The last cast.

Anglers of all stripes are familiar with the phenomenon. It is the last attempt at a fish. It comes after “I should get going soon” and “just a few more.” It is the nail in the coffin before the streamside post mortem. It is the last cast.

But anglers are also well aware that the last cast has a few asterisks. There are a couple of completely reasonable caveats and exceptions for this self-imposed fishing rule. There is, in fact, an entire spectrum of meanings if you really want to plumb the depths of the semantic domain of last.

If I may, I will now present nine last casts. You may be familiar with one, you might be acquainted with all of them. If you have been fishing long enough, there is even a chance that you have employed the whole lineup within short order of one another. Regardless, it behooves you to know what lexical flexibility is at your disposal when you say “this is my last cast.”

The last cast… but it was bad.

Everyone knows that a bad cast can’t be your last cast. If there is a tailing loop, cast again. If you miss your mark, cast again, If your fly lists a bit to the right or left as your leader is descending, cast again. It was a bad cast. And that can’t be your last cast.

The last cast… right before a rise.

Obviously a rising fish negates any rash vows to end a day’s fishing. It would be borderline negligent to not present a fly to a rising trout. You’d be considered masochistic to walk away from a bass swirling at some unseen frog or dragonfly. Get dialed in and get casting.

The last cast… wait, was that a fish?

So you’ve made a good last cast. There is a tick, a thump, or a slight pause in the strike indicator. There is no fish on your line, per se, but such circumstances necessitate another cast. Think of the first last cast as the set and the second last cast as the spike. They’re two sides of the coin.

The last cast… snag.

A snag, be it in in a tree behind you or in the water before you, renders any last cast null and void. The sentence has no period. The dissonance does not resolve in consonance. The feng hasn’t shuied. So what can you do but start all over with a true last cast?

The last cast… but the fly was fouled.

Similarly, reeling a fly in after a last cast only to find a tangled multi-nymph rig or line twist in front of a streamer automatically establishes the illegitimacy of any preceding cast as a bona fide last cast. It wasn’t fair to the fly. It wasn’t fair to the fish. It wasn’t fair for you.

The last cast… (in this spot).

Resigned to be done fishing, you make your last cast and head back to the car. But you have to cross over the river to get to your car. Or you have to pass by a pool that someone else was fishing earlier in the day. Or you think that you might have a chance at a fish that you saw earlier and missed. It is just one more cast. Or a few. No harm, no foul.

The last cast… but your buddy is still fishing.

You wanted to be done. You were all ready to go home. But your friend (who you rode to the river with) is still fishing. It is only polite – nay, it is angling etiquette for you to keep fishing. Standing there, not fishing would put undue pressure upon him. That is undignified. Cast once more, fair fly fisher.

The last cast.

It has to happen sometime. The curtain falls. The time of death is recorded. Hooks are placed in hook keepers, drags are released, and you walk or paddle your way back into the real world. Today you are done fishing.

The last cast… fish?!?

The softly spoken magic spells of anglers do, every once in a while, manifest the remarkable. “This is the last cast.” Then the stars align and something responds at the end of line, leader, tippet, and hook. It happened. It really happened. What a way to end the day.

…

But, I mean, now you’ve figured out what they’re hitting in this pool. So you should probably cast again. Maybe just a few more times. There is daylight after all. And everyone will understand why you had to stay a little bit later. You caught a fish on the last cast. I guess you’ll have to explain that it was and then it wasn’t and why all of that happened the way it did. But worry about that later. Now, you fish.