5 Minutes More & One Last Cast, part I

“Of course it would be on my last cast.”

He muttered this primarily to himself. He was also aware that he was muttering those and other, more  colorful, sentiments to any startled woodland creatures in the immediate vicinity. That is if they all hadn’t vacated the entire valley from the noise he had quickly stirred up. Hanging there, stinging from  hip to armpit, he hesitated to move again and disturb the silence. One can’t offend the squirrels, grouse, and toads.

It had been a relatively normal day of fly fishing. A pleasant drive. Fine weather. Willing trout. In some ways, it was a banner day of fly fishing. A greasy fast food breakfast that satisfied without causing gastrointestinal discomfort. A full parking lot; a parking lot full of hikers – not other anglers. These are the kinds of days one expects when blocking off a calendar square for fly fishing.

The drive was only an hours, but the hike in took about the same amount of time. Just go a little farther. Once you get there, hike for five more minutes. That patient penance might not yield significantly better fishing. But it is a discipline that he had developed over years of wanting one more cast. Looking at the next pool, peering around the next bend, he always wished  he would have started farther upstream. “A little farther, then five more minutes,” was his hike-in motto.

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My Re-Invented Trout Stream

I usually make a habit of walking the banks of rivers, even when they’re closed for the season. There is a lot you can glean from water when you’re not fishing. There is a lot you can learn when you can’t be fishing. While a fall-spawning fish might not be in that same location come springtime, you gain a general knowledge of what kind of fish are in the area. As vegetation dies or flows go low, stream bottom or bank features are revealed. Plus,  the presence of water is cathartic.

Last week I needed an hour of that kind of catharsis.

It had been at least eight weeks since I walked this particular stream. It is a small, spring-influenced creek that I delude myself into thinking is my little secret. Flowing behind homes right outside of a moderately-sized New England city, it holds a surprisingly  healthy brook trout population. In all the year’s I’ve fished it, the most dramatic change has been a new landowner posting my favorite place to park. Everything else has remained the same.

This winter things changed. A lot.

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Podcast Ep. 114: The Undercut Bank

There are some spots in rivers and streams that you just know hold fish.

Deep blue pools, frothy eddies, and overhanging limbs all look incredibly fishy. Another spot that ought to be in that list is the undercut bank. Fish, especially trout, covet these spaces for the purposes of safety and food.

In this week’s episode I talk about undercut formation, why fish like them, and how I approach these productive spots. It is a broad overview, but ought to provide enough for you to get out and targeting undercut banks on your favorite rivers.

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

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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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