my favorites, if only because of his description of the process that turns curiosity into addiction: "If the fly-fisherman is lucky, the passion becomes manageable, second nature, like tying knots in the dark or reading a deep green pool by an undercut bank and knowing where the trout are holding and which fly to use. But having gone through the novitiate, fly-fishermen are never the same again."

If you're not a steelheader, you may not have noticed the lines blurring between traditional two-handed casting and single-handed rod techniques. At most you might have heard of switch rods, a strange and wondrous invention that gives big-river anglers the flexibility to cast using both single-handed and two-handed techniques. To offer a simple example, think of the added advantage that an 11-foot rod gives you when roll casting long distances and making big mends. The same rod can handle basic spey casts and perform single-handed distance casting with ease.

This week California fly casting instructor Jeff Putnam puts a switch rod through its paces, demonstrating a variety of ways in which to take advantage of the rod's unique abilities. While he focuses on the Snap-T cast, you'll pick up a lot of useful tips by watching him manage his line both before and after casting.

Some fly fishers look forward to fall and early winter -- in many places the spawning season for big brown trout -- simply for the chance to throw streamers. You can call it "banging the banks" or "bouncing streamers" or "slinging lead" (sometimes heavy flies and lead-core lines make a lot of sense), but it boils down to a nice change of pace from the technical fishing of summer.

This week on MidCurrent Gary LaFontaine discusses the best strategies for Fishing Streamers and Undercut Banks. As in all of LaFontaine's instructional videos, he shows how best to approach, analyze and adjust to unique stream conditions. "One or two bangs in a spot and move on," LaFontaine suggests. "You're not going to run out of good spots" when streamer fishing.

New West's Bill Schneider takes a sojourn to Oregon's Grande Ronde and finds steelhead doing the thing that makes fly fishers' hearts pound: taking skated dry flies. "This means using a huge fly, extensively doped with floatant, cast roughly at a 45 degree angle downstream and then skated back toward shore until directly downstream. Instead of trying to leave no wake, you want the largest wake possible, which is why they call it either waking or skating your fly."

"A red ball of bait -- tens of thousands of bay anchovies -- pulsed like a giant beating heart as bluefish, their sides flashing like metal, ate their way through the frenzied bait." In this morning's New York Times, Peter Kaminsky takes his daughter fly fishing for bluefish and stripers, a fall activity that often requires a keen eye for birds and an understanding of how predators trap prey.

Shallow Water Angler editor Mike Connor offers some excellent thoughts on how to connect with the next saltwater fish that tries to eat your fly. Beyond keeping the rod tip down and pointed at the fish, Connor says, experience proves that certain techniques have advantages over others: "There is little debating that the strip-strike is far and away the best way to set the hook with a fly rod in salt water. There is debate, however, to what degree, and just when to add a rod sweep to the equation. Most fly fishers agree that adding a slight rod strike (low and to the side) just after a good solid strip-strike is the way to go. "

There isn't a fly fishing columnist alive, I think, who hasn't suggested a solution to the angling etiquette problem. My own advice is that if you think you might be crowding someone, you probably are. It's a big world, go find another spot. (The corollary to that argument is that if someone is less capable for physical reasons to get to their own stretch of water -- even if you were there first -- invite them in and move on.) After countless incidents on the water as a guide and angler, I can honestly say that three times out of four it's sheer ignorance that leads someone to interfere with someone else's fishing. But the number of people who get incensed at the behavior of other anglers is growing, not shrinking (witness the book Rod Rage
by Rhea Topping in 2004).

This morning in the Albany, New York Times Union, Robert Streeter weighs in with a balanced perspective: "Many people who exhibit various forms of rude behavior on the water do so out of ignorance. Their mind is locked on catching that big fish to such an extent that they block out many other things, like courtesy."

In my own case, becoming a fishing guide was almost accidental. I was taking a year off from a publishing career and was asked to cover his "overflow" by a veteran Key West guide. The only advice I got? Read 92 In the Shade and go fishing. But thanks to Colorado Mountain College's Timberline campus in Leadville, you can learn the ins and outs of guiding with a bit more structure, at least if you want to be a trout guide.

The latest podcast by Orvis's Tom Rosenbauer offers tips on setting the hook on trout. "Take heart. If you are missing strikes, it's often not your technique that's to blame. It could be one of two things. One is if your fly is not quite right, what happens is that a trout sees your fly on the surface or underneath the water and at the last minute sees that something isn't quite right -- it just doesn't look like food. And what they do is they don't inhale the fly, but their momentum carries them forward, so what you see is a splash or what looks like a rise, but the fish has gone past your fly and never opened its mouth."

"The biggest cutthroat of the year come to my egg flies when the chinook salmon do their dance of death and life in South Sound rivers. The Nisqually, the Skokomish and the rivers that flow into Hood Canal also offer great cutthroat trout fishing during the salmon spawn. I usually lose these big cutts to the snags or my own excitement." Chester Allen writes about fishing egg flies for big cutthroat in the many Washington rivers where salmon spawn in the fall. In the Olympian.

Nearing the end of trico season in Wyoming, guide John Schwalbe gives Wes Smalling some advice about how to end the nightmare. "You need to present your fly each time in a motionless drift right to the trout's snout, timing the arrival of the fly to the fish only when the trout is ready to come up for another bite." In the Caspar Star-Tribune.

"You can't say enough about fishing. Though the sport of kings, it's just what the deadbeat ordered." --- Thomas McGuane

Talking with a Wall Street Journal reporter yesterday, I was presented with an innocent question: "Fly fishing is a rapidly growing sport, isn't it?" "Well, no, not really," I said. Before the words were out of my mouth I remembered that one of MidCurrent's purposes is to help grow the sport, that this was national media, and that my suggestion that participation in fly fishing had stagnated wasn't helping our cause. "It's an age issue, I think.... More reflective of overall trends towards kids staying indoors and our not giving them reasons to be excited about the sport."

Maybe I've been watching too much politics.

The fact is, fly fishing is and will remain a niche sport, and that many times when we attempt to draw some picture of universal appeal we dilute the message. I sometimes wonder if by telling folks that fly fishing is easy, that it is sexy, that it has all the excitement of snowboarding and the stimulation of a good video game, we aren't getting the message out at all. In reality, our sport is one of the most complex activities you can engage in while out of doors. And that is exactly how it should be. The effort to become a better fly fisher inevitably makes us more aware of our intricate connection to the natural world. If you don't understand that, or don't know its value, you might as well be fishing with dynamite.

So when fashion moguls film someone "fly fishing in black tie and waders on a grand country estate," we should snicker at the Brideshead Moment, but only because it looks elitist. If we want to preserve what's valuable in fly fishing, let's make more of an effort to make the sport accessible to those who want to learn (kids, for example) and worry less about making it simple. We won't preserve anything of our sport by dumbing it down and allowing it to slide into irrelevance. Designers don't sell clothes by making them look all the same, and kids see through our suggestion that fly fishing is a great sport for deadbeats too. The king doesn't need new clothes, he just needs some good old-fashioned advice -- and a good, quiet place to fish.

Dan Carpenter fashions a fly rod out of a willow branch, paper clips and duct tape, and learns that while catching fish is possible with the lowest of tech, it's not quite as fun as graphite. "I was actually able to get the 7-weight line out there," he said. "The line slipped the guides pretty well. I could even mend with it. "There was a hatch, and I tied on a Quill Gordon, ginger, No. 12. "I got it laid down and the fly was floating nice when a big body came right up and scooped it." Rich Landers in The Olympian.

In a short video, fly fishing guide Karl Weixlmann discusses essential gear and flies for catching steelhead from the Lake Erie shoreline.

The accompanying article also gives lots of advice on technique: "After making the cast, I like to tuck the cork handle of the fly rod under my arm pit and use both hands to strip in the fly line and dump it into a stripping basket. You simply cannot outstrip a steelhead that's bent on eating your fly in open water. Another retrieve that works on the lakeshore is to strip the line in erratic spurts from 1 foot to 3 feet long with your line hand while keeping the line tucked under the cork handle with your rod hand."

On NWPAOutdoors.com.

As Eric Sharp points out, fishing for St. Marys River pink salmon with indicators is about as easy as salmon fishing gets. The best part is that catching pinks will give you all the experience you need in determining when any type of salmon has taken a fly. "Sometimes the bright green, acorn-size foam indicator jiggled a little without going completely underwater. Other times it suddenly slowed down. Either occurrence was a signal to raise the rod tip and feel the sudden, hard headshake of a hooked fish." In the Detroit Free Press.

This week Joan Wulff demonstrates several advanced fly casting techniques, including changing directions, curve casts, and casts for weighted nymphs. While the techniques are described as "advanced," fly casters of all levels will appreciate her tips on dealing with the challenges of positioning and presentation on a trout stream.

Excerpt: "Right now I have deep water ahead of me, so a straight line cast would go over the rock, not in front of it. I'll do a curve cast, starting with a horizontal stroke to the target area. Then, as the line is unrolling I'll quickly move the rod sideward and pull it back in close to me in a curve, at the same time slipping line."

"The pervasive stillness on the Teton River makes the fishing all the more intense. Slow currents slide and twist along the hay-lined banks, pulling tricos, the product of a light hatch earlier this morning, around in the river's relaxed spin cycle." Samuel S. Bacon writes a lyrical entry on trico fishing on the Teton in the Denver Post.

"The strategy was simple: Cast flies to the bank or to nearby log structure. Hit the dark water and fishy places under overhanging trees. Then impart a realistic action to the fly by stripping and pausing so the fly suspends in the current imitating a distressed minnow." One of the best parts of this article by Howard Meyerson is the photo of the smallmouth flies he and guide Leo Wright were fishing with: Dahlberg Divers, Clousers, and sharp-looking microfiber CK Minnows. On MLive.com.

Lefty Kreh once said, "You haven't lived until you've caught a catfish on a cane pole." Well, if you have caught a catfish or two on a cane pole, what you might consider next is catching a 50-inch northern pike, or even a monster muskie, on a fly rod. And do it with a topwater fly.

This week Robert Tomes shares an article on the techniques for doing just that from his upcoming book Muskie on the Fly. "The Muskie Top-Water Retrieve" will tell you everything you need to know about the sweep-and-strip retrieves that work magic on big muskies (and other big freshwater fish).

New on MidCurrent, Gary LaFontaine talks about strategies for fishing big freestone rivers, reminding us that it's not always obvious where the fish or how to catch them. "The middle of the river will hold fish, but you should never ignore the current flows along the edges and the associated pocket water. The side channels, with slower flows, sometimes provide fish with easier meals and a place to rest. They're always worth at least a quick exploration. There are times when large fish actually congregate in places like this, so always be ready."

What techniques contribute to better timing and higher line speed? As Joan Wulff shows us this week in "Distance Casting," modifying shoulder and elbow position, shooting line on the backcast, and adding single hauls can easily help further your reach. At the end of the video she also demonstrates a handy trick for creating loops that will not tangle when shooting line while wading.

Excerpt: "There are two stances that will solve all of the problems you encounter between distance and accuracy. Accuracy is a little bit like throwing a dart. It doesn't matter how you stand, but your shoulders are square to the target, the rod is vertical, and your hand comes in close to your face. As that line lengthens, drop back your right foot and shift your weight, and that makes your stroke a little bit longer. And as we get more line, it gets to be more like a baseball throw: we change our stance from square to the target to sideways to the target by rotating at the hips, opening the shoulders backward, and angling the rod off vertical to about 1:30."

Gordon Wickstrom is clearly a picker. As he correctly asserts, with patience most knots can have their diabolical innards exorcised. "There's a metaphor somewhere in this matter of tangles. Life itself might be thought of as a hopeless tangle, the ultimate tangle, the tangle of all tangles, of which, in the end, there is no undoing whatever. Still, it may be well to have the savvy of the angler to keep looking down into the center of the mess, as down into the center of Dante's Inferno, to find a way out. Even though there is none." In the Boulder Daily Camera.

I happen to be a puller, as a lot of guides I know are. Does it have to something to do with the speed at which I can re-tie leaders? Probably. Or maybe I just don't want to ruin a good several minutes worrying over another of life's Gordian knots. So I'll give it a glance, take a couple of tugs, then follow Alexander's example of going to the sword.

Here's a pretty good tip, though: As we all know, fly lines tangle, and sometimes they don't do it until you are just making that perfect shooting-line cast. When that happens, the first thing to try is to pull on the back end of the line, and leave the front end of the line alone. Think of it as the "last in , first out" principle of fly line tangles.

It used to be that only Florida Keys bonefish pursued post-graduate educations. With the rise in fishing pressure along Florida's Gulf coast, redfish have become the new doctors of selective eating, according to this Sarasota Herald-Tribune writer: "Head for exotic destinations such as the Bahamas, Venezuela, Mexico, Belize or Christmas Island, and even the most inexperienced fly fisher can become a seasoned bonefish pro. For our money, redfish are tougher than bonefish when it comes to shallow water sight-fishing with flies or artificial lures. Redfish can make bonefish look downright easy."

Randy Cameron reviews the ten commandments of stealth, as taught to Gary LaFontaine by river keeper Henry Ramsay. "The crusty old caretaker of the Windsor Club pulled him out of the bushes by his ear, and after admonishing the young LaFontaine, told him he could fish the stream if he learned the skills necessary to never be seen by any member of the club." In the Monte Vista, Colorado Journal.

As Morgan Lyle notes, before fishing with a single dry fly became the ultimate test of trout-fishing skill, tandem rigs were commonplace. While fishing the West Branch of the Delaware, he becomes yet another convert. "Blue-winged olives with size 18 bodies and tall smoky wings were on the water, but I didn't see any of them taken by trout. I became convinced that the rises were being caused by trout feeding on emerging mayflies approaching, but not yet in, the surface film." On New York's DailyGazette.com.

"Match the hatch."

"Unmatch the hatch."

"Match the hatch unless...."

You've probably heard it all by now. But there are a few principles of fly selection and presentation strategy that will get you through 90% of hatch-matching challenges. Charles Meck shares them with us this week in "Mastering the Hatches."

For most expert casters, a single haul comes naturally: they do it almost unconsciously, sometimes very subtly, adding it as one more motion that increases their feel for the line. The double haul, of course, contributes greatly to line speed and is commonly used to counter the effects of wind and to shoot line. But its use extends to even short casts and windless days.

This week Joan Wulff demonstrates an easy method for learning the Double Haul, using an overhead camera to show when and how fast to move the line hand during the casting stroke.

Vermont angler Lawrence Pyne finds the silver lining in a summer of endless rains by returning to the upland streams of his youth. A fine story comes full circle with this quote by Aldo Leopold, from his essay on small-stream fishing in A Sand County Almanac: "What was big was not the trout," Leopold wrote, "but the chance." In the Burlington Free Press.

Pick any river lined with grassy banks and it's hard to go wrong with hopper flies in the heat of summer. Add wind and you have one more ingredient in what can be fabulous mid-day fishing. But as Eric Sharp points out, there are still a couple of things you can do wrong. One is to ignore the local hoppers' colors. The other is to choose the wrong size. "One mistake many anglers make is the same one they make with Hexagenia mayflies -- using imitations that are far too big. If you hold a grasshopper up to a hook gauge, you see that even the biggest are usually No. 2-4 in length, and most are about 4-8. You don't have to exaggerate the size to get fish interested in hoppers -- the insect equivalent of a submarine sandwich." In the Detroit Free Press.

This video covers a subject on which LaFontaine literally wrote the book. "Caddisfly Water" shows how to position yourself properly to fish caddis dries and emergers and demonstrates why caddis water demands different tactics than the typical mayfly stream.

Excerpt: "During a hatch, emerging nymphs in the film escape their shucks and adults skitter across the surface, so you can fish the adults up and across with no drag. And then, after the dry fly has drifted downstream, twitch it and pull it back slowly. There are three possible spots from which to fish here. A is on the bank here. B is on the bottom of the run. And C is here, on the right side."

Second after the video on Orvis's new Silver Label XT bootfoot waders (which feature integrated laceable boots), Rosenbauer podcasts on fly fishing for wary bass and panfish on stillwater.

Excerpt: "The first thing to do is to throw that bug out there, let it sit on the water, let all the rings disappear... wait, wait, wait... to see if anything takes it. If nothing takes it, try a very subtle twitch. Just keep your rod low to the water. And pull some line through the fingers of your stripping hand. And this is a really important point in stillwater fly fishing. A lot of people keep their rod tip up in the air. There's nothing worse for line control than having that rod up in the air; the wind blows it around and you really can't control it, so the closer your rod tip is to the water, the more control you're going to have over the fly and the easier it is to set the hook."

Yesterday reader Steve Piper sent us this link to a long thread exploring the history of fly fishing for corbina in the California surf. We don't normally spend time perusing fly fishing boards, but this discussion caught our eye, if only for the detailed contributions. As always, the question of who "first" caught a corbina on fly -- like the question of who "created" a fly pattern -- has a lot to do with who kept the first records, but there is plenty to chew on here, including this quote from author and saltwater expert Nick Curcione:

"I'm always hesitant to use the word 'first' because even the most thorough research (I was a sociology prof in my other life) may not uncover all the facts. I caught my first corbina on the fly sight casting in the surf about 100 yards south of Hermosa Beach pier back in the fall of 1973. There were fish cruising back and forth on a sand bar and I finally got one to take an early version of my beach Bug. I remember I was using a fiberglass Fenwick 8-weight and an a Medalist reel with a lead core shooting head."

If anyone else has information that would help these folks answer the question of where fly fishing for corbina originated, they can contact Steve Piper via email at scpiper2@gmail.com.

As Gary LaFontaine says, "most of the problem in fishing high mountain lakes is finding the fish. Once you've found the fish, then you've got a few basic food forms." LaFontaine's video on how to fish a "Small Mountain Lake" shows where to find trout in high mountain lakes and how to feed them.

Excerpt: "A fairly steep shoreline is always good. Shorelines naturally gather food blown by the wind. You can fish lakes from the shoreline alone, but a float-tube or boat is more versatile. Bays too are a great place to find fish, as are the shelves and drop-offs associated with bays. Other good places are submerged trees, large rocks, or weed beds in deep water."

This week on MidCurrent Joan Wulff demonstrates the "Reach Cast." It's one of a trout angler's most useful techniques, providing longer drag-free drifts. A few key pointers on timing and technique also make it one of the easiest casts to perfect.

Excerpt: "A dry fly fisherman has to be aware of what we call 'drag.' Drag is that motion that makes the fly look as if it is a water-skier instead of a free-floating insect, and it's caused by the currents that work on the line and leader. So we need affect that by doing what we call a 'Reach Cast,' which will put the arm and the upper part of the rod upstream of the fly, so that the fly drifts down first."

Early July can produce good permit fishing in Key West, but as the month drags on toward August, calm winds and high temperatures can make it maddeningly hard to find fish, and especially ones that will eat. Apparently that's what happened during this year's annual Del Brown Tournament. Only three fish were caught in three days, and that's out of eighteen skiffs fishing.

One notable story coming out of the tournament is that the winning team was guided by Scott Collins -- the same guide who partnered with David Dalu to win the first ever one-season hat trick of tarpon tournaments this year. Collins and angler Greg Smith won by only 3/4" of an inch (that's what separated their one fish from the second-place catch), but it does suggest Collins is doing something right.

Below are the final results of the tournament:

1st Place: Angler -- Greg Smith, with Capt. Scott Collins (1 fish on day 2)

2nd Place: Angler -- Jack Knoll, with Capt. Jeffery Cardenas (1 fish on day 3)

3rd Place: Angler -- Chase Wise, with Capt. Bryan Holeman (1 fish on day 2)

A couple of weeks ago Tom Rosenbauer wrote about why you might impart drag to a fly as an obvious signal to trout that it is time to take a fly. But Rob Brown makes a subtle distinction between intentional drag and the imperceptible drag that he says can also stimulate feeding. Heresy, you might say. But it's an interesting theory. Is it possible that trout are reacting to imperceptible drag more often than not? "The fisher has made a good throw and a fine, long drift. At the physical limit of that journey, the fish is almost convinced, that is, there hasn't been enough stimulus to trigger the fish's finely honed instinctual response. At that precise moment, the time when the fly is about to drag, it begins to speed up, suggesting that liftoff is imminent, and at that critical juncture there is sufficient stimulus to provoke a rise and take from the trout." In BC's Terrance Standard.

The roll cast puts all of the basic fly casting principles to use, and so learning it is one of the first steps in becoming a competent fly fisher. It's also one of the most useful casts, giving you options when your back is against high bushes or trees, and helping you quickly lift line off of the water before a new cast.

This week Joan Wulff, in her typically clear teaching style, demonstrates the mechanics of roll casting, breaking it down into steps and showing just where the hand and arm need to be during each stage. She also shows how a small shift in arm position allows fly fishers to deal with wind coming over the casting shoulder.

Vermonter Drew Price ignores the naysayers and throws big flies at whatever wily, finned critter will eat them, including carp, longnose gar, and even bowfin. "Price's preferred form of fly fishing is more cage match than ballet. He likes casting huge, garish flies to big, brutish fish using heavy, powerful rods that would have Hulk Hogan grunting with approval." Lawrence Pyne in the Burlington Free Press.

The hand and the arm -- they are, after all, the gears driving any good fly cast. Tip control, proper application of power, and even the particular style of presentation all begin with mastering the fundamentals of hand and arm control. Joan Wulff considered it so important that she began her now-classic instructional DVD "Dynamics of Fly Casting" with a discussion of role of the arm and hand in the casting stroke.

We're lucky to have permission from producer Jeffrey Pill (whom you probably recognize by now as the producer of "Why Fly Fishing" and Gary LaFontaine's "Successful Fly Fishing Strategies") to begin showing segments of Wulff's "Dynamics" on MidCurrent. Wulff has the remarkable distinction of having taken the art of fly casting to its highest level while remaining able to explain complex techniques in the clearest, simplest terms. "The Hand and the Arm" is an example of why she has had such a tremendous impact on fly casting instruction.

After glancing at the opening photo for Deborah Weisberg's piece on the growth of carp fishing in the U.S., all I can say is, "To each their own." While I won't be tying garbanzo-bean-flavored Clouser Foxy Red Minnows any time soon, I applaud those who have challenged themselves to trick these very difficult fish on a fly rod.

This week on MidCurrent, Gary LaFontaine shows us how to best position ourselves for fishing attractor dry flies on a freestone stream. It's another segment from the DVD "Successful Fly Fishing Strategies" (Jeffrey Pill, producer), in which LaFontaine and former major league outfielder Dick Sharon demonstrate a wide range of situational strategies. LaFontaine tells why he favors the across-and-down presentation with attractors, and he even shows how to hold a trout without having it jump out of your hand.

On FishandFly.com, Jeremy Lucas describes the steps he uses to make a coiled leader, part of the system developed by the Spanish to detect the very subtle takes of trout feeding on tiny nymphs. "They can eject it in a flash, particularly fish like roach, dace or grayling. We need every chance possible in order to register when a fish has mouthed the fly. The greased, coiled indicator is far more sensitive than the proprietary available strike indicators, though will not support as much weight as these, but then it does not need to do so. We are employing mostly lightly-ballasted, single (occasionally double) nymphs in size 20, 18 and 16, at depths commonly less than a metre."

"The swirl in the chop said northern pike. When the fish gulped the guy's bunny streamer, it showed nothing of itself. But you could see the boil, and it was profound. So was the bend in his fly rod. The beast sulked, as if it were thinking things over. Then it poured on the coal and pulled free." Ed Dentry describes what happens in Colorado's reservoirs when the early summer sun finally warms the flats and pike laze in water only inches deep. In the Rocky Mountain News.

The legendary Hexagenia limbata hatches that cause midwestern snowplows to come out of hibernation and make bridges unsafe in early summer are also one of the least predictable "macro events" in fly fishing. The only real answer, according to Eric Sharp, is to fish more. "At one point, a fish started rising closer than the length of my nine-foot rod, and when I dapped four feet of leader on the water I got an instant strike from an 18-incher. I'll never forget that night. However, I would rather forget the 200 or so other nights when the Hex hatch produced a few trout of moderate size, and the 100 nights when I got absolutely nothing." In the Detroit Free Press.

"Foam means food,' [guide Dan Legere] explained. 'Bugs collect in the foam and fish look to the foam for food. Whatever fly you choose, land it and dead drift it in a patch of foam. I know it's tempting to drift your fly all by itself on clean water, but fishing the foam will get you way more takes.'" John Holyoke highlights a tip from a top Maine guide talking about fishing a caddis hatch on the West Branch of the Penobscot, but the advice could be applied anywhere. In the Bangor Daily News.

V. Paul Reynolds nails it with his discussion of the importance of tippets in fly presentation. In the process he's quite eloquent on new-versus-old, pricey-versus-cheap, and Lefty worship. "I have begun to look beyond fly angling orthodoxy, which teaches that matching the hatch (the right fly) and proper presentation (smooth, ethereal delivery of the fly upon the water) is the thing. If you have matched the hatch, and made a good cast, and still the trout ignores your offerings, is there something else? Oh yes. Try tippet trickery." (Thanks to reader Howard Fenderson for this link.)

Looking for something to occupy your time during the runoff hiatus? Try damselflies, says Charlie Meyers. "In that eternal search for evidence of a just and beneficent God, we present for your consideration a simple insect, the damselfly. At precisely the time when rivers are overflowing their banks and the high country remains wedged in snow and ice, this compassionate being sends relief to frustrated fishermen in the form of what may be the perfect bug." In the Denver Post.

Back in 1999, Curtis Rist wrote an article for Discover magazine on the physics of fly casting. It's worth reading again to remind ourselves how we manage to deliver a fly to a target that is sometimes a hundred feet away. Rist points out that while the smartest folks in the world are challenged to reduce fly casting to a mathematical formula, the physics of achieving momentum with a fly line are apparently simple: "Bullwhips operate under the same principle as the fly line: Energy travels from the arm to the thick end of the whip all the way down to the tapered tip, which accelerates wildly as the mass decreases. The characteristic crack of the whip results not from the tip snapping to the ground, but from the tip literally breaking the sound barrier and producing a concussion of sound waves." On FindArticles.com.

"Shadows of the surf, gray ghosts of the shoreline, that's corbina, a prized croaker that ranges from the Sea of Cortez to Point Conception. They can grow to 8 pounds and are known for their great initial runs and fights. Anglers say they're tough enough to catch with bait, such as sand crabs, which is 90 percent of their diet. It takes an artful angler to fool one with a fly." Ed Zieralski writes about the challenges and rewards of chasing Corbina in the California surf in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

"Put simply, every fish has to be somewhere, and that place invariably will just be a few feet from shore. These trout are easy to locate, hungry and, on a typical day, as dumb as fish ever get. Anglers who can make the mental break into a new mocha-colored realm can turn what ordinarily might be the bleakest time of the year into a bonanza." Charlies Waters points out the several advantages to fishing runoff-muddied trout streams, including the fact that even a poor presentation can produce big fish. In the Denver Post.

In his latest podcast,Tom Rosenbauer talks about spinner falls and why the frenzied feeding of trout on spent spinners makes fishing a classic "hatch" seem dull in comparison. "Mayflies live underwater for just about 12 months. Then the nymphs rise to the surface, they split their skin, and an immature adult emerges from the skin. It's a winged adult, but it's actually not a true adult because they're not sexually mature yet. This is called a 'dun,' or subimago, and the dun is kind of an intermediate adult stage. And this is what people refer to when they talk about a 'hatch.'"

Think big bluegill take a fly readily and wouldn't tow a five-pound bass backwards? Think again, says Tim Kennedy of Grand Rapids, Michigan, who regularly pursues oversized sunfish. "'When I see the smaller fish rising to flies on the surface, I like to drop a woolly bugger or a crayfish imitation or a No. 12 hare's ear in the deeper water near them,' Kennedy said. 'I use a 10-foot leader with three feet of 5X fluorocarbon tippet.'" Eric Sharp in the Detroit Free Press.

One of the truisms about fly fishing is that it provides fodder for endless debate, self-limitation being inherent in the sport. Often the focus of disagreement is whether or not a particular piece of gear, technique, or fly is legitimate. Since there is no central governing body of all things fly fishing, no rules committee or international court of appeals, and since fly fishers are probably more inventive than most other sorts of anglers, every so often the classicists rise up in anger over the introduction of a "new way." And that, many would say, is how it should be.

So it is with the latest fashion in England, which involves the use of "blobs," balls of fiber that are stripped through the water and have upped the catch rate considerably on English lakes. (You can see blob fly examples here and here.) "England fly-fisherman Jeremy Lucas said while the use of the blob and the booby - a brightly coloured lure with polystyrene 'eyes' - could encourage novices, it was 'repulsive' to see them used by experienced fishermen. He said: 'Most of us would wash our hands of it. It reflects fly-fishing in a very bad light.'" Keith Perry in the U.K. Telegraph.

Gary LaFontaine gained wide notoriety for his sparkle pupa series of fly patterns and for his classic book Caddisflies. But to the people who were lucky enough to know him, he was more than just another very knowledgeable fly fisher. He was, as one friend told me, "the kind of guy you could sit down and have a beer with, and come away with some bit of knowledge you'd never considered before." The fly fishing world lost one of its great mentors when LaFontaine died of Lou Gehrig's disease in 2002.

This week we're happy to begin a series of showings from the DVD "Successful Fly Fishing Strategies," in which LaFontaine and former major league outfielder Dick Sharon demonstrate a wide range of situational strategies. Besides being another example of Jeffrey Pill's truly fine filmwork, the DVD is packed with tips on how to handle everything from small stream pocketwater to undercut banks. This first segment covers "Deep Water Nymphing" and shows how indicators and weight are effectively employed in high water.

It seems like every day or two we get an email from someone asking us to analyze a casting problem or provide direction to resources for improving their casting. Our best advice: follow the example of the top professional golfers who are always getting personal instruction -- often from players who can't compete at their level -- in order to improve some aspect of their game. Fortunately fly fishing has an official certification for instructors, managed by the Federation of Fly Fishers, and finding a qualified instructor is much easier than it sounds. Just use the FFF's online search form to get names and contact info for instructors in your area.

That quote comes from Tony Soltys, president of Alaska's Rain Country Fly Fishers, and it highlights Alan Suderman's piece in the Juneau Empire about learning to fly fish. As he soon discovers, even the experts claim they never stop learning. "When I asked [Brad] Elfers, who said he's been fly-fishing for 20 years, if he considers himself an expert, he frowns and thinks for a second before saying, 'maybe in a few parts. It's one of those sports where becoming an expert is an ongoing thing,' Elfers said. 'You're never there.'"

With all the talk about drag-free drifts, you'd think the fly fishing world revolved around limp leaders, bounce casts, and stack mends. But fly fishing is filled with examples of where doing the exact opposite of the general advice often gets better results. Skating flies is a perfect example.

This week on MidCurrent, Tom Rosenbauer shares his considerable insight on the subject in "When Drag is Desirable:"

"Imparting movement to a dry fly is one of the most effective and exciting ways to fish dry flies, but it must be done under the right circumstances with special techniques that distinguish movement given to the fly by the fisherman from ordinary drag."

U.S. west coast casting instructor Jeff Putnam shows how to use the Snap-T -- a cast originally developed for two-handed rods -- in effective fishing with single handed fly rods.

Ed Engle says the time is now if you want to hit the peak of the Mother's Day caddis hatch on the Arkansas and nearby rivers. "The key has always been that you want to get the higher water temperatures that will stimulate the hatch before you get the brunt of the runoff which raises, cools and dirties the water. It was beginning to look like we were going to have relatively clear water, but it was too cold for the hatch and by the time it warmed, the river would be high and muddy." In the Boulder Daily Camera.

As I was explaining tarpon behavior to Patagonia fishing product designer Steve Straqualersi earlier this week, it occurred to me that a hooked tarpon behaves very much like a certain presidential candidate. "Give a tarpon any amount of leeway," I suggested, "and they will fight forever. You need to fight them from the moment you get them on the reel, and make them think they don't have a chance."

Sue Cocking's recent experience with a large Key West tarpon had her wishing she had picked a less experienced fish. "For the next 20 minutes, the wicked fish alternately charged away on after-burner, or turned and aimed itself like a torpedo at the boat. A couple of times, it surfaced briefly to gulp air, but it never jumped again. 'Something tells me this fish has been down this road before,' I puffed to [Captain Tom] Pierce." In the Miami Herald.

Tom Pierce started guiding in Key West back when wire was the preferred material for tarpon shock tippets. His experimentation with knots for dissimilar lines led to many improvements in leaders, not the least of which was the Slim Beauty knot. And he's one of the most mentioned captains in the IGFA world record book. Through it all Tom has remained one of those guides that never boasts, never says an unkind word about a client, and would rather be fishing than doing anything else. The Miami Herald's Susan Cocking describes an example of the complex leaders that Tom has perfected over the years for catching large, fast, or toothy fish on fly rods. "The fly line was connected to a 12-inch butt section of 30-pound mono, which was fastened to a six-inch section of thin shock gum, which stretches like parachute cord. There followed another small butt section with a loop to connect to the two-pound, tournament-grade tippet which was fastened to a flexible wire-trace bite tippet. It seemed to me you could launch a fly shop with just what was on my rod."

There are some situations where the only way to offer a drag-free presentation to trout is with a downstream drift. Deep, unwadable pools and runs with complex currents are examples. Morgan Lyle looks at the technique of fishing dry flies downstream, and though the idea is nothing new, he does suggest several reasons why those stuck on "up-and-across" presentations ought to consider a downstream drift. "When casting upstream, the fly starts coming back to you the moment it alights on the water. If your best cast is 50 feet, that's all the water you can cover. Downstream, on the other hand, you could theoretically let your fly drift for the combined length of your line and backing, although you'd have a devil of a time detecting the strike and setting the hook 500 feet away." On DailyGazette.com.

"Trout are a lot more interesting than bugs." That's the launching point for Rosenbauer's excellent new podcast on reading trout water on the Orvis Web site. Rosenbauer has, of course, written extensively on the subject, but hearing him explain stream dynamics really brings the subject to life. Not to mention the fact that, if you prefer, you can download the the audio and listen to it on your iPod.

Here's a sample from the new podcast: "People have found that trout prefer to lie in water that's moving at about one foot per second. That's comfortable for them -- they're able to maintain their position -- and they won't exhaust themselves. And then they like to feed in water that's a little bit faster, because obviously the faster the water the more food that goes by their mouth. You may wonder Well, how do I find out how fast the water is moving? One of the ways you can do this is to put a yardstick down on the table and move your finger and count one thousand and one, one thousand and two, etc. and see how fast your finger moves when it travels one foot per second."

Faced with the highest spring waters they've seen in years, many anglers in the U.S. will be floating rivers rather than wading this spring. Arkansas guide John Berry has some excellent tips on etiquette at the ramp and on the river, our favorite being "Just because you like Toby Keith [music] does not mean that everyone else does." In the Baxter Bulletin.

Runoff. No matter where you live, if you fly fish for trout that word conjures images of swollen rivers and unexpected challenges. And since big water is right around the corner for many of us, this is a great time to remind ourselves of safe wading practices.

This week on MidCurrent Dick Galland lists thirteen key bits of advice for wading safely and effectively, among them: "A wader belt is as important as a seatbelt," and "Don't die for your tackle."

Lean into the current. Always plant your staff upstream of your body, leaning into the current. Should you begin to lose your balance, the current will push you upright rather than downstream.

Keep your body sideways to the current. Facing directly upstream or down exposes you to the full force of the water and makes it difficult to maintain your balance.

Read more...

Way back in 1987 (even before the advent of Tarpon Wear and before anyone knew what an Abel or Tibor was) Nelson Bryant recorded his observations on the "not-very-popular" sport of saltwater fly fishing in The New York Times. "Any decent fiberglass, graphite or graphite-boron fly rod capable of handling a No. 9 or No. 10 line is suitable for blues and stripers. The reel for these species need not be a costly custom-made job, but it should have room for at least 150 yards of backing plus the fly line. The venerable Model 1498 Pfleuger will do the job, as will the Martin Reel Company's new and similarly-inexpensive MG-9 reel. The Martin reel has an excellent drag and will hold a 10-weight line and 300 yards of 18-pound test dacron backing."

"'It works on little streams. It works on big streams,' [Skip] Morris said. 'Anywhere you have moving water or even still water, a nymph can be effective. Eighty percent of the time, if you really want to have great fishing, you need to fish a nymph.'” So said the Washington state author and fly tier at the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission auditorium last Monday. Bryan Hendricks on NWANews.com.

Morris's latest book is Morris on Tying Flies (Frank Amato Publications, June 2006, 112 pages).

"At times like this, it pays to consider the nature of the rivers themselves. I have learned that different rivers turn on at different times in the spring. It could be that the Big Thompson will give up a few midge hatches, but there won't be any trout rising to them and they might even be unsettled about taking the pupa below the surface." Ed Engle suggests throwing aside old habits and paying attention to what the fish are doing this year. And it doesn't hurt to have a local who can keep you tuned in to the daily changes in activity. In the Boulder Daily Camera.

Bonefish & Tarpon Unlimited, an organization devoted to ensuring healthy populations of bonefish and tarpon, just released a new guide to handling and releasing bonefish. An excellent read for anyone new to the sport, the guide contains one bit of advice that may surprise those accustomed to using mechanical lip-gripping devices: don't. As the guide says, "If lip gripping devices are used, it's best to use them only to restrain a calm fish in the water while removing a hook; if the fish's weight is desired, cradle the bonefish in a sling and suspend the sling from the device.

You can download the new guide from the BTU Web site.

"In his later years, my grandfather often looked on as I fished there, pointing out the birds, whose Latin names he knew well but whom he referred to only by first name -- and that name was always Charlie. Whenever I hooked a fish, he exclaimed, 'Oh, by golly!' which was his way of commenting favorably on the universe.'" In The New York Times, Peter Kaminsky writes about the wonders of bass fishing on golf course ponds and lakes.

Respected casting instructor Jeff Putnam delivers the goods when it comes to solid video instruction on Spey techniques. But who makes an automatic connection between Spey techniques and single-handed fly rod casting? In "Single-Handed Fly Rod Casting Using Spey Casting Techniques," Putnam shows how the roll cast, switch cast, snap-t cast, and snake roll cast all fit perfectly into single-handed fishing techniques.

More fly fishers are heading out in the last weeks of winter to fish tailwaters, perhaps encouraged by the absence of manic crowds, and the fact that the best fishing of the day happens either side of lunch. And while big fish are to be found feeding on midges, frigid conditions also require more observation of trout locations and feeding patterns, as Roger Wheaton notes in "Time for Tailwaters." "Learning to position yourself properly once you’ve discovered a feeding trout is essential. Lethargic winter trout are focused on conserving their energy and won’t move far to intercept your offering. Precise casts are required. My preference is to position myself to the side and slightly upstream as close to the quarry as possible. Try to minimize glare so that you can follow the fly and watch the trout’s reaction at the same time."

A new interview in American Angler magazine with Jan Isley reminded me of the first moment of awe I felt when fishing on saltwater flats. Like Jan, I was mesmerized by the ferocity of a barracuda swimming and feeding in a foot of water. Gordon Lewis tangles with a big one on Fosters.com. "Off on a blistering run the fish goes as I sneak a peek to ensure that my line is not about to run out as the barracuda is doing his best to spool me. As I'm trying to stem his retreat I see the line streak skyward followed by the gleaming silvery green form of my fish rocketing out of the water."

Throwing a fly at a pod of steadily rising trout seems like such a easy proposition. The fish are happy, the target is big, and if one fish doesn't bite there's another fish waiting in line to commit. But if you've fished pods on rivers like Montana's Upper Missouri, where the number of targets is often not an issue, you know that getting a fish out of a big bunch -- even if they are actively feeding -- is harder than it looks.

This week on MidCurrent George Anderson, one of the masters of making difficult fish eat a fly, offers 14 key bits of advice for "Fishing Pods."

Arkansas guide John Berry was first turned on to soft hackles by author and tier Sylvester Nemes, whom he happened upon in West Yellowstone pizza joint. He offers some commentary on their use in this morning's Baxter Bulletin.
"The soft hackle is most effective when used as a searching pattern. Use it to cover large sections of water, when you do not know exactly where the trout are. I look for broken water, particularly below rapids. I face downstream and cast downstream to the right at a 45-degree angle to the bank. As soon as the fly hits the water, I strip it back a foot or so to sink the fly into the film. I keep my rod tip low to the water and track it as it swings in the current."

The deadly effectiveness of centrepin fishing tells us much about the importance of a drag-free drift. "In fly-fishing, if we can get 10 feet of drag-free drift, we're delighted. With a centerpin system, I've often let a lure run drag-free for 100 feet before stopping it, and in some rivers I could have let it go until I ran out of line. The long rod serves three purposes: It keeps the line off the surface, lets the angler use very light line (usually four- to six-pound test) for big fish that might be line shy and allows the use of terminal rigs with the float 10-12 feet above the lure." Eric Sharp in the Detroit Free Press.

Ed Engle spends some time nymphing a long way from home (Long Island) and asks the question Is it better to throw big weight or to high-stick your way to success? This article includes the clearest explanation of European nymphing techniques that I have read.

"What most of these nymphing tactics have in common is that three (or sometimes more) very heavy, larger nymph imitations are rigged on six to twelve inch droppers from an untapered 3X or 4X nine-foot leader. When I say heavy I mean really heavy -- figure three or four times heavier than the heaviest weighted nymph of the same size you have in your fly box. The nymphs are specifically tied to be streamlined so they won't foul on the bottom." In the Boulder Daily Camera.

You can read more of Engle's thoughts on nymphing in "Small-Fly Freestyle Nymphing" on MidCurrent.

Ed Jaworowski -- a full-time classics professor and author of many articles and books on fly casting -- notes that good casting technique can be learned, especially if you remember a few key principles. Morgan Lyle offers a layman's interpretation of Jaworowski's instruction on DailyGazette.com. "The line can only go in the direction the tip is moving when it stops. Does your cast pile up on the water, short of the target? You may be stopping with your rod tip pointing slightly downward, and not even realize it."

Before you conclude that there's yet one more essential cast to learn, check out the photo accompanying this piece on the Kentuckiana Fly Fishing Show. Elbow pads, anyone? In truth, we've fished a few streams where this skill might come in handy.

You can read some excellent casting tips from Macauley on MidCurrent:

The Elements of Style
Beyond Competence, Part I
Beyond Competence, Part II

Among the highlights of Bill Graves's billfish adventure was saving a large green turtle from death-by-longliner. "If and when a sailfish does appear, it’s the first mate’s job to keep pulling the teaser away from him, enraging the fish into more violent attacks. Once the teaser of interest is within casting range, the mate jerks it away and the angler casts an 8/0 fly about the size of a robin into the path of the hot sailfish." In the Bangor (Maine) Daily News.

Somehow the advice of an angler who earned money for his first fly fishing outfit by ferreting (catching rabbits with a ferret) carries more import. Welsh angler Moc Morgan recounts observations made while practicing for the world championships in Poland, where he had a chance to watch teams from various nations fish to the same trout. Turns out fishing down-sun wasn't making the difference, but fishing the "blur area" was. "I watched closely and realised the fish were only taking flies in one particular section of the river and I remembered reading once of something called 'the blur area' – that is the area between maximum glare and clear vision." From IcWales.

Among the odder target species for saltwater fly fishers, a sheepshead may be just about as hard to get to eat a fly as a permit. Given that they are so plentiful and love shallow water, though, they appeal to sight-casters looking for a good challenge. An article in the southwest Florida Herald Tribune describes the techniques used by Sarasota guide Any Cappar. "It's not a game to play if you just want to catch a few fish. In fact, fly-fishing for sheepshead isn't a game played by many at all. Sheepshead are crustacean eaters that are rarely fooled by artificials."

"That's what carp stories do to fishermen. They weigh on them for so long before driving the angler to confess every last detail of landing one. They're like a really bad blind date." Ed Zieralski says fishing for carp, and especially fly fishing for carp, makes you a real stand-up guy. In the San Diego Union-Tribune.

"You should learn the roll cast first. With, say, 50-feet of fly-line-belly, fly-line-taper and leader to a nicely decked out fly, give this a try. Start facing downstream and let the line flow down so the fly is fully extended in a straight line from the rod tip. This position, all Spey addicts know as the 'dangle', a term coined by the Simon Gawesworth, one guru of current Spey casting." Canadian writer D. C. Reid gives advice on learning to Spey cast, and suggests the order of learning, from roll cast to Snake Roll, Snap T, Circle C, Overhead and Perry Poke. In the Times Colonist.

"My clients frequently ask how a fish can see and be caught by such a small fly. You have to consider a full-grown man eating M&Ms. They are small in relation to his total body size but he eats several of them at a single setting. Midges are the most available food source at certain times and the fish eat a lot of them." Arkansas guide John Berry suggests a few different techniques for feeding trout one of their favorite wintertime foods. In the Baxter Bulletin.

Veteran steelhead guide John Nagy is releasing an expanded and updated edition of his Steelhead Guide: Flyfishing Techniques and Strategies for Lake Erie Steelhead (Great Lakes Publishing, December 2007, 320 pages). The 4th edition has 119 new and innovative steelhead fly patterns contributed by guides, fly tiers and steelhead fly fisherman from all over the Lake Erie region -- 44 tiers in all. Deborah Weisberg writes about the upcoming book and a couple of the hot patterns from the book's "Deadly Dozen," including Greg Senyo's Wiggle Stone, in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "The Wiggle Stone is patterned after the stonefly nymph that abounds on Great Lakes tributaries, and gets its lifelike movement from its jointed construction. 'Stoneflies cling or crawl; they don't swim. When dislodged from rocks, they move frantically, trying to find something to grab onto,' said Senyo, whose Jag Fly Co. employs tiers in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan."

You can pre-order a copy of Nagy's new book from his Web site.

"The first thing I do is change flies. Try a different size of the same pattern. Try a different pattern. If you are fishing small nymphs, try a huge San Juan worm. If the tiny Adams fails, try a Dave's hopper. Mix it up." Arkansas guide John Berry offers a few bits of advice about coping with difficult fish and difficult conditions. In the Baxter Bulletin.

Guide Ray Travis talks about a variety of tactics for effectively fishing the fall steelhead run in Lake Erie tributaries. He covers water flow and prospecting, using the proper amount of weight, and even gear and tippet selection: "'I always use the lightest tippet fish will let me get away with,' says Travis, who usually fishes a 10-foot, 6-weight rod. 'I use 3X and 4X [tippet] a lot. It's a rarity when I have to go to 5X. If the fish are there and they look at the pattern, but [there are] no takes, I'll drop down in my tippet and maybe drop down a fly size, too.'" Deborah Weisberg in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Included in Joe Zentner's article on bonefish fundamentals in All At Sea magazine is some clever advice on how hard to set the hook on these explosive fish: "... just enough to pull it from a blade of grass should it be caught." "The fly-fishing drill goes thus: you stand on a small deck at the bow of a skiff while your guide poles the craft across the flats, where the water may be from six feet maximum to six inches deep. You’ve stripped off 20 or more feet of line, which is lying in loose coils at your feet, and you’re holding the rod in your casting hand and the fly in the other. When your guide spots a group of bonefish working their way across the flats, he points them out to you."

It's spooky how effective dropper flies and tandem rigs are for catching trout. Even many experts who slammed the technique for not being "classic" fly fishing (the ghost of Frederick Halford moans in the distance) have come to appreciate its effectiveness.

But there are many more ways to design effective tandem rigs than the simple dry-and-nymph combination. In his new book Tandem Fishing Flies, Charles Meck explores the many different non-traditional setups for dropper flies, among them rigs that employ two dries, multiple nymphs and -- the latest in trout candy -- sunken spinners. This week we excerpt Meck's new book on MidCurrent.

Charlie Meyers notes that whitefish aren't the only fish that don't jump: take a look at bonefish. "Find a good whitefish hole, tie on a nymph with an egg pattern dropper beneath an indicator and wait for the fun to begin. There can be no better way to introduce a youngster to the sport. The fact that whiteys continue to bite throughout the winter wherever there's open water adds to their charm." In the Denver Post.

With baetis hatches beginning to wane in most parts of the northern hemisphere and midges becoming the food of choice as cold weather truly grabs hold, it's probably worth brushing up on some bug science. Check out TroutNut.com's pages on baetidae, or blue-winged olives, and chironomidae, or midges. Or skip past the science and heed Neuswanger's advice: "The number of genera and species is hopelessly huge for angler entomologists to ever learn, and the identifing characteristics often require slide-mounting tiny parts under high-powered microscopes. Even the most Latin-minded fisherman must slip back to the basics--size and color--to describe his local midge hatches."

Brave man that he is, Field & Stream's Kirk Deeter suggests that "playing a bass usually involves about as much action and drama as the Spinks-Tyson fight did in 1988. Jump, shake, fall down."

"Fly-fishing means eliminating all the variables — what fly you choose, what cast you make, how you approach — until you solve the single, irreducible event that is happening in front of you: the head of a trout taking a mayfly from the water’s surface. For me there are no variables left. I am no longer up to problem-solving. The cold has reduced me to a single hypothesis, which the trout are now rejecting." In The New York Times, Verlyn Klinkenborg decides that becoming "one with the fish" is not the only reason to cast flies. (Thanks to reader John DeVault for this liink.)

Veteran Arkansas fly fishing guide John Berry lists the errors he encounters most often when helping anglers cast to and hook trout. The thing that tops his list: fly fishers who seem to think that the more line they cast, the better. "This is my pet peeve. I see fly-fishers fighting their line all day to try and consistently cast 50 or more feet. I find that they are usually going past feeding fish to reach sterile water. With that much line out they can't see or detect strikes. In addition, they have difficulty setting the hook. If they should hook a fish, they begin the fight with 50 feet of line out and if the trout takes a 35-foot run they are already in the backing." In the Baxter Bulletin.

Charlie Meyers's summary of the lessons demonstrated by the winners of this past week's U.S. National Fly Fishing Championships includes an astute observation from the winner: "For every public-water fisherman who finds himself hemmed in by angling pressure, the advice of gold medalist George Daniel of Lock Haven, Pa., might be equally precious. 'It's all about time management and strategy' Daniel asserted. 'I try to figure out how to fish the water completely without having to go through it twice, to get the most out of it on that first pass.'" In the Denver Post.

OK, from this research we can take: limp fly lines tangle more, as do fly lines that are not confined to small spaces. Further, we may even predict that the next generation of stripping baskets will involve coiling line. "Two physicists used string-tumbling experiments and mathematical models to create a step-by-step recipe for knot formation and determined which factors cause the knottiest knots. Their research, published online this week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, sheds light on an everyday phenomenon about which little was known beyond the madness it incites." Jeanna Bryner of LiveScience.com.

As Gary Lewis points out, it's not just about cast, swing and take two steps downstream. Here are several tips he's learned from watching expert steelhead anglers who seem to always beat the odds. "Depth, distance, leader length, knot and fly. They're all important, but not nearly as important as delivery. Here's where it all comes together, or falls apart. Make that downstream cast, throw the quick upstream mend and then let it swing. Don't shuffle your feet, don't lower or raise the rod. You'll telegraph to the fly and the fish." In the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard.

As an example of how the situation and not the fish determines gear choice for some fly fishers, Casey Cox goes after an eleven-pound fish with a 15-weight, trying to break the Texas state red snapper record. Even the hook is carefully considered: "It's basically a super fine wire circle hook with a very long shank that makes it easier to tie material to. It doesn't take much force to get a good hook set with this hook, and that's important when you have 90 feet of line out." Ray Sasser in the Dallas Morning News.

"It's like a very hungry person sitting at a table in front of two platters, one mounded with raw celery and carrot sticks and broccoli heads and the other with shelled Maine shrimp accompanied with melted butter. Even though the veggie pieces are much larger, most of us would start on the high-protein shrimp to satisfy our hunger and pop them into our mouth one at a time, each morsel dripping with butter." Ken Allen explains why the superabundance of tiny bugs during a blue-winged olive hatch makes trout key in on the small but nourishing flies. In the Kennebec Journal.

"Here the problem is that you often see the trout approaching. The idea is to patiently wait until the trout rises and actually takes the fly, closes its mouth and begins its return to the bottom. I call this the longest second in fly fishing. The tendency is to give in to the adrenaline kicking in and set the hook as soon as you see the fish." Guide John Berry lists the four different ways hook setting can be done wrong: not setting the hook at all, setting the hook too late, setting the hook too quickly, or setting the hook too hard. In Arkansas's Baxter Bulletin.

In response to a question about why it took Joe Brooks 42 minutes to land his world record 29-pound striper and three-and-a-half hours to land a 65-pound tarpon, Lefty Kreh delivers a short but interesting history lesson on Dan Blanton's bulletin board: "Anyone who has fought big saltwater fish with bamboo knows that it really deforms the rods, putting a serious curve in them. To straighten the rod we would attach it for a few days to a warm pipe that fed steam to a radiator used to heat our home. This is one reason that Joe took so long. Bamboo taught you not to place too much strain on the rod when fighting a fish. When fiberglass came along Joe at first applied this fighting technique to what he always knew."

As the final installment of MidCurrent's essential fly fishing tips, we've collected 42 Fly Fishing Strategy Tips. They cover fly selection, approach, presentation, and landing and releasing fish, and we hope you'll find an example or two of clear thinking about common challenges.

To get you started:

Size Matters When choosing trout flies, the relative importance of fly characteristics in your selection, in order, should be: size, shape, color, and action (for stripped flies). In saltwater, action is often more important than exact size and shape.

Dropper Flies or Tandem Rigs Dropper flies are a trout angler's secret weapon. A simple dropper rig can be made by tying a small nymph onto 14-18 inches of tippet material tied to the bend of a dry fly. If the trout takes the nymph, the dry fly serves as your indicator. Nymphs can also be tied in tandem, enabling you to find out which nymph is working better.

(If you haven't read our other tips, you can find them here: Fly Fishing Gear Tips and Fly Casting Tips.)

Arkansas guide John Berry discovered that the same techniques used for drag-free nymph presentations are surprisingly effective for fishing dry flies of all sizes. "You make an effective presentation by just flicking the fly up stream for a soft landing. Since there is nothing touching the water except the fly it is easy to achieve a perfect drag-free drift. With this method, you can easily deal with complex currents. The shorter line enhances line control because you can easily set the hook at any part of the drift since there is no slack in the line." In the Baxter Bulletin.

"The best part about brook trout creeping has been the departure from commerce. There are no guides working the high-and-brushy, no fly shops. There are no fishing tournaments, no book signings or seminars, no angling celebrities with funny hats and sponsor patches quoting into video cams." Ed Dentry writes about what makes the hunt for brook trout in streams no wider than a shower stall so maddeningly addictive. In The Denver Post.

I saw a thousand permit caught on live crabs before ever throwing a fly to one. Does it help? Yep. Andrew Steketee confirms the teaching value of fishing with bait in part three of his series on young Keys guides on Gillraker "I even muster the humility to inform Eric of my newfound respect for spin and bait fisherman, to which he responds: 'The best fly-fishermen I know still throw plugs and bait, because it teaches them hundreds of unseen variables. I’ll never tell a client, or myself, that we can’t learn more. Most fly-fisherman who step foot in my boat are horrible anglers, because they’re close-minded. My job is to correct that.'”

"The first thing is small hooks require small tippets. The weakest link in your tackle is not the small tippet but the knots in the tippet. Carefully form your knots and lubricate them with water before pulling them tight. Test them to ensure that they will hold." Guide John Berry offers four or five good tips on equipping yourself properly to fish for big fish with small flies in the Baxter [Arkansas] Bulletin.

We get our casting knowledge from a variety of sources -- friends, guides, videos, books and magazines, and Web sites -- and it doesn't always fit together neatly. No one is whispering in our ear as we practice, typically, and telling us that knowing the roll-cast pickup is more important than learning to haul. Here are 28 simple tips to help you cast more accurately, farther, and with better results once your fly hits the water. Read "Fly Casting Tips" on MidCurrent.

I remember the first time I saw someone -- in this case one of the great trout fisherman of our time -- use a stomach pump on a trout. My reaction, if I remember correctly, was to swallow the word 'gross' as it started out of my mouth. Somehow it grated against my sensibilities, and it still does a little. But there's no question that, short of killing a fish, using a stomach pump is the only foolproof way to find out what a trout is eating. John Berry describes the right technique in Arkansas's Baxter Bulletin: "To pump the fish's stomach, I fill the pump by inserting the tube in the water and squeezing the rubber bulb. Then, while securely holding the fish, I gently insert the tube down the fish's throat as far as I can. I take particular care not to injure the fish during this process. I gently squeeze the rubber bulb, forcing the water into the fish's stomach. Then I gently remove the tube from the fish. The suction created by the pump extracts the stomach contents."

Boating magazine interviewed me a couple of weeks ago for their FishBoat blog and released the podcast this morning. The interviewer wanted to know about techniques for fishing for heavily pressured fish and the resulting 4 minutes of talking on my part includes some very general tips about how to get difficult fish to eat. You can hear the streaming podcast on the FishBoatMag site, or download it from this link (3.9MB).

There's some pretty interesting work being done on fish vision by Andrij Horodysky, a PhD. candidate at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. Horodysky is studying not only the affects of different light conditions on fish's ability to see potential prey, but on how various combinations of color stimulate feeding behavior. For example, striped bass see and respond differently during bright daylight hours than they do at night. "His studies of striped bass found that during the day they need light and shallow, clear water. They can see blue, chartreuse (green-yellow) and even some red. At night, striped bass become 100 times more light sensitive and adjust their eyes to diminish the amount of red colors absorbed, which means they focus more on the blues and greens." Horodsky also happens to be a contract fly tier for Umpqua. Norm Wood in the Hampton Roads, Virginia Daily Press.

In the New York Times, Harry Hurt gives an honest assessment of his fit with the sport of fly fishing. In spite of the deluge of information brought forth at Orvis's Millbrook campus, even a 10-foot cast is Sisyphean: "Unfortunately, I was too clumsy to tie a basic clinch knot, much less a barrel knot, a perfection loop, or a loop-to-loop connection. I was even worse at basic casting. The trick was to move the rod back and forth with your forearm and a couple of flicks of your wrist without adding bicep or shoulder thrust. When done properly, your fishing line shot out on the water in a straight line about 10 yards long." (Thanks to reader John DeVault for this link.)

The stars finally align for Bob Gwidz, fishing the hex hatch late one evening on Michigan's Pere Marquette. "It was a steelhead, the biggest rainbow trout that I'd ever taken (by far) on a dry fly. An armchair fish biologist would have dubbed it a Skamania (summer-run), as it was as sleek as a torpedo and shiny as a freshly minted coin." On MLive.com.

In an article about anglers' odd obsessions in London's Times Online, author Brian Clarke explains how his research for his book The Trout and the Fly led him to discover the reason that surface insects are easily visible to trout at night. "We had our answer at once. It was that wherever part of a fly — feet, body, wings — touched the surface tension, they dented it slightly. This distortion, when viewed from below, acted rather like a lens — it gathered and concentrated any light remaining in the night sky. The result was that, from the position of a trout looking up, each fly on the surface was brightly outlined against the darkness all about it."

The Trout and the Fly on Amazon.

Eventually -- if we aren't lucky enough to have an expert coach -- we'll end up reinventing the most practical techniques. That was certainly true for me when it came to throwing big flies and casting with a strong right-hand wind. Someone taught me to water haul. Then I began adding a sidearm backcast. Then I realized that if I moved the rod tip high over my left shoulder on the forward cast, I further reduced the chances of whacking myself in the back of the head with a big bug. A casting instructor, wincing at my progress, would note that I had, in fact, learned the Belgian cast.

Luckily, there are folks around who can save you from having to reinvent this very useful cast. Master instructor Macauley Lord makes it all quite clear in his lesson on "The Belgian Cast." New on MidCurrent.

Fly fishing guide John Berry offers some excellent advice on teaching the next generation to fly fish, including a couple of tips on easily overlooked gear: bring a big net, and a camera. "Keep things simple. I have found a simple roll cast or high sticking technique is very effective. I generally use larger tippets than I normally would, so when they hook a fish, they have an easier time landing it." In central Arkansas's Baxter Bulletin.

"The perfect conditions for fishing dry flies is overcast, drizzle and no wind. The bugs in this case -- Pale Morning Duns, Cahill's, and Pale Evening Duns. This is the way it works: When the bugs come to the surface to hatch and the humidity is high or it's raining, it takes them a long time to dry their wings and fly off; they drift hundreds of feet struggling to get airborne." Randal Sumner describes catching the perfect hatch -- sans clients -- in the Yakima Herald Republic.

"The great fly fishermen are not generally conventional strivers. They are interested in a kind of excellence that no one ever sees, like an artist whose work you only catch a glimpse of once in a while. You know he's painting but the work is hard to find." An astute observation about the nature of fly fishers from Randal Sumner, in his sideways glance at commencement speeches. In the Seattle Times.

Big bonefish have a way of getting a person's dander up. They snub their noses at perfectly good presentations, reject the flies that work so well on their smaller brethren, and generally succeed in baffling the slickest fly fishers among us. Why bother? you might wonder after a morning of throwing flies to fish whose response to your perfect casts has been to move ten feet to the right and start tailing again.

Well, the reason is simple. A bonefish over ten pounds is an awesome fish.

This week Tim Mahaffey, who is the only angler in history to win all of the major fly fishing invitational tournaments in the Florida Keys, shares his secrets on flies, gear, and presentation for approaching and landing big bones in "Targeting Giant Bonefish." His tips are useful not just for tournament-level flats anglers, but for anyone who enjoys sight-casting in saltwater.

You should also check out Tim's terrific fishing blog, "Tournament Tails," which he regularly updates with advice on advanced saltwater fly fishing techniques. Good stuff.

OK, if fly fishing is not so much like golf (hey, the hole moves), then could it be like surfing? Scott Willoughby thinks so: "Surfing demands far more patience than you might expect, waiting for the right waves as you might wait for a fish to strike. You might spot a potential lunker now and again, and then it comes down to placement, just like casting, before you can set the hook. Then that sucker takes off like a tarpon, a wild animal that you still have to land, even play." In the Denver Post.

"The only possible cast was from where we were standing, high on the bridge directly above the trout. A cast from here would have no cross-current to drag the fly aside. But the fish could not be fought from here." While defending fly fishing as a non-boring sport, Brian Clarke inadvertently lays the parallels between fly fishing and golf in the U.K.'s Times Online.

Dave Wolf makes an interesting suggestion in his coverage of the frenzy surrounding the annual green drake hatch in Pennsylvania: watch for the concurrent hatch of smaller bugs that will often be the target of the bigger fish. "Last but not least be vigilant for a 'masking hatch,' a smaller sized fly like the sulphur that is hatching at the same time the drakes are. If you want to take a trout on a drake imitation, keep on fishing. If you want to take more trout and large trout, switch over to the smaller pattern." In Pennsylvania's Lebanon Daily News.

"I smirked as Lori tied on the Big Ugly and cast toward the blow down. The gargantuan fly was all but too much for her delicate rod. It hit the water with a loud kerplunk and drifted downstream about two feet." John Berry fishes Buffalo Ford in Yellowstone National Park with his wife and discovers that even smart fish with plenty of insects to choose from will fall for an outsized, inelegant pattern. In Arkansas's Baxter Bulletin.

"In early June, this colorful member of the char family hangs around pond shallows next to inlets and outlets and over gravel bars and dark-bottomed coves, which warm first and activate forage items such as invertebrates and baitfish." Ken Allen advises brook trout fanatics to fish hidden Maine waters with two rods ready: a 6-8 weight with a fast-sinking line, and a 4-5 weight with a floater. On MaineToday.com.

"The day I spent in a classroom listening to this master fisherman was also a day spent thinking about what kind of angler I want to be. That’s where I came up with a season’s worth of resolutions: be a smarter, quieter, stealthy, experimental and accurate fisherman." Gene Koppy describes a thought-provoking seminar by Ed Engle, who says "Make your first cast your best cast." In the Great Falls [Montana] Tribune.

"The water is stained as well as high, the product of a couple of days of heavy rain, and it probably will take several days to drop to normal levels. So what's a fly angler to do? Fish streamers, of course." Eric Sharp gives advice about fishing off-color runoff water in Michigan in The Detroit Free Press.

Learning the double haul is one of those pivotal events in a fly fisher's life. Suddenly, as increased line speed makes timing more obvious, all those little adjustments in casting technique seem to make much more sense. It's addicting.

On MidCurrent this week Tom Rosenbauer uses some very nice illustrations by Bob White to explain exactly what steps a beginner should use to learn the double haul. He even includes our favorite bit of advice: practice by letting the line fall to the water/ground after each haul. If you know someone just getting into fly fishing or looking for a little extra distance, this piece may help them lose their hesitation about learning one of fly fishing's most important skills.

"Caucci is best known for his Comparadun fly, whose low silhouette and buoyant deer hair wing solved the problem of how to fish for highly selective trout in very technical water. Of course, you have to cast properly, which, on the Delaware means a drag-free, downstream presentation; these finicky fish flee at the first sign of drag and will never respond to a classic upstream presentation." Peter Kaminsky writes about a recent trip to the Upper Delaware and the spring hatches of Qull Gordons, Hendricksons and Green Drakes there. In The New York Times.

Not sure how Ken Allen did it but he managed to squeeze a wonderful T.S. Eliot quote into the same column as tips on where to find wild brookies and a suggestion for how to trick online fly fishers into revealing local hatch information. "Jill posted a note on an Internet fly-fishing board and claimed that she and a lady friend -- both recently divorced school teachers in their 30s -- would be spending the summer in a cottage an hour's drive from Pierce Pond. Jill asked if anyone could tell her what to expect for aquatic-insect hatches so she would know what flies to buy." On MaineToday.com.

Why are fish and anglers in Colorado's Blue River keying on mysis shrimp? "'The turbulence kills them,' said Pat Martinez, a Colorado Division of Wildlife biologist who specializes in the freshwater shrimp, which were imported from Minnesota to Colorado in 1957. But where Mysis spill through dams, they become Twinkies for overweight trout for a mile or so downstream." Ed Dentry in the Rocky Mountain News.

"Green Drake hatches are drawn out affairs. The duns will begin to emerge when water temperature is above fifty degrees and continue to emerge sporadically throughout the rest of the day. Trout take them as targets of opportunity rather than settling into a feeding lie and waiting for the next one off the assembly line." George Grant describes the hatch cycle of green drakes and various techniques for fishing during emergence and the spinner fall. On Tri-Cities.com.

Arkansas guide John Berry gives some good advice on fishing the sulphur hatches with both drys and emergers in the Baxter Bulletin. "The major mayfly hatch on Ozark streams is the sulphur. The hatch occurs during May and June. The yellow/orange insect emerges from gentle riffles and runs in the afternoons with a spinner fall at dusk."

A recent Andy Mill interview mentioned something about fly fishing for tarpon that most anglers consider a black art: keeping the fish on the line. To paraphrase, Mill said that he's come to the conclusion that the best thing to do when a tarpon takes your fly is nothing. That's a over-simplification of his advice and the process, of course, but it does reinforce something we've believed for many years -- that the most important thing in keeping a tarpon hooked up is not slamming home the hook at every opportunity, but keeping the fly in the fish's mouth. Keeping tension on the line until the fish turns his head prevents the fly from slipping out, and when the fish does turn and run, the hook is more likely to stick in the corner of the fish's mouth. The other key ingredients to making this strategy work are very sharp hooks and big drag settings -- 3-5 pounds is ideal if you are fishing with 16-20-pound tippet. By the way, the tarpon photo is from last Friday morning in a basin in southwest Florida, where the fish were thick before the latest front came through.

"The hard-core fly fisher is one that has put in years of practice and combined years of experience to be somewhat proficient at the sport. And as with golf, there are days when even the best of the best are out of sync and a rank amateur could most likely outcast and outfish them." Dave Wolf writes an excellent introduction to fly fishing that includes an astute comparison with golf -- a sport that shares the same kind of enthusiasm and dedication. In Pennsylvania's Lebanon Daily News.

So says Andy Mill about the likelihood of getting a particular tarpon to eat. Besides suggesting that the biggest mistake anglers make is throwing flies too close to fish, Mill says fly fishers need to keep flies in front of the fish longer (read neutral buoyancy and slow strips). "'Instead of casting and stripping, feed the fish,' Mill said. 'Tarpon are scavengers. They want to eat. You want to leave the fly in a tarpon's face as long as possible. Even if he's not hungry, he'll bite it to get it out of the way.'" And all I can say about his advice to do nothing when a tarpon eats a fly is: Finally someone's got it right. Steve Waters in Florida's Sun-Sentinel.

It's always intriguing to read an "outsider's" take on the sport, especially when it offers a unexpected observation. Hannah Wiest goes fishing in Wyoming's Platte valley and discovers that fly fishing is mostly -- it seems -- about numbers. "Lesson five: Movies don't know squat about fly fishing. They always show some desirable guy hanging behind a girl, moving her arm for her. That would be annoying. And they say to do a 10 o'clock, 2 o'clock motion." In the Caspar, Wyoming Star Tribune.

Chris Santella writes in The New York Times about the advent of the double-handed rod in the U.S. and why it received such a warm welcome among steelheaders. "'When I was introduced to spey casting in the U.K., some anglers were using a rod called the Double-Built Palakona, manufactured by Hardy,' said Simon Gawesworth, one of the world’s pre-eminent spey casting instructors. 'It was 18 feet long and weighed 54 ounces — a rod for real men.'”

One of the hardest "levels," if you will, of saltwater fly fishing is achieved when you stop thinking of the wind as your enemy and know that for every mile per hour it blows over 15 knots the fish will be that much more relaxed. Of course confidence in your casting skills is key, but it also helps to catch some fish at half the range that you would on a calm day.

This March has been particularly windy in the Keys. An average daily wind speed of 12.5 miles per hour doesn't sound like much until you factor in the several calm days that are assumed to be in the mix. (An email we got from Diana Rudolph yesterday started with "It's windy" and ended with "Did I mention it is windy?") But the fish don't mind wind. I recall a day in the late 1980s fishing the east side of the Marquesas in winds gusting to 30 miles per hour. Frank Bertaina -- admittedly one of the better fly casters I've ever seen -- jumped 12 tarpon in an afternoon of fishing.

A couple of things you can do to make your windy-day fishing more successful:

-- Strip less line out -- you won't need it.
-- Be methodical about your line management: pay more attention to where your line goes when you strip it in and be sure it is well-arranged in on the deck or in a stripping bucket.
-- Learn how to water-haul.
-- Help the person on the poling platform by staying near the front of the boat and staying balanced.
-- Make the wind your friend.

(Thanks to reader Ted Lund for the article link.)

Chico Fernandez is one of true pioneers in saltwater fly fishing (think Seaducer flies, fly fishing for billfish and bonefish, and destination angling) and has spent 50 years teaching the subtleties of the sport. If you've ever been interested in knowing what grain-weight sinking head matches a 9-weight rod, or how long your leader should be when fishing 20 feet down, Chico's "Deep Thoughts" is a good place to start. As always, preparation is the key. On MidCurrent.

Charlie Meyers profiles Vladi Trzebunia, who 15 years ago compiled more points in the World Fly Fishing Championship than the next three national teams. "Vladi's way, Dennis said, involves a close-order approach to the trout with constant tension on the line to detect even the lightest strike. 'It seems simple, but there are intricacies of how you hold your wrist, when you pause, how you put the weight on.'" In the Denver Post.

After attending a rather chilly L.L. Bean fly fishing demonstration last week, Nick Mills is inspired to consider what makes his own "secret" waters so productive. "'I’ve spoken to anglers coming out of the pool who confided that they had been killing ‘em -- killing ‘em! -- on a Great Golden Goosefly, or somesuch. Size 6. 'They’re going for the big stuff,' they whisper. I nod, head for the pool, and start killing ‘em on size 20 beadhead cream midges." On MaineToday.com.

By the way, Mills mentions listening to Macauley Lord talk on fly fishing for smallmouth bass. Besides being a smallmouth expert, Lord is one of the top casting instructors in the world. You'll find three of his excellent articles on fly casting on MidCurrent: "Beyond Competence, Part I," "Beyond Competence, Part II," and "The Elements of Style."

Despite book and Internet advice to the contrary, Chester Allen plays the cards as they are dealt and discovers that the fish don't often care what the experts say. "All the magazine writers said the same thing, and so did the famous anglers on the steelhead videotape I rented. But there was a nice summer steelhead tipping and sipping away. My head actually started hurting. I couldn't believe that that steelhead was ignoring the facts on steelhead behavior." In Olympia, Washington's Olympian.

"Fly-rodding is not quite an art, but the fluid motion and seemingly effortless casts made by experts do seem a style of modern dance, almost a performance art where form meets function." Frank Sargeant goes down Lefty's list of the essentials in good fly casting, including keeping a straight line, making a good backcast, and keeping the elbow low. In the Tampa Tribune.

"On the Mayan Riviera, that resort strip on the Yucatan Peninsula south of Cancún, a brew pub actually produces a beer under the Permit label - subtitled: 'The Beer That Won't Bite.'" Charlie Meyers describes the aura of impossibility that accompanies fly fishing for permit, which he recently tasted while fishing in Xcalak, Mexico, near the border with Belize. In the Denver Post.

For more on fly fishing for permit, read "Hunting Permit" and "The Permit Puzzle" on MidCurrent.

"Their casting was superb: distance casts, short flick casts between tree branches, side casts through narrow gaps under willows, roll casts, back casts and steeple casts - you name it, they had it in their repertoire." Harvey Clark tells an encouraging tale of two young New Zealanders who represent fly fishing at its best as they fish the difficult upper Ngongotaha. In the New Zealand Herald.

An article by Ben Ianotta in the Keys News raises some interesting questions about how permit behave in response to cold water temps. As the article notes, a lower Florida Keys guide, Darren Doop, found permit in a surprising place during the recent cold weather: "After the last front, Doop went into the backcountry and couldn't believe what he found. Permit. Not a lot of them, but big ones. They were swimming near the mangroves in the rising tide, at a place where a creek enters a backcountry island. The water temperature was 66 degrees."

For those who wonder, 81 seems to be the ideal water temperature for getting permit up onto the flats, and if there are gobs of them around, that will continue until the water starts warming to 87 or so. The "slot", if you will seems to be 78-88. Obviously wind direction and cloud cover will make a 2-3 degree difference to the equation: I'd much rather fish for permit in 79-degree water with a SE wind than 82 degree water with a north wind. The strength and timing of the tides also makes an enormous difference. Here's an example: the air temperature could be 74, the rising water in the morning could be 70 degrees, but later in the afternoon, large sheets of water heating up over a dark grass flat might rise 5-6 degrees in temperature, so permit may begin feeding near the end of the outgoing on the edges of that flat, drawn up in to water that is now in the mid-70s.

As for whether big fish are more resistant, my guess would be yes. It seems that if the weather turns colder, the big fish leave the flats last. As to whether they come up first, I kind of doubt it, though if you see really big permit on the gulf side of the keys it is typically in cooler months, probably because they are stimulated by the same events that make early spring permit fishing so good.

(Thanks to reader David Dalu for the link to the Cold Water Permit article.)

There's a common misconception floating around that to extract the greatest enjoyment from fishing, you need to have fished many different types of water in many different places. Those who've been lucky enough to learn and appreciate everything there is to know about one body of water know different. Jack Overman has been fishing Kansas's Roaring River State Park for seventy-five years, and we're guessing he doesn't feel he's missed out. "For Overman, the most significant differences between then and now are the dramatic increase in numbers of anglers and the advances in their equipment. He isn't happy about the latter. 'Back in the '30s, open-faced and closed-face spinning reels hadn't been invented yet, so it was all fly-fishing. That was work.' " Jim Low on Kansas City's Infozine.com.

"The water is 37 degrees, the air temperature 35. You get the call. Midges. The Monsters of the Midgeway, size 20-24 black dry flies." Randal Sumner calls it civilized. We call it "too much time spent indoors." In The Seattle Times.

Del Brown once said to me, "Between you and I, all I care about is hooking them." For many anglers, the excitement crests when the fish first follows, swallows and comes tight. For the same reason, seeing a fish eat your fly and finding nothing there when you lift the rod tip is one of the bitterest moments we know. It's especially true for tarpon and steelhead fishing, where heart-shocking takes are often followed by wilting silence and a limp fly line.

This week master steelheader Dec Hogan, whose recent book A Passion for Steelhead (Wild River Press, 272 pages) has already gone into a second printing, shares his secret for making every take count. "Striking the Fish" looks at the standard methods for ensuring a hookup and demonstrates one that makes all the difference with these incredible fish.

"'You can always tell a Smoky Mountain angler because they habitually cast side-armed,' guide Ian Rutter says. A trout fishing guide in Tennessee for more than 12 years, Rutter guides anglers into the Great Smoky Mountain National Park and knows how to hook the native fish." Ian Rutter describes the technique required for fishing wild trout in small streams, where 15-foot casts are the norm, in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Article by Eric Bruce.

Guide extraordinaire Steve Huff spoke to a standing-room-only audience at the IGFA in Dania Beach, Florida yesterday, sharing some tremendous insights gathered during more than four decades of fishing south Florida. About snook -- a fish he likes catching more than any other -- he said, "Unlike permit, they play fair. If you put the fly in front of them and you do everything right, they'll sometimes eat the fly, as long as they are not in super-clear water and they haven't noticed you yet. I like the low incoming tide above all. It seems to be the time when they'll eat just about anything."

Some other Huff snook tips:

-- Don't use anything less than a 50# shock tippet, and it doesn't need to be Fluorocarbon (Steve doesn't use Fluorocarbon because it makes the flies sink to fast and he hasn't noticed a difference in the number of hookups).
-- "Fishing for snook is the only time I recommend throwing the fly beyond the fish: 12-15 inches beyond and in front seems to work best."
-- Always use a loop knot to tie on the fly -- it makes the fly move more naturally.

By the way, Steve, who still runs 4 miles a day, often after getting up at 5:00 AM to go fishing, stopped reading fishing magazines and watching fishing on television years ago. "I don't know what it has to do with fishing," he says.

"I'm holding in the current with other trout, watching bugs float by. One is drifting right at my head. I turn for a closer look and am foul hooked. I swim to the surface and spit the regulator out of my mouth. 'Dang it, Bruce, you snagged me again.'" Kirk Deter grabs a mask and tank and goes deep with the trout at the Bridge Hole at Boxwood Gulch Ranch in Shawnee, Colorado, learning plenty of stuff that can't be gleaned from above the surface. Among the less obvious lessons:

-- Tippet size doesn't seem to make that much difference; if in doubt, go big.
-- Even the best anglers miss more than 50 percent of takes when nymph fishing; if you think a trout has eaten your nymph, it probably has.
-- Trout are most likely to eat nymphs that approach them at nose level; with nymphs, weight can be as important as pattern.

Tons of other good insight here on trout behavior and tips on adjusting your fishing style. In Field & Stream. (First picked up by TroutUnderground.com.)

Whenever the subject of writing a book on fly fishing for permit comes up -- and it comes up fairly often in my conversations with friends who know about that fish's magic -- my mind races. There are so many ways to look at the challenges permit present as a fly fishing quarry. And then there are those great unutterables: the experience it takes to learn the fish's timing when it takes a fly, the skill of knowing which fish will eat and which won't, and the willingness -- even desire -- to take on the challenges of strong wind and current. It's not beyond imagination to guess that writing such a book would take a very, very long time.

But as with most types of fly fishing, becoming reasonably good at permit fishing -- at least good enough to build a passion for it -- is not nearly as hard as advertised. This week I share ten tips that might help you rid yourself of the notion that permit are extremely hard to catch. The reality is that in many cases they are easier to fool than bonefish, and oftentimes simply being prepared for what happens makes all the difference. Even if you've never saltwater fly fished before, "Hunting Permit" should give you a good introduction to the fish that beckons so many fly fishers to make them a lifelong goal. New on MidCurrent.

The January/February 2006 issue of Fly Fishing in Saltwaters gives fly fishing phenom Diana Rudolph plenty of ink, with a six-page article that chronicles Rudolph's beginnings in the sport and follows the sources of her passion for fishing. Additionally, the lists 10 tips from Rudolph on how to "up your game in salt water." Here are our few of our favorites from that list:

"Water Loading -- Often when the wind is up, or I have a funky angle, or I'm casting heavy or bulky flies, I will flip the fly behind me and use the wate to help me load the rod. This lets you get the fly where it needs to go with as few false casts as possible."

"Know Your Fly -- Take a few minutes to see what your fly looks like and how it behaves in the water. After I tie on a pattern, I watch it to see how fast the fly sinks and moves in the current. Then I'll try a couple of different strips to see what it takes to make the fly move and how that movement translates to the fly."

"Set the Hook -- I don't really set the hook hard. I slow strip then come up with the rod tip just enough to come tight and stay connected. That's all you really have to do. That's why I have a lot of success with lighter tippets. If you try to Bassmaster or rip the fish's lips, you'll end up breaking a lot of them off on the hookup. Just come tight and stay connected."

(If you want to read more on Diana Rudolph, check out our interview on MidCurrent.)

If you don't know what an elbow-caster or a side-caster is, don't worry -- you're not alone. We weren't quite sure either, until master casting instructor Macauley Lord explained the difference.

This week Lord, whose revised edition of the L.L. Bean Fly-Casting Handbook comes out March 1, shares several insights into how elbow position influences our casts, and points out that breaking out of our muscle-memorized stroke can make all of us better casters. If you're like us, "The Elements of Style" will have you starting off the new year by setting up your video camera for a bit of self-assessment in the backyard. New on MidCurrent.

Wendell Ozefovich, who has spent several years now photographing the underwater behavior of trout, shared some surprising insight at this week's Fly Fishing Show in Denver. "'This notion of a blind spot behind is very specious,' says Ozefovich, who has positioned himself to know. 'All they have to do is turn a little bit and they can see everything.'" Among his more significant bits of advice: don't use bushy hackle (trout need to see a distinct profile) and never grease a trico's body (trout expect them to protrude through the surface). Charlie Meyers writes about Ozefovich's presentation in the Denver Post. Ozefovich's videos can be purchased on his Web site, UnderWaterOz.com.

Greg Davenport, a survival expert who will be speaking at the International Sportsmen's Exposition running Thursday through next Sunday at the San Mateo County Event Center in California (ISE San Mateo), offers tips that are useful for any outdoorsperson, in virtually any climate. His three critical rules: 1. Stop and Stay Put, 2. Identify Your Survival Needs, and 3. Improvise. "A car has a ton of improvising equipment. For instance, a mirror can be ripped off as a signaling device. Seats cushions can be cut up for insulation. A spare tire can be burned as a smoke signal, but only if you know the search-and-rescue teams are close." Tom Stienstra in the San Francisco Chronicle.

Andy Simon and Mike Davidchik offer up some of their experience in dead-drifting nymphs for steelhead on WashingtonFlyFishing.com. Among the tidbits: "Anadromous fish do not use the same lies as fluvial (stream and river resident) fish. Fluvial fish will select lies than allow them to feed easily, and are willing to fight a little more current and expose themselves a little more than anadromous fish to accomplish that. Anadromous fish, on the other hand, will commonly lie where the current is soft...." It is interesting to note that the authors repeat the importance of getting flies to the bottom -- somewhat at odds with Dec Hogan's advice in his recent book A Passion for Steelhead. Of course it is entirely possible that they all agree, and the difference is only in what their definition of "bottom" is.

Using ladders to fly-fish wasn't invented in Nevada -- I first saw them used in the Keys in the 1980s to help anglers get better visual angles on bonefish -- but they do find an unusual use there: enabling fly fisherman to cast in deeper water where the larger cutthroats are. "'Initially, they would take a milk crate and stand on that to get a little higher, but over the years, that has changed to an a-frame painting ladder with nice steps and a shelf on the top that makes it a nice little fishing ladder.'" Zoe Rose in the Fallon Star Press.

Mentioned yesterday by Tom Chandler at TroutUnderground, a new article by Ken Hanley on "Prime Time Beaches" on FlyFishNorCal.org has some great info on chosing tidal phases and beach locations for fly fishing west coast U.S. shorelines. As Hanley points out, there are two key "Interpretive decisions" you need to make when considering where and when to fly fish on California beaches: "profile (angle of slope) and aspect (north or south facing). Both of these concerns contribute to creating 'prime time' conditions for individual locations. They combine to have an impact on tidal affects, swell presence, food distribution and so forth."

A visit to Wyoming's blue-ribbon Sand Creek leaves Wally Zimmer discerning the difference between "smart" and "wary" and beginning his New Year's Resolution list: Find more stupid fish. "You spot a fish feeding, or see a mess of them on the finder. You know they're there, but the scaly *%#@!& just won't bite what you're offering. And you forgot the freaking midge nymphs." In the Jackson Hole Star-Tribune.

But wait a minute, won't a summer course interfere with fishing? Get used to it, if you want to be a fly fishing guide. "The Timberline Campus of Colorado Mountain College in Leadville will begin a summer 2007 course of study that will deliver a certificate of proficiency in the the fine art of guiding." Charlie Meyers in the Denver Post.

"A short time later I got another chance. A trio of tarpon were following the exact same path as the earlier group. I was determined not to blow this chance. I made the same false casts and dropped the rabbit fur fly in front of the oncoming fish. I could see the lead fish swish its tail harder and accelerate to the fly." Casey Allen tells a simple but resonant story about breaking his casting arm just weeks before his next tarpon trip in the Eureka, California Times-Standard.

"It's been my experience that the more emphatically you deny being crazy, the crazier you seem. It is just the opposite, however. I don't go fishing in the winter because I am crazy, I do it to maintain what little sanity I have left." Mark Littleton describes the rationale heading out for trout in winter in the Seattle Times.

Let's see. If Dallas-based fly fishing guide Ken Cole is starting his day at 4 AM and getting home at 10 PM after fishing Lower Mountain Fork River in southern Oklahoma, either he doesn't fish every day or he gets even less sleep than we do here at MidCurrent. Ed Stoddard describes the pace for Reuters: "'4 a.m. This is when I normally get up and pack the cooler box and check everything. I'm out of the house by 5 am.'"

"'When the water's high like this, you have to prospect and look for pockets that hold fish,' [guide Gerry McDaniel] said. 'That's what we were doing. It's just like deer hunting. You can be in a tree stand all day, and if they're not moving, you're probably not going to see many." Gerry McDaniel takes Gary Garth, Pat Carroll and McCauley Lord to fish Kentucky's Cumberland River tailwaters and meets the challenge of excess water. In the Courier-Journal.

McCauley Lord is head instructor for the L.L. Bean Fly Fishing School. You can read his advice on intermediate casting techniques in "Beyond Competence, Part I" and "Beyond Competence, Part II."

New on MidCurrent: Paul Schullery writes about whether or not trout are really as lousy at the job of eating bugs as they seem to be. "If you've been fishing even a few years, you've watched a trout come up to your fly, give it a look, and turn away. That kind of rejection is discouraging, but at least it's a nice, simple message from the trout: 'I don't like this.' And at that point, you're welcome to apply whatever combination of stream savvy, folklore, and science you can muster -- to try a different fly, a different tippet, a different presentation, a different prayer, or a different fish." Read "Coping with Rejection," excerpted from Schullery's new book, The Rise.

Spey casting guru Simon Gawesworth will be demonstrating his flawless technique on the Bob Marriott casting ponds during the California store's annual Fly Fishing Educational Festival. "The 17th annual fair, returning to the Fullerton store after going offsite the past three years, is this weekend. Gawesworth will be on the demonstration pond, spey rod in hand, at 3 p.m. Saturday and 1:30 p.m. Sunday." Dave Strege in the OCRegister.

"'I had a flats boat, and even though it had a very shallow draft, I couldn't get it back to where the redfish were. They'd be so shallow you could see their backs. You couldn't wade because even though the water was shallow, if you got out you'd sink to your armpits in mud. So I started using a kayak.'" Jimbo Meador, former guide and now vice president of Legacy Paddlesports, the North Carolina company that makes the Native kayak we reviewed at the Fly Fishing Retailer Show in August. Gary Garth in the Louisville, Kentucky Courier-Journal.

In a story about a Missouri River guide's first spey casting experience, Clearwater River guide Jeff Jarrett gives some simple but sage advice about steelheading: "... stick with the basics. Fish in water that is 2 feet to 8 feet deep and flowing at about walking speed. Fish close to the bank rather than trying to cast into the middle of the river. Look for underwater structure, such as boulders, drop-offs and rocky points where steelhead like to rest." Story Roger Phillips in the Idaho Statesman.

The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is considering various proposals to change the rule which prohibits the snagging of sockeye salmon in any part of the body other than the mouth. Some say snagging is snagging. Others, like emergency room doctors, are wondering what they will do with all of the free time on their hands. "All summer the emergency room doctors at Central Peninsula General Hospital stick the fishhooks they remove from people's bodies into foam dummies dressed like anglers. At summer's end they usually have a collection of about 200, mostly of artificial flies intended for sockeye salmon." Brandon Loomis in the Anchorage Daily News.

After dispensing sage advice on hook removal techniques and barbless hooks, Casey Allen tells one of the funniest anecdotes I've ever read about hooking oneself -- while suffering the after effects of a bar fight. "The doctor did not say much. He selected a big needle and eventually numbed my chin. He then returned with the biggest forceps I have seen and clamped down on the hook. He pulled until it felt like my chin stretched to my knees." In California's Times-Standard.

They don't jump and they shake their heads like a freshwater jack, but for some folks they qualify as a memorable gamefish. "We wanted to catch enough fish to wake up sore-armed the next morning. In short, we needed whitefish. If a few trout happened to weigh in as collateral damage, then all the better." Charlie Meyers in the Denver Post.

"The rod caught under the dock. I moved to the right, twisting a bit to reach the rod and free it. Dietrich continued to paddle when the tow line apparently jogged, overturning the kayak to the left, dumping me face first into the 62-degree ocean." The author of this piece in the Worcester, Massachusetts Telegram discovers that nothing is as simple as it seems, especially when kayaking in 20-mile-per-hour winds.

Eye protection is a must when fly fishing -- even if you are not the one doing the casting -- as angler Gary Hays will no doubt attest. Gary sports a booby fly in his right eyelid in this photo on UKFlyFisher.co.uk.

In the U.K. Independent, Keith Elliott writes about the growing interest among fly fishers in once-outcast fish species: pike, catfish, bream, flounder... you name it. "Fly-fishing is changing. Once it was the domain of irascible old buffers in tweed suits who hunted salmon in Scotland and trout (pronounced 'trite') on Hampshire's chalk streams. To them, there were only four types of fish: salmon, trout, sea trout and others."

Some pretty cool photos here of Duane Hada's home waters amidst the artist talking about techniques he uses for approaching big, smart browns. "Presenting a fly in aquarium-clear, moving water to a constantly vigilant fish is no easy task. An errant throw over the top of the target typically puts the angler back on the hunt for another fish. 'When I am guiding someone who wants to do this kind of fishing, I emphasize to them that the first shot is possibly the only one you are going to get on a fish,' Hada said." Steve Brigman in the Springfield, Missouri News-Leader.

"'Oh yeah, there's a lot more people getting into it--carp are hot,' said Andy Kurkulis, owner of Chicago Fly Fishing Outfitters Ltd. 'It's kind of hard to say how many [fly fishermen] are doing it, because there is still a perceived shame. A lot of guys don't like to talk about it.'" Charles Sheehan writes about the growing -- if not easily countable -- numbers of fly fishers who chase carp in and around U.S. cities in the Chicago Tribune.

After just managing to help raise two kids to the age of four, I think "the easy way or the hard way" is just a natural part of every conversation with a toddler. But maybe it's also a choice for anyone just starting out, as trout bum Mark Littleton suggests it is for fly fishers. "I found this comical, a fly-fisherman who didn't like to fish the hatches. Chris hated dry fly-fishing so much that more than once I caught him nymphing during an excellent mayfly hatch. My first response was, 'You have got to be kidding. We waited all summer for this hatch and he is ignoring it.'" In the Seattle Times.

"Jones' bread-and-butter method is the running line. A running-line expert uses one or more large split shot made of lead or some other heavy metal to quickly sink a fly in swift, deep water. Instead of a thick fly line that would retard the sinking rate, the method calls for a thin-diameter line that knifes through the water with minimal drag." J. Michael Kelly describes the use of thin fly lines, long rods, and marble-sized indicators as some of the alternatives in rigging for Lake Ontario chinooks in the Syracuse, New York Post-Standard.

Forget about drag-free drifts. The current rage among Pere Marquette trout anglers -- especially those looking for big trout after dark -- are big hairy flies that leave wakes. "Mice, once the weapon of choice of a few hard-core, tight-lipped, after-dark fly fishermen, are mainstream now. More and more anglers are becoming acquainted with the big bushy bugs that are known to draw the attention of a class of trout that many anglers never even see." Bob Gwidz on MLive.com.

I'm usually reluctant to talk about any guide's highly developed techniques, especially if the guide isn't getting full credit for "authorship." But Sue Cocking's article about Bob Branham's M.O.E. fly stripping technique for permit lets the cat out of the bag, appearing this morning in the McClatchy newspapers. "'Crab flies, you don't strip because they tend to spin and act un-crablike,'' he said. 'Most people have success throwing the crab fly, letting it settle and waiting for the fish to eat it. But it's hard to tell when the fish eats it. I like to be proactive; I don't want to guess. If that happened day after day, I'd be frustrated. No wonder these guides are so ill-tempered.'''

For permit aficionados, this is a must-read piece, since Branham reveals at least half of what he knows about attracting permit to stripped flies and Cocking even describes his favored pattern. And bonefishers should check out Branham's Razberry fly; I caught a 10-pound fish on it with Branham and MidCurrent reader Chris Miller in June.

Roland Martin created a phenomenon when he introduced flourocarbon to the tournament bass fishing set in the early 1990s. Where did he learn it? From his saltwater friends in Florida. Martin began actively fly fishing in the Keys in the late 1980s. "Martin had discovered that polyvinylidene fluoride (the official name for the fluorocarbon material) was indeed less visible to fish. Measured via a refractive index that gauges the light refraction of water at 1.33, that early fluorocarbon line was gauged at 1.41 or so, while monofilament line is 1.55 and greater." Tim Tucker on Gainesville.com.

Tom Chandler offers a handy bit of advice for those trying to eke effectiveness out of fishing in the almost-dark: sprinkle an excess of fly floatant on your fly. Is it the bubbles, or just the fact that seeing the fly better almost guarantees a better drift? On TroutUnderground.com.

Why are blue-winged olives such a favorite of trout everywhere? In part because they are typically abundant, and in because they belong to the "swimmers" group of mayflies, making them more available to hungry trout than "crawlers," "clingers," or "burrowers." Ken Allen talks about why the BWO deserves distinction and about some of the most effective and classic tactics for imitating them. "Fly fishers cast the Pheasant Tail quartering across and downstream, let the submerged fly swing on a tight line and retrieve it by rolling the line over the fingers, which inches the fly along. This simulates the swimming nymph and can keep a rod bent all day long." On MaineToday.com.

"They've splashed me in the kayak numerous times. I know channel cats, especially, feed at all depths. But to get catfish on a dry fly would make my summer and then some . . . I know catfish are [low-rent] fish to most, but I don't care." Angus Phillips fishes with conservative polemicist Matt Labash and discovers that catfish can drive a man crazy. In the Washington Post.

"Under the Bro's nose was a colorful little moustache that looked a lot like a Royal Wulff. The hook had somehow missed the outside of his left nostril and gone clean through his septum -- the bit between the nostrils where the bull's nose ring goes." Nick Mills suggests that among the arguments about whether or not to fish barbless, one reason is painfully obvious. In his Virtual Fish blog on MaineToday.com.

How many times have I heard otherwise companionable saltwater fly fishers turn into seething enemies when one or the other feels they are not getting their share of time on the bow? If you can't agree, or just need a level playing field, follow a rule like the one mentioned by Joe Doggett: 30 minutes per angler. (We'd also suggest that hooking a fish means your time at bat is over.) It's a good one for two reasons: it prevents anyone from monopolizing good fishing, but it's more than enough time to be standing sentry when things are slow.

As Eric Sharp points out, carp are legendary for their hyper-sensitivity and caution, so anglers must follow strict rules when it comes to stalking them. "Let's get something straight -- we're not fishing for bass, which are so aggressive they'll hit an old doorknob, or trout, which are so dumb they sometimes don't recognize food even when they're starving." In the Detroit Free Press.