Is It about Practice, Or I am Doing Something Wrong?

[Danoinark]

Leonard

I always like to fish on the first day of the year. Seems the best way to start a New Year...Dano

[Crippled Caddis]

LMF you have recieved a LOT of good advice from some very knowledgeable fishermen. Adding anything will be difficult, but let me try.

Dano had a VERY good point. Neophytes often fail to recognize drag. And it's fully as critical when nymphing as when fishing dries----and far more difficult to recognize. So start by getting a good line dressing and using it OFTEN! A line that sinks cannot be mended properly. Period! Give yourself an even break up front by not casting across water with many different current speeds acting on fly, leader and line. Learn to mend and, maybe more importantly, when to mend. If the fly isn't moving at the same speed as the water it's in that is a dead giveaway to the fish.

Someone else suggested just watching. Allow me to expand on that theme. Make a trip without even bringing your tackle. Bring a chair instead and spend your time watching and asking questions of the most successful fishermen when they come off of the water. Tell them exactly what you have been doing and why. You will probably be overwhelmed by their earnest efforts to help.

As someone else pointed out your fly should be almost on the bottom to be in the trouts window. Spend some serious time experimenting to see how much weight and how much line between fly and indicator is needed to satisfy that most basic requirement. You'll find that both factors require constant adjustment as conditions change. Make them as needed! You want the fly just 'ticking' bottom once every 4-5 feet to be sure it's where the fish will see it.

I've been using 'Photo Flow', a darkroom wetting agent, as a means to get flies to sink RIGHT NOW! for years. Any wetting agent, including 'Basic H' from Amway will work---no need to pay exhorbitant sums for flyshop products. Even tiny droplets of dilute baby shampoo or dish soap well massaged into the fly will work fine to get the fly down.

Others have pointed out that people often use too much indicator for fly and conditions. Spot on! Some have noted for your edification that anything 'different' done by your strike indicator should be answered by a strike. Let me emphasize that: It has been said that it is alright to put all of your eggs in one basket----as long as you WATCH that basket. Your strike indicator is YOUR basket. If it hesitates, speeds up, burps, farts, rises, falls or seems to appear to even be considering any of those actions in your estimation---raise your rod right now! By doing so you will not only learn to recognize a strike but the concentration will eventually help you develop a 'sixth sense', common to all better nymphers, that tells you better than any visual indication that it's time to strike. You will no doubt fail to understand that sense once developed any better than do those who use it every time they fish. It isn't quantifiable or subject to logical verbalization. It just 'is'. Your task is to acquire it and the suggestions of others and my own feeble efforts is how you do so.

Perhaps you're familiar with the old bit of folk wisdom that sez: "Watch your pennies and your dollars will take care of themselves". Flyfishing is like that. It is the tiny details that make up the whole. With any of them left out there is no 'whole'. "The Devil is in the details".

HTH, Tom

[LostMyWife]

Tom

I have gleamed info from all of the comments posted here. You hit several that were totally new to me but should have been obvious.

Thanks for taking the time to add your thoughts

LMW

[gonefishin]

Gosh- lots of great advice.

A guy along time ago put a small ad in Field and Stream. The ad simply said, "$1 for the greatest fishing tip ever". He got a bunch of dollar bills in the mail- and what did he send back? I note card with the words, "Keep you bait in the water".

The fun of it is the practice.

Sounds to me like you was a buyer. ??

To tell the truth I need a new rod and reel so I am willing to give away a tip that is guarenteed to improve your catch. Anyone who is interested just send $5 dollars for shipping and handling and I will remit this fantastic tip via USPO. But wait! Act now and I will include a second tip absolutley free. Thats right you get the first amazing tip and a second tip both for free. The only cost is a very reasonable shipping and handling fee of $5.00 All people who order within the next 7 days will receive a free taiwan made fly that is guarenteed to catch a fish if you throw it enough times to dumb enough fish. So what are you watiing for. You cant beat a deal like this and like I said I need a new rod and reel so please order now.

[LostMyWife]

Hey Gone

I can scan the money and send it to you. You scan the advise and send it back.. Who needs shipping and handling charges these days

[Charley Hart]

Been a while since I posted. Spending too much time working.

I think all the advice people are giving is right. Many factors to consider, but you will figure it out with practice.

I can only comment on what helped me. I did a TON of warmwater fly fishing before I hit the trout parks. Not because I wanted to, but my distance 3+ hours from trout water just necessitated it.

I learned the casting basics and just general fly fishing stuff that you pick up along the way. Also fishing for some warmwater species gave me some practice in strike detection. Crappies IMO helped me the most. They strike very softly and gave me the ability to see more strikes on stream. I still miss like anyone, but I think I am better because of practice.

About mid-Feb I start hitting the crappie, and the takes then are so soft I would say out of 100 strikes, I might land 10. Still fun as heck.

Stream fishing is a whole different ball game, but many of the basic techniques casting, line control..etc I learned in many ponds/lakes in the KC region.

[LostMyWife]

That is exactly what I planon doing this summer. We are 5 hours frpm taney. But we have made it our plan to get down there one time a month, even it is just for a day.

But, we live in a community that has 2 lakes. One small fishing lake that is full of crappie, bluegill and bass, and a larger lake that has it all.

Can you take a catfish on a fly?

We plan on hitting Su Twan and throwing poppers off the dam for bluegill and crappie. We just got started a bit too late in the year.

[Flysmallie]

LMW, you may not live close to Taney, but I know you live a lot closer to some good smallmouth streams. That's how I started this whole flyfishing deal. I thought I would practice with the smallmouth, I had some knowledge on catching them, and then change over to trout. I learned two things. I didn't know as much about smallmouth fishing as I thought I did and a 18" smallmouth is hell on a 5 weight. When the water is warm there is nothing better than wet wading a smallmouth stream.

It is a lot about practice, but you also need the help of others to get you catching fish and building confidence. Had it not been for a very friendly guide on Taney one day I probably would have given up on trout. Me and a buddy had been fishing for smallmouth with flies all summer and that fall we decided we should try to catch a trout. Went to one of the flyshops and they told us they were catching them on scuds. So we loaded up on their recommendations and hit the water. We fished for a couple of hours never catching a fish. We might have had a bite but we probably couldn't tell. There were several people around and they were all catching a few. About the time that we were ready to give up this guy in a drift boat rows over and asks what we are using. We showed him and he asked if he could make some suggestions. He gave us some midges and told us how far up to put the indicator and exactly how to fish them. I tried to pay him twice but he wouldn't take anything. He just told us that next time we came down we should come by his shop and he would sell us something then. And then he just paddled away. We ended up catching about 30 fish together in the next couple of hours.

I don't know why he picked us out of the crowd, maybe we were just that bad. But if didn't, that would have probably been my last trip to Taney. I'll have to give him credit for turning me into the trout bum that I am slowly becoming.

Bottom line, you will get there with practice. But if you can spend a few hours with one of the really good guys on this forum you will pick it up a lot faster.

[AZ_Trout]

LMW

You have received tons of great advice - let me add a little more.

Don't rule out the Trout Parks --It's catch n release season - you will find some good nymph fishers there. You can always use an egg - glo bug and an indicator.

Second - check out the local -St Louis area for winter trout stockings in the local lakes.

Not the same as at Taney - But practice is practice, and some times these trout will have a very soft subtle take. You can stripe a crackelback, or some beadheads, wooly worms, even small micro jigs under an indicator. This helps to develope the feel of a take. If you can put a float tube on one of these lakes - then you just opened up to a whole new trout fishing.

I've spent many a good day Winter fishing back in Topeka, KS area. And just spent 3 hours today playing with some cooperative little dinks here in So. AZ.

Rod

[LostMyWife]

That is exactly what we plan to do in a few weeks.