One of the best lessons I ever learned when it comes to fly fishing with terrestrial patterns was explained to me by the late, great Denny Breer as we were fishing the Green River in Utah years ago.
We were floating the “B” section of the river and throwing cicada flies—me fishing from the bow of Denny’s boat as he rowed. I made a cast along the bank, and after a few seconds, decided I wasn’t happy with the way the bug was drifting, so I loaded up to unfurl another cast.
“Hang on there! Leave it alone for a bit longer,” Denny piped.
So, I let the fly drift a bit more, and even though I could clearly see the fly was dragging, sure enough, a big old whopper brown trout emerged from the depths and inhaled that bug like nobody’s business.
“Time on water equals fish,” Denny laughed.
Give it a chance
His point was well taken. Often, especially in low, clear water, smart old trout will scrutinize a large meaty fly before they decide to eat it (or not), sometimes following it as it floats downstream for dozens of yards. I have actually (honestly) seen trout follow a single fly nearly the length of a football field before spinning around and eating it. Then again, I’ve seen them take a good look and then swim away more times than I can remember. Either way, you must leave that fly on the water to give yourself a chance (which reminds me of another guide lesson: It’s pretty hard to catch trout when your fly is in the air!)
But wait… we’ve all been told that we need a perfect, drag-free drift, right? Drag-free dry-fly presentations are absolutely paramount when you’re fishing a blanket mayfly hatch and you want your bug to look as natural as possible.
But fishing with terrestrial flies like grasshoppers, crickets and beetles is a bit of a different game. After all, those insects aren’t born in the water. The wind often blows them in the river, and when that happens, they aren’t happy. So, they twitch and pop and do things that make a drag-free drift somewhat irrelevant.
In fact, I can remember another time when I was fishing hoppers on a glassy spring creek with a buddy who had local insights. I shot what I thought was a pretty slick downstream cast right against an undercut bank, to no avail, and my buddy shot me a puzzled look.
“Throw it off the bank and give it a few twitches,” he said.
So, I did that. Boom.
Think more about behavior
As TU’s resident entomologist Maggie Heumann said in her latest “Bugs with Mags” column in TROUT magazine, if you want to be successful with your fly presentations, matching the hatch is part of the battle; the real trick is matching the behavior of the insects you imitate.
In the case of grasshoppers, and especially at this point in the season, that starts with leaving those flies floating on the water for longer, more deliberate drifts. The trout are going to want to take a good look, so leave it longer than you think you should.
Time on water equals fish.
I’ve found that to be a pretty good all-around mantra. Not just when it comes to keeping your flies on the water, but also when it comes to growing and improving as an angler overall. You can read books and magazines, watch videos—even soak in deeply inspiring and informative newsletter stories—and that’s all absolutely fantastic. But nothing will teach you better than the rivers and fish, trial and error and the time you spend on the water yourself.