-
The True Cast – same gear different sports
Fly fishing in rivers and on saltwater flats are worlds apart. I often daydream about fly fishing for trout. But my night dreams inevitably involve tarpon. Like over 90 percent of fly anglers, I got my start on a little river chasing trout. But I’m now an “anadromous” fisherman, migrating back and forth from salt…
-
The True Cast – Secret Spots
The best “secret spot” story I can share involves a place (I still can’t say where, other than somewhere in southwestern Colorado) a good friend (D.)
As a writer of fishing stories, one thing I wrestle with most is whether to divulge the places where the stories take place. That’s not a new dilemma. Legend has it that when Ernest Hemingway wrote about the “Big Two-Hearted River,” he wasn’t really writing about the actual Big Two-Hearted River. I admit to doing…
-
The True Cast – The smell of mud
I can smell spring coming. It reminds me of walking to the school bus stop in Wisconsin, in a lost era when the ground would be covered by Thanksgiving with snowfall that would last until St. Patrick’s Day. After a long, dark winter, I would yearn for the special sunny morning when I would catch…
-
The True Cast – That bug thing… how do I pick the right fly?
If you told me I could only pick six patterns to fish for trout anywhere in America, these are the patterns I’d pick.
Fly fishing for trout encompasses many challenges, which I think is much of the appeal of the sport in the first place. It is, as my friend Monte Burke so eloquently explained, all about puzzle solving; How do I make this cast? How do I know where a trout will be in the river? How…
-
The True Cast – It isn’t about the gear. It’s about the hook.
When I first signed on as the editor of TROUT magazine, the great John Merwin—author of The New American Trout Fishing and then the fishing editor for Field & Stream—offered me some friendly advice. “Run a cover that shows a trout with a Panther Martin lure hanging out of its mouth,” he said. “That’ll get…
-
The True Cast – We Should Take It Easy on “Make it Easy”
At what point did some fly fishing companies decide that the learning curve was a bad thing? After all, it seems like every piece of gear these days is designed to make fishing easier. This fancy rod will not only help you cast farther it will also improve your accuracy like nothing else! This reel…
-
True Cast – How to choose a fly rod for trout.
Hint: it isn’t just about the fish.
Hint: it isn’t just about the fish. It’s a question I get asked all the time, so I’ll try to tackle it now for those of you who might be thinking about a new rod for spring. First and foremost, people often make the mistake of assuming that certain rods are meant for certain fish……
Category