Stop!… For Good Cast When I was reading through The Little Red Book of Fly Fishing, this tip seemed like it is shouting out to me. Often a little voice in my head says “What’s so important about stopping the rod anyway?” This is what’s up. Always remember that the stop is the key component, the one that makes all …

The trees are leafing out, the flowers are popping and spring time is around the corner. It’s about time to put away the shot and indicators and start thinking about throwing dries and soft hackles. It’s funny, but I’m sort of a “stick to it” type of guy. This fall and winter I’ve been throwing nymphs and a few streamers …

I’ve always been a fan of Dave Hughes and have a ton of his books in my library. I’ve got one of them that I highlighted as I read it and he talks about the benefits of carefully and stealthily moving in position to make a shorter more accurate cast. This has stuck with me throughout my fishing career. I’ve …

A good fly cast starts with the grip. If you have ever received lessons in golf, most swing flaws can be traced to your hands and how you hold the club. This holds true with your fly cast. You need to keep a firm grip. The line goes where the rod tip goes. (Burn this into your brain). Because of …

“10 and 2 is too little too late” – As we have heard from the beginning of our fly casting learning curve, our cast is to be imagined as if your rod moves along an imaginary clock face, with the forward cast stopping at 10 o’clock, and the backcast stopping at 2 o’clock. In reality, when we start casting, we …

It seems like the roll cast is used so often, whether you fishing with bushes behind you, doing a roll pickup to re-deliver a dry fly or re-casting a nymph rigg when you’re drifting down the river in a boat, that it should be on the top of everyone’s list to practice and master. So basic and such an important …

As I’ve stated before, I’ve always been a fan of Dave Hughes, his books introduced me to two casting techniques, the wiggle cast and the reach cast. By adding these two casts to your game you can just about present a dry fly, emerger or dry dropper combination in any situation. If you get a handle on these two techniques …

I just started helping a local high school teach their students the art of fly casting. Many casting errors are traced to these two main causes, breaking the wrist and incorrectly applied power at the pickup of the line off the water and in this case the grass. We’ll concentrate on the second problem here. Many anglers start their cast …