Your fly-rod and you

Tim Bando from Cleveland Ohio writes in:

Tim, Here's what I know about the subject...

When we got to the river and looked at its diminutive contents I was positive we would be fishing for our health and not for Trout as I had so intended. Frank was confident that we could actually pull fish out of the river, but it looked more to me like the run-off streams you see behind an apartment - there couldn't be fish in there, especially Trout, especially big trout.
Frank grabbed his spinning rig, hooked on a shiny piece of metal which he felt confident would produce fish where there were clearly no fish within 10 miles of us. He went to the waters edge and stood atop a large boulder to get a look at the fauna in our surroundings. Seeming to spot something of interest, Frank stepped off the boulder and started casting.
I watched for about 30 minutes before I decided Frank has lost his marbles and was going to spend the day beating the surface of the water with his metal thing-a-ma-bob. I, on the other hand, was thinking clearly and had brought enough reading material to keep me busy for the next two days. Just as I reached for a trusty paperback I heard Frank yell. Since I was already in my backpak, I took the first-aid kit and started to dash to the riverside. Half-way to the water I saw Frank holding a fish - a big fish.
Frank had landed the largest Rainbow Trout I had ever seen. It was easily over 24 inches in length and had not a mark on it. After exchanging some explatives describing the size of the fish in comparison to various body parts, I talked him into letting the fish go back to the water.
When he leaned over the river to let the fish go, the proportion of fish to depth of water was way off. The thickest part of the trout was about 4 or 5 inches, and the river only had about 6 inches of water in it.
Certainly Frank was the luckiest schmuck on the planet. I watched as he went out to the shore and started thrashing on the water again, and it was not even 5 minutes and he had another trophy fish on the line.
At this point it was clear that I needed to get invloved. I grabbed the fly fishing rod I had lugged out to this trickle of a stream and walked to the shore. 10 o'clock, 2 o'clock, 10 o'clock, 2 o'clock, I kept this running in my head as I started the fly over the water to its intended destination. I was sure I looked completely professional in my precise attack on the monster trout.
An hour later I had caught nothing, my arms were killing me, and Frank was laughing as the last 3 fish had taken the rest of the energy out of him. Relenting to the fact that Frank had fished my butt off, I asked what he did which made his day so successful.
Frank told me about two things, Trout Fishing and Fly Fishing.

Often we think of fly fishing and trout fishing as the same thing. This is not always the case, and in fact, if you ONLY fish with a fly pole you may learn great patience while catching only a few small fish at a time. People have forgotten the addage that what works for one person may not work for another. While I had an understanding of fly fishing (I knew the motions to go through) I did not know how to fly fish for trout. In my dealings with fly fishing I forgot the whole point - to catch fish.
The way I approached this paradox was to make a decision about what I wanted to do the most - catch fish.

Frank told me that Trout are fairly easy to find, but hard to catch. Being a Bass and Catfish man I usually had the opposite problem when I fished, so this was a bit new to me. Frank had this idea that you could use just about any trout lure as long as the presentation was correct, and you were willing to cast your line out until your arm almost falls off. He could back this up with the most trout caught on any trip in any body of water in the time I knew him.

So lets discuss trout fishing first.

Trout Fishing:
If you want to get good at Trout fishing you will need some info before you go out and get all the glittery fishing gadgets for your tackle box.
First consider the body of water you will be fishing in. Is it a lake, stream, or river? This tells you a bit about WHERE the fish may hide, and how deep they may go. If the fish are in a lake, you will need to find them on cover, or rocky bottoms. In a stream and fast-moving river, you will find trout near cover like rocks and trees, but at a shallower depth than in most lakes. You will also notice that trout will look upstream in the flow of a river or stream, as if to ambush some prey coming downstream. They may also hold to 'boils' or places where the water seems to hit an object and spin like a whirlpool and wait for forage to get caught up in the swirling water.
In a shallow stream the fish may be smaller and in very shallow water. This also means that they may literally 'see you coming' and be fickle to bite. The shallow water also dictates that the water temperature will vary from day to day, and this can cause the fish to move to different areas. In a stream, especially a shallow one, a move to another area can translate into quite a hike for the trout angler. You will need to fish for awhile before you start to understand any of the fishes patterns, but there are some lures and bait to help you get started in the mean time.
In the category of bait, I have to admit that the Berkely PowerBait for trout and panfish really does work when all else fails. I used to scoff at the idea of using a colored clay-looking substance to catch these regal fish, but the stuff just plain works no matter what anyone says. The main reason I mention the trout bait is that it affords a great way to find out what color the fish prefer. The bait comes in as many colors as Play-Dough and it floats. You can cover a treble hook with it and put a sliding sinker about 18 inches below the bait so that it floats off the bottom. Start with the Red or Chartruce and see if you get any bites.
Once your floating bait is on its way into the water, look around the water and see what is going on.
What baitfish do you see?
What bugs and flys do you see?
While your bait is on the bottom, you can grab another rig and start casting. Personally I have always used only two trout lures - Mepps Sonic Roostertail and any of the KastMasters. I have friends that also use spoons - red/white, gold, and silver spoons, about an inch long.
For the Roostertails, the Red and the Yellow/Black seem to work the most often for me, but I have green and yellow versions which have caught a few fish here and there. I think the Yellow/Black produces constantly because it resembles a bee - something that almost all trout have the opportunity to eat! Either way, the best color to use will be that of the forage in the area. If you see many small fish - minnows or shad, you may want to go with something a bit more silver and shiny in color. If you see many bugs in or on the water, take note of thier size and color. Match the KastMaster or Roostertail to this color and size the best you can. Next, cast that lure out like you have to contact every water molecule in the stream/lake/river.
Choose your area of attack on the water and then pick a starting side. If you cast with your right arm, start with the right-most side of your target zone and begin casting. First run the bait about 6 inches below the surface for a few casts. Try to keep the casts and retrieves in the same area. After your wrists start to hurt, try a slightly different depth or retrieve. When you elbow starts to swell up, move yourself a few feet and start the process over again.
If you do not get a fish after a few casts, keep casting. Do not give up.
You think the casting is wrecking havoc on your body now?
Wait until you have had a 5 hour fly-fishing marathon where all you caught was Bluegill!
Consider all this casting and bait selection to be training for Fly fishing.

Lastly, there is one old-world fishing trick which has stood the test of time for catching trout - the salmon egg.
If you can get them, Salmon eggs are a great bait. You can put one on a small gold hook and float it down a river or stream. The reason this is so effective is that the Salmon egg has some bouyancy and will float as it rides the current. This causes the floating salmon egg to be at the whim of the current, and behave like a peice of passing food to the trout. This is deadly in most water I have tried it, with the exception of lakes and slow-moving streams.

Fly Fishing
Everyone and thier sister will give you the skinny on Fly Fishing. Akin to Golf for purists, Fly fishing is thought to be the essence of all fishing - the combination of a fly's simplicity, the fluid motion of the fishing gear, the precision of the fisher-person to present the fly, and the simple beauty of ones surroundings. Truly a way of acheiving fishing Zen and harmony with the universe as far as some are concerned.
If you want to just Fly fish and not align yourself with the planets and good Kharma you will want to get someone to help you.
Also akin to Golf, Fly fishing is vary easy to learn to do incorrectly. While anyone can go through the motions, you need to avoid learning bad habits. When you present a fly to a fish you want it to look as real as possible. This means you need control over where the fly lands, and how it lands. Personally, if you find some odd technique that gets the job done, it does not matter how you cast the fly as long as it goes where you want and looks perfectly real. You may find that establishing 'personal style' with fly fishing will cause a small hook to get stuck somewhere in your head, so get someone to show you the ropes and make sure you do not practice any bad habits. Do not be phased by 80-year old people who claim to be experts. They probably are, and most good fly fisherman become Good Old Fly fisherman.
Do not be so concerned with the brand of your fly fishing gear either. Most fly fisherman I talked to, stated that the cast and presentation was all important. If you used a bamboo pole, graphite pole, or a coathanger, it mattered most how the bait looked to the fish and not how you look to everyone fishing around you.
As far as what to fly fish with, you will need some flys. There are wet flys and dry flies and variations on the two. Either way, your fly fishing partner will know what to use to get you started, or you can ask someone in the area you are fishing for guidance. If you have nothing to start on, you can use flys which resemble the bugs in the area or you can tie your own flys.
The innevitable side effect of Fly fishing is fly tying, by the way. You will get a hankerin to want to tie flys to suit your own sorroundings. If you do persue this side effect of Fly fishing, you will find that a good knowledge of how to fly fish will be needed before you will know what you want your flys to look like.

To date I still have caught nothing with my Fly fishing rig. I wished I had hung around Frank and some of his friends longer to learn the ropes. On the other hand, I have caught trout in California and Texas on lures with simple, light spinning rigs and even PowerBait.
For outright information on fishing a specific area, it is best to ask people fishing in that area. As obvious as this sounds, we tend to assume something we do not understand will not work for us.
The best rule with any type of fishing is to slow down, take note of your surroundings, use lures and methods you have confidence in, and do not give up.

If you have any fishing or mountain biking questions for Flyin' Al, you can send an email to: Flyin' Al G

Your questions may be made into an article on this website.

Flyin' Al G

A Special thanks to Tim Bando of Cleveland Ohio for sending in the question about trout fishing.
I hope you have success in your new fishing hobby Tim.

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Want to go on Fishing Trip to South America? Find out how surprisingly low the rates are. We are acting as booking agent for several outfitters. For full information as well as rates, please email us at this address: