Daily Cast Archive

My fly tying for the Bahamas is now underway, progress is relatively slow however due to my limited time outside of work hours and the fact that I’m an incredibly slow fly tier.

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1. The Movement 2. The Time Lag 3. The Smell

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There is not much for me to write about this week. The weather sank into the dregs of winter for us here in South Florida, but as usual, it was nowhere as bad as in the rest of the US. While the air temperature only dropped into the 50 degrees F range, it rained almost the entire time and the wind howled in the tree branches outside my windows. That is about as uncomfortable as it gets in these parts, so I spent my weekend inside. As others have described some very artistic patterns of late I will not bore y’all with the simplistic patterns I tied to refill my boxes. In fact, it felt as if I spent more time looking for materials that I have run out of than actually dressing flies. The good news is I made a list of what I was missing. With any luck, I will be able to replenish those missing materials later in the week when I attend the major fly show that is rolling into Atlanta.

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At long last, I’m tying flies again. You see for the past 4 months, we’ve been remodeling our basement, which is where my fly tying workshop is located. The entire place was stripped down to the studs, and in fact, one of the wall of my workshop was torn down completely (the new shop is bigger). All my tying stuff was packed up and covered in plastic sheets to keep the dust off as much as possible.

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In last week's front page, I detailed my return back to fly fishing after several years of being obsessed with the mechanics of the golf swing. In this week's Front Page, I'd like to detail one of the first light bulb moments I had that I think lends itself really well to fly casting.....the concept of feel vs. real.

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I’m continuing on with the theme of forgotten flies today. I’m not talking about forgotten flies from centuries past (although I might some day), but flies I used to fish a lot, and that somehow got pushed out of the box. Last time I was enjoying a mild December to fish an “old” Danish classic, The Djihad by Steen Larsen. Today I’ll tell you about The Wolf by Martin Votborg.

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If you are fishing whole day you need to have break in some point. At least I think so. Often after break your fishing is getting better. Especially beginners needs to have good break and it is doing good. I have noticed that in some point you start to overthink fishing and casting. You know how it should go and you realize by yourself mistakes and how to fix it but…… You start to squueze the rod, over doing and over trying, pushing yourself to get that one fish…… Have a break, relax. And that is why I gather everybody out of river to have break together when I’m guiding.

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In a spare moment I was looking through an internet fly fishing forum this week and a particular thread caught my attention; a simple request for some advice on which wading boots to purchase. What followed the opening post was pages, and I mean several pages, of people complaining about how their boots had fallen apart after X number of trips. This resonated with me as my own wading boots are currently banished to an out of the way cubby hole, minus the felt soles which detached themselves mid-stream sometime back. I’ve since replaced these with rubber waders with built in boots, these are holding up well so far.

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This indeed is my SL front page number 300. I didn't see that coming when several years back Paul asked me, if I could think about supporting SL with a weekly fly fishing report.

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This past weekend the weather gods served up a “can’t miss” opportunity. Our South Florida weather has been rather benign of late: dry sunny days with high temperatures approaching 80 F, cool nights, and little wind. Saturday night that was all expected to change, dramatically. The strongest cold front of the season was expected to come through and usher us into our version of semi-tropical winter. But Saturday during daylight hours was expected to stay the recent path: a last opportunity before things changed. It was also a curious moon phase: full moon and at perigee – meaning strong, almost extreme, tides. I headed out in one of my canoes, solo, to check on the snook status. The upcoming drop in water temperatures will pack the backcountry with snook, but some early birds should already be back there. And, since the weather has been gentle, they likely would not be in their semi-hibernation lethargy yet.

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I’ve been gathering together a group of like-minded fly casters in Kuala Lumpur for the past few months. The plan is to meet every month to cast, compete and share ideas. I’m doing this partly for their benefit but also for personal reasons - namely the best way to stay up to speed and improve your game is to compete regularly.

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It seems like nature made it rough to be a good caster because all of the movements in (fly) casting go against what a person would normally do. -----Jim Green Reverse every natural instinct, and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having the perfect golf swing. -----Ben Hogan

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Behind “plastic in the basket”, both the concept and the hashtag, is Danish angler and writer, Nikolaj Korsholm. The message and the goal is simple - raise awareness of the general plastic-problem that we all know, raise awareness to the fact that there’s a lot of plastic on our own, Danish beaches, and most importantly, that we can all make a difference.

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You probably know why there is belt in waders and you are using it. But there is different kind of belts and sizing of waders is issue also. I have find out that it does matter what you wear especially if you are spending more than 8 hours in waders few days in row. I had to use few brands before I found (I accept that it will cost) good ones. And with this I mean that they fit and I’m comfortable in those. Satu had same issue but different reason earlier but now she is also happy.

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Tracy and the committee of the BFCC are starting to put the calendar together for this year’s casting and competition days. The current plan is to have 7 full events plus a presence at a few shows e.g. the Game Fair. As normal we hope to be able to offer top class instruction as well as an enjoyable set of competition events. The rules for these remain unchanged from last year; perhaps with the exception that the ‘fly’ used for the accuracy event now must be an un-weighted piece of fluff. At the last event of 2018, a number of competitors used flies that were to the world championship specification, i.e. brightly coloured palmered flies with the hook bend cut off. These are great over water, producing a pattern of concentric ring waves where they touch down allowing for easy marking, however over grass they were a nightmare, bouncing significantly on contact with the ground and generally being hard to spot.

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The simple fly is not always the best one. But the best fly is ALWAYS simple. Finding the best fly is everything, but NOT simple!

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What if you don’t catch a fish? It happens. I expect it happens to all of us. Well, at least it happens to me, and it just happened this past weekend. It's not like I scored a complete zero. I caught some non-target species, but I did not catch “the” fish. The one I was hoping for. The supposed reason for the trip. The prize. Most of the hype one hears about fishing for large tarpon centers on the big schools during the spring migration. Unknown to many except south Florida locals with an incurable tarpon addiction, there are fish to be had throughout the year. I do not know whether these fish are permanent residents or if a small percentage get separated from the herd and decide to hang around until the next tour, but there are usually tarpon, big tarpon, to be found if one looks hard enough. At this time of the year just finding some is a minor victory and one that should be savored, because getting them to eat a fly is an even more daunting task.

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A current discussion on the Board reminds me that I haven’t mentioned the latest when it comes to taking shots. It’s funny, in some ways every single cast I make nowadays feels like a shot, but what I’m really thinking about is sight fishing for moving targets. As most of you will no doubt know by now, I’ve planted myself in the middle of the most difficult, most time-restricted, sight shot-fishing that there is: free-rising Snakehead that are air breathing.

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A couple of weeks ago I wrote a review of Phil Rowley and Brian Chan's Stillwater Fly Fishing App for the blog over at Big Sky Anglers, the fly shop I help out at here in Montana. I figured this might be a group who might want to hear my thoughts about this new bit of angling "literature" as well. And, if anyone out there has some cool stillwater fly fishing literature from over there across the pond in the UK or the rest of Europe, feel free to get in touch with me. I'm always interested in new takes and approaches. Take Care and Fish On, Matt

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It’s an old discussion, and one that has manu sides depending on your stand point and reasons for using, or not using, fluorocarbon. I have two main reasons for not using it. 1. It never breaks down if you loose a leader or a tippet, 2. I really think nylon casts better.

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In August 2017 Satu said go fishing, this time she meant that go fishing alone. No guests, no children or wife, just you, take few days and go. I was shocked…. what, where would I go, just me nobody else. I told her that I need to go somewhere else than in our home waters, I would meet friends anyway, not that I don’t like my friends but this trip was meant to be different. After a while I suggested to her that I go to Kiruna area, there is some waters I want to try and at same time I could meet some new partners also. I decide to go on last week of August because there was no clients, but most of all it was just after weekend when meeting some other reindeer herders in north Finland and fishing in Arctic sea with them. (Another FP coming). From that kind of weekend you need rest. (you should know that when we meet there is lot of booze on table)

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James is away on business this week, so I’m home-alone going through the saltwater flies to check for corrosion or other damage. I’m trying to work out how many flies we need for our Bahamas trip in April and what types James needs to tie. Thankfully, he’s managed to gather some hooks (from friends, the local tackle shops we frequented over the Xmas/New Year break and some ordered from Finland), so when he gets back from his US trip, he can start tying. It’ll give him something to do whilst he gets over his jetlag.

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Is maybe the most difficult thing to achieve and it never seems to be meant to stay with us for always. For sure I believe it to be the best part of a human live.

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There is a common and often recited saying that “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks!” Time has given me the opportunity to scrutinize that statement and approach it from a slightly different perspective… like through the eyes of the old dog. Maybe the old dog is quite capable but simply not keen on learning some new tricks? In fact, maybe the old dog is a bit pissed that it has to keep learning new shit when it feels it has paid its dues and by now it should be allowed to just sit back and enjoy licking itself!

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Many years ago I was having a chat with Marc Bale and Jerry Siem at Sage when I brought up the subject of rods softening over time. Jerry said with the modern resins this shouldn’t happen. However I was a little skeptical because in my experience they were softening prior to breakage. I took in a TCR to the Denver FTD show the next day and Jerry measured it. He said it was on the soft side but couldn’t say if that was because it was manufactured that way or if had softened with use.

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Last weekend my son and I had the pleasure of spending the day with our good friend, Captain Freddy Lynch, sight fishing for Redfish and Black Drum in the Upper Laguna Madre. Freddy is one of the pioneers of saltwater fly fishing here in Texas, and with several State and IGFA fly caught records coming off his skiff, he has become the go-to guide for chasing "bulls" with the long rod. After several false starts and cancellations due to sketchy weather, we finally had a day with light winds and bluebird skies. Anticipation ran high, as the forecast called for near perfect conditions for chasing big tailing fish with a fly. Unfortunately, the unusually volatile weather patterns this fall had the fish in a very foul humor. We presented flies to probably 20 big Redfish and Black Drum without so much as an even a vaguely interested look. On days like this, it pays to have a certain level of mental toughness in hopes of coaxing a bite out of a stubborn tight-lipped adversary, but an angler can only take so much rejection before the mind can start to wander during the down times.

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It’s winter, but it’s a fairly mild one at that. We’ve had a few, short periods with frost, but generally it’s been mild and above-zero temperatures both day and night.

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It is busiest week of winter. Or at least it feels like that. I have been doing 16 hours per day now about two weeks. Still thinking lot of fishing but no time to sit down and write. So this week you will have my just in case -file. I asked one of my guests to write short review for our website..... Well It seems that it got little bit out of hand but it is nice memories with them and good storytelling, I think. So here you are Shemeikan kalakerho story with me. Shemeikan kalakerho means Shemeika's fishing club. (shemeikka is Karelian Don Juan)

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Well the weather was perfect for casting a #5 weight over 130 feet at the UK fly casting sport event in Millom, Cumbria last weekend (as per last week’s FP). Paul had beaten me at pool just the previous night, with me throwing away a 2-nil lead to lose 3-2, so I thought I’d hit back where it would hurt most i.e. on the casting court. Paul threw before me and put in a very good performance, recording a number of casts above 130 feet and some even higher. I would have to beat my competition PB to take the lead, but given the casts I’d been seeing on the flat in the lead up to Christmas, and the great conditions on the day, I was confident. How wrong I was!

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During the past days I have been trying a fair number of new flies for Zander. Finally I am happy with one, the Zanderking!

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Over the holidays I not only managed to meet my social obligations but I also fit in two canoe trips into the Everglades, one solo and the other accompanied. I’m sure some folks reading this realize how hard that is to do! On my solo trip the weather, in particular, the wind, was not optimal. In fact, it was almost prohibitive. Many locations I like to fish by canoe require long paddles across large open bays. That was not going to happen with the breezy hand I was dealt, but I had an open day and I was determined to get out.

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