Trout & Feather: January

You care about your flies. More than that, you care about the organization of your flies. You spend time, energy, and effort to tie or buy your flies, so it only stands to reason that you should be concerned about where they go.

Of course, you can put flies in anything. An old Altoid tin will work. But for a few dollars you can find the ideal fly box.

Today there are dozens of fly boxes at any fly shop and hundreds available online. What separates one from another? This month on Trout & Feather I discuss seven different kinds of fly boxes.  Labels might matter a little and there could even be some bells or whistles. Really what it all comes down to is the method by which your flies are held in any box. What are the strengths of various fly box styles?

Also, I feature a few videos from Trout & Feather. One is an excellent explanation of ways to keep the eye of your hook clean. The other is a detailed walkthrough of an articulated trout pattern. Both are worth taking the time to watch.

Watch the videos, and find a link to the article, below:

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VIDEO: Flies Unboxed

The vast majority of the time, the bulk of your flies will be in a fly box. Fly boxes not only allow you to carry hundreds of patterns with you as you fish, they keep your flies organized and dry.

But we all need some place to quickly stash and access a fly or six.

Hat brims and fleece patches work. But they’re not ideal.

There are some newer products that anglers have put together that demonstrate some real ingenuity.  They will absolutely serve as drying stations for your flies. They’ll also hold enough patters to keep you fishing all day if you are into minimalism. On top of that,  some other really helpful features have been built in.

In this video I cover six items from three small businesses that I think you should consider sticking your flies into:

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Podcast Ep. 113: Angry Angling

Fly choice. Feeding lane. Approach angle. Your emotions?

When was the last time you stopped and considered how much your attitude impacts your fly fishing? In this episode I stop short of psychoanalysis, but I do consider how your mental state impacts a few essential parts of your fishing. Think about it this way: professional athletes acknowledge that their emotions play a role in their on-field performance. In a very derivative, yet related way, your casting and fishing should be thought of as being influenced by everything that is happening between your ears.

Listen to the episode below, or on your favorite podcast app.

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Ice (Fly) Fishing

This is not a joke. To be fair: I have contemplated creating a satirical article advocating casting across the ice into a small, drilled hole. This is not that article.

This is an article that legitimately discusses fly fishing when there is ice present. It is brief, but it is an overview of what you can/can’t and should/shouldn’t do around ice.

While there are some things I caution against below there are also a lot of opportunities. Ice forming is a natural and normal part of the seasonal cycle of a river. Understanding it, and how fish react to it, is wise and helpful for fly fishing.

Here are five things to think about if your favorite trout stream has ice in, on, or around it:

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All Things Bright & Beautiful

My mother told me that my grandma would read Casting Across now and then. She wasn’t a fly fisher. She just liked reading about what her grandson was doing.

She passed away last week at the age of 89.

 

Some of my earliest memories involve my grandma and grandpa. They were remarkable people. They also lived on a farm. Combines, corn fields, and cattle make quite the impact on a little boy. And as a little boy I spent a lot of time with grandma and grandpa on the farm.

Bottle feeding lambs. Counting puppies as they are born. Climbing into the hayloft to see baby doves. Hearing coyotes yap in the distance. Finding raccoon tracks. Dodging ornery bulls.  Creeping around the barn to catch a glimpse of owls. Naming dozens of cats. Flushing pheasants.

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Podcast Ep. 112: Fly Fishing Resolutions, 20/21

I don’t make a lot of New Year’s resolutions. Sure, I decide to do a lot of things… they just happen to be more spur of the moment than calendar-based.

However, I do like to think about my fly fishing on an annual basis. Perhaps it stems from buying licenses on January 1st for so many years. This year I offer up three resolutions for fly fishing. Maybe you’ll want to take one of them for yourself. Maybe you’ll simply copy the exercise. At a minimum, I hope you’ll enjoy thinking about your fishing in the coming year.

Listen to the episode below, or on your favorite podcast app.

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Casting Across: A “Top 3” Year in Review

Happy (early) New Year from Casting Across!

First of all: Thank you for reading, listening, and being a part of Casting Across. With everything that 2020 brought, this website, podcast, and community has been a positive constant. Hopefully something I wrote or said helped you get on the water and get through the difficulty of the year.

While I don’t spend a lot of time looking at stats, I do try to take an inventory every once in a while to see what people are reading. Since the end of the calendar year is as good of a benchmark as any, I thought I’d share some “top 3” lists from the past 12 months on Casting Across. I’ve included:

  • Articles published in 2020
  • Articles, overall
  • Podcasts
  • “Clicks”

Check out the lists, including links to all the articles, below:

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2020 via Casting Across

This year, 2020. This weird, awful, ridiculous year.

But looking at these nine little thumbnail images is a reminder that there was a lot of good. A lot of good. In fact, these “top nine” pictures represent a mere fraction of the blessings that came in 2020. For one, they’re all only related to fly fishing. If my social media reflected the wider spectrum of my life there would be at least eight different images shown above.

Casting Across is about fly fishing though. Fly fishing is a part of my life, and was a part of my 2020. Here are nine good moments from this past year: read more

Podcast Ep. 111: Fly Fishing Storytime

Merry Christmas from Casting Across!

Since this episode is being released on the night of Christmas Eve, I thought I’d go ahead and do something a little different.

Nostalgia and tradition is a big part of the holiday season. Stories of those who came before us and the way things used to be come part and parcel with this time of the year. So along with the normal segments on the podcast,  I’ll read some selections from The American Angler’s book (1864).

Listen to the episode below, or on your favorite podcast app.

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Rusty Flybox: Merry Christmas!

Merry (early) Christmas from Casting Across!

I’ve got something fun for you to unwrap today. Three things,  to be precise. Whether you’ve been naughty (bobbers?) or nice (strike indicators!), feel free to crack into them a couple days before the main event.

  • The first item is a new spin on an old holiday classic. Instead of lords a-leaping and turtledoves, I’ve got some of the less desirable species that swim in our waterways. Of course, liking weird fish is cool these days.
  • Up next is another song. This is a celebration of the most despicable and despised style of fly out there. The fly that intends to suck the joy out of little dry fly purists’ dreams.
  • Last? Ideas to get you on the water and away from the… whatever you have going on otherwise. It is the holidays, but that means it is the holidays.

Check out each article, below:

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