Last Cast of the Week, 9/2/2016

Most Fridays on Casting Across are  devoted to other people’s contributions in the fly fishing community. Articles, pictures, social media accounts, videos, podcasts, products, and more will be featured on The Last Cast of the Week.

Today, I’m sharing items from The Missoulian, The Fly Shack, & In The Riffle.

If you’d like to be featured in the Last Cast of the Week, or have seen something that others might be interested in, use my contact form or shoot me an email (matthew[at]castingacross[dot]com).

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Going for the Bronze: Smallmouth Bass at Dusk

This summer, I haven’t even started fishing for smallmouth until after 7:00pm. There are some fish-focused reasons for this. As is common across cold and warm water ecosystems, there is an uptick in insect and baitfish activity at dusk. Diminished shadows and light provides a sense of security for aquatic creatures, including bass. Additionally, there are some logistical factors. Where I am in Virginia, rivers can be pretty busy with kayakers and tubers until around dinnertime. Plus, I have to contend with all of that work-stuff during the day.

But just because you may be forced into waiting until later doesn’t mean that you are missing out on good opportunities for chasing smallmouth bass with a fly rod. In fact, there are many reasons why waiting until later is a good idea for any kind of fly fishing you’ll be doing in the summer. And summer smallie fly fishing can very well be one of the most accessible and most rewarding ways to fish late.

Here are three things to keep in mind as you wade out into the river looking for hungry bronzebacks:

See the trees:

Trees overhanging the river are some of the best places to catch river bass of any size. There are a number of reasons for this. Smaller fish will hang out under the branches waiting for a meal. All fish appreciate the cover that limbs provide. Often, overhanging trees extend out to where there is a drop-off or bottom substrate change; both of which also attract the bass’ food sources.

Casting up under trees can be tricky and/or risky, but it is a necessary chance you should take. Use heavier leaders (I like 8-pound fluorocarbon at the lightest) that can take some abuse and jerking. Make casts that stay low, such as a sidearm cast or a tight roll cast. Don’t worry about your cast making some noise, as the fish would be okay with a small critter making a “plop” as its falling out of the tree.

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Trout Quixote. three.

This is the fourth part in this series. Read the first here , the second here, and the third here. Subscribe by entering your email address in the right sidebar to receive a notification of new content on Casting Across.

So I obviously didn’t catch a trout.

That, as you are very well aware, is a Lepomis cyanellus. The green sunfish. Common across the eastern half of the United States, it is a fine panfish in its own right.

I caught these little guys, one after another. They were more than eager to eat dry flies and streamers. They even put a little bit of a bend in my three-weight.

The ability of sunfish to live in even the smallest, swampy trickles is pretty remarkable.

But sunfish are most definitely not trout.

I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t disappointed. After all of that anticipation, all of that build up, to catch something other than a brook trout was a letdown. A five pound bass wouldn’t have given me a reason to cry, but it still wouldn’t have been that little trout that my imagination had conjured up.

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Last Cast of the Week, 8/26/2016

Most Fridays on Casting Across are  devoted to other people’s contributions in the fly fishing community. Articles, pictures, social media accounts, videos, podcasts, products, and more will be featured on The Last Cast of the Week.

Today, I’m sharing items from  The National Park Service, Vedavoo, and Rouse Fly Fishing.

If you’d like to be featured in the Last Cast of the Week, or have seen something that others might be interested in, use my contact form or shoot me an email (matthew[at]castingacross[dot]com).

Thanks again for reading, and please take a moment to subscribe by plugging your email address in the field on the right sidebar.

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Trout Quixote. two.

This is the third part in this series. Read the first here and the second here. Subscribe by entering your email address in the right sidebar to receive a notification of new content on Casting Across.

I sat in my car out in front of my house. I had three hours, and I intended to fish. But where?

Even in suburbia, there are plenty of options. There are some ponds nearby that are filthy with carp, and I’ve had these big goldfish on the brain lately. I’m only a few minutes away from medium and large rivers. There are smallmouth, catfish, and anything else that decides it wants to live in Northern Virginia. I can literally drive five miles in any direction and be on good water.

But I couldn’t get that little pool, off the side of a busy trail, out of my mind.

All my warm water gear was in the car, so I had to hop out and run to quickly get my three weight. I plucked a half dozen puffy dry flies from a trout box and dropped them in an empty Altoid tin. Then I was off.

It was a quick drive from my house to the trailhead. To get to a legal parking space I had to pass by “the spot.” This took me to what is essentially the backyard of one of my former homes. Pulling in there was somewhat nostalgic, but in a “fishing context.” Perhaps I was a little focused / obsessed, but I wasn’t thinking about memories of family or school at that place. I was thinking about all the places I fished when I lived there. How I could have very well gone to this particular place to fish if I had known about it. How I could have figured it out, gotten to know it well, and determined if there were indeed trout in my town.

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Last Cast of the Week, 8/19/2016

Most Fridays on Casting Across are  devoted to other people’s contributions in the fly fishing community. Articles, pictures, social media accounts, videos, podcasts, products, and more will be featured on The Last Cast of the Week.

Today, I’m sharing items from Fly Fishing Museum of the Southern Appalachians, Catch Magazine, & Fly Fishing Girls of the Mid Atlantic.

If you’d like to be featured in the Last Cast of the Week, or have seen something that others might be interested in, use my contact form or shoot me an email (matthew[at]castingacross[dot]com).

Thanks again for reading, and please take a moment to subscribe by plugging your email address in the field on the right sidebar.

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Creek Sneak: 4 Ways to Think About Approaching Water

Maybe grandpa told you not to talk or you’ll scare away the fish. Perhaps you watched a super artsy video on YouTube where the anglers moved in slow motion. Whatever the reason, you’re convinced that trout are the smartest creatures on this planet. And not just smart: paranoid. They do nothing but wait and watch for goofballs dressed to the nines in Simms shirts and Patagonia waders, saving their tail-flick-and-swim routine for the moment you lay eyes upon them.

Some of that is reality, but most of it is not.

Do you have to be quiet around fish? Yes; relatively. You have to be relatively quiet on the subway or else you’ll get beaten up, too. Do you have to move slowly? Yes; within reason. We’re not hunting deer with bowie knives, we’re fly fishing.

Folklore and “grandpa always said” make up a great deal of how fly fishers approach the water. And to be honest, that stuff is harder to deprogram than the yahoos that trudge into the creek hollering to their buddy about who knows what. While those troglodytes need education, the former need reeducation. And fly fishing, like the rest of life, often means an old dog / new trick scenario.

So now that I’ve offended everyone equally (extensive snark = one pejoratively used “troglodyte,” no?), I have a brief look at some things one might want to consider when approaching the water. This isn’t a list so much as it is a hierarchy. Everything matters, but some things matter more. It is like a dry fly: Yes, it is nice to have Spanish muskrat hindquarter hairs for a tail on that one special Catskill pattern. But Super Valu Brand rabbit will do just fine.

So here are, listed from least to most important, the things one needs to consider when walking into position to try and catch a fish on a fly.

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Trout Quixote. one.

This is the second installment in a series. Here is a link to the first post. Be sure to subscribe on the right sidebar to get notifications when new content comes out!

When I go jogging outdoors, I like how I have an opportunity to think with minimal distractions. Call me paranoid, but having earbuds in seems like a great way to get hit by a car / mugged / mauled by a cougar. And being in the middle of  a move and a job change requiring all sorts of contemplation, I could use a little bit of time to think. But getting lost in my thoughts leads to other kinds of getting lost.

Since I’ve moved from a rural location to more suburban environs, I’ve been exploring more and more on my daily runs. Saying that Northern Virginia has changed over the past decade would be a gross understatement. I have gotten lost more often than not. A road that used to terminate into a T-intersection now continues for miles. Thus, I run for a few miles more. And then I have to run back. It has led to great fitness, and a little bit of stress. Thankfully no one has called in a missing persons report while I’ve been exercising.

As I roughly sketch out these jogs, I do consider running along the many subdivision ponds and interconnecting streams. While it is an unfortunate reality that most of these waters are overfished and probably poached, I’m always on the lookout for a possible secret spot.

One particular day I was running alongside an incredibly busy trail. Cyclists, walkers, and other joggers were everywhere. I’d been on the path dozens of times over the years, and a few times in the past month. This time, for some reason, I noticed a little pool for the first time.

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Last Cast of the Week, 8/12/2016

Most Fridays on Casting Across are  devoted to other people’s contributions in the fly fishing community. Articles, pictures, social media accounts, videos, podcasts, products, and more will be featured on The Last Cast of the Week.

Today, I’m sharing items from National Park Maps, Tightline Productions, and Lee Wulff Films.

If you’d like to be featured in the Last Cast of the Week, or have seen something that others might be interested in, use my contact form or shoot me an email (matthew[at]castingacross[dot]com).

Thanks again for reading, and please take a moment to subscribe by plugging your email address in the field on the right sidebar.

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