Daily Cast Archive

I’ve written about converting old (salmon)flies to modern hairwings for years. And this is far from something I’ve come up with. Since the late 1980ies/early 1990ies Swedish Mikael Frödin has been spearheading this discipline and has in many ways set the standard. I’ve tied plenty of Frödin’s designs, both new and old, and I’ve also made some of my own.

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I have always hated hook holders on rods. For my use there are wrongly placed, too sharp and ironmade. Few times I have hurted my finger with those, So I started to cut them off if rod had one. I put line around reel and hook on first ring. That how I have always my starting line out when coming on the spot. Interesting to see how sexyloops get they magnetic holder work, that could be something for me also.

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This week I decided to go ‘old school’ with my casting practice, putting a #5 line on a #5 rod (or is it a #6? Someone has definitely written #5 on it. But then what exactly is a #5 rod? – I’ve plagiarised Lasse’s comments there). It certainly makes for a different experience to my usual TCX #10 which is my standard #5 (and #7 and sometimes ST27) competition rod, as well as being Tracy’s predator fishing rod.

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In the very first place was about finding all kind of strategies to help all my clients - each having a different level of fishing skills, to catch more and bigger fish.

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A recent thread on Sexyloops has caught my attention. Well, actually, all the threads get my attention, but this particular one piques me more than most as it deals with something I feel I might actually know something about. Which is funny because even though I consider myself a life-long fly angling addict, there are only a small percentage of topics on this board to which I can practically relate. In the wide world of angling, if fly fishing is itself a niche activity, then what I do is a niche within that niche. And, guess what, unless you are a world wandering vagabond like you know who… that niche within a niche label probably applies to you too!

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Some busy times for me during the Malaysian Wet Season, in particular I’m renewing VISAs and organising licences, fitting a bull bar and winch to my truck later in the week, fly tying and planning a few days fishing in the rain shortly. I’m having another boat built at the moment which will be ready by the end of the year and will make fly fishing in the Wet Season a much more pleasant experience! I’m also planning to build a fly fishing encyclopaedia as one way of navigating Sexyloops; it’s a fantastic idea we had about 10 years ago and will help bring the old pages into line, making them mobile friendly, it will bring some older content back to the fore, and finally it will allow us to see what subjects we haven’t thoroughly covered and rectify this. There are some good discussions on the Board at the moment regarding knots and so I thought I should talk a little about knots today…

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A few months back I detailed in an essay entitled "Lessons Learned", how my son and I made an ill-fated attempt to wrestle with the giant Black Drum of Matagorda Bay. In the process we found ourselves involved in what I have come to classify as a "teachable moment" when we made the unwise but well intentioned decision to use some dead crab that was, how shall we say... very well aged and fermented. Well, next week we're going back for round 2, better equipped, better prepared, and armed to the gills (pun intended!) with knowledge gained from the last debacle.

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The Board is one of the central hubs of Sexyloops. Let’s face it, discussion forums don’t currently have the popularity that they used to have. Facebook and social media has been in a large part responsible for this. While I use FB for business I really don’t like all the data collection, profiling and intrusiveness that it involves - if I could avoid it I would - but sadly we can’t. Also, I can’t really see the point of spending hours discussing something like fly fishing or flycasting when the advice or discussions there have a very short shelf life, a limited audience and are unsearchable. It’s a totally different format of course and not one suitable for long or technical discussions - which is probably a good thing because they know enough about us already! I like the idea that a discussion that we have on the Sexyloops Board conceivably will by read by someone in a hundred years from now, potentially enhancing his fishing and casting enjoyment. In years to come they’ll be talking about Viking Lars and was he really a Viking? Of course he is and he’s pillaging right now over in Sweden, which is why I’m covering the FP slot at short Viking notice :D

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Sometimes you hear about fly which is best in the world. People talk about that like it is only fly and how good it is with everything. I haven’t found that kind of fly yet even there is some flies which gives you special feeling when fishing. Donald duck just to be one of those years back but now it is lemming fly which is similar with surf board. It might not be best fly in the world but fishing is often out of this world when using it.

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The final BFCC meeting of the year was held at the weekend, concluding a casting season that started in March and featured six competition meetings, two fly fishing shows and the Game Fair. Having a competition day, with all seven events cast, after the clocks were set back for winter proved to be a bit of a close call in terms of available daylight. It was distinctly dusk by the time the last casters were finishing their events and it was most definitely dark when we finished packing all the BFCC paraphernalia back into our car. However, it was a great event to finish the year on with perhaps the most stunning backdrop to a BFCC competition ever.

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When I was a wee guy, the Crystal Maze with Richard O'Brian was one of my favourite TV shows. I particularly enjoyed the Aztec and Medieval zones, my least favourite was the Industrial zone, but I still liked it. Which is kind of how I feel about the near shore fishing in Tokyo Bay, it's not the kind of environment that I'm really excited about fishing in but it's also cool in its own way, especially at night. Japanese seabass are a very popular target species around Tokyo.(probably 2nd only to black bass) The massive construction and storm defences around Tokyo, Yokohama and Chiba has created a fantastic environment for seabass and the species they prey on.

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What if you were almost sure where the fish were going to be? What if you knew that they would be feeding and which fly they would want to eat? In other words… what if you had solved the puzzle? What if, after years of research, contemplation, and experimentation, you no longer had questions, you had the answers? Would you still go? Would it still be fun? Would it still be worth the price of admission: the effort? Those are questions I wrestled with en route on my recent trip. The turn of the seasons here in South Florida has a dependable effect on some of my favorite fish.

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If you go fishing with me then this is the first question I always ask. Never assume your clients can swim! If they can’t then you really need to be aware of this fact. If the answer is that they can, then I want to know how well, and when was the last time. But what I really want to know is can they swim. Because if they can’t then I need to be very much aware of this fact.

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The fire is the main comfort of the camp, whether in summer or winter and is about as ample at one season as at another. It is as well for cheerfulness as for warmth and dryness. ---Henry David Thoreau

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There are thousands and thousands of well established fly patterns in the world. Some are not necessarily known world wide, but are still well established “local” or “regional” patterns. I’m certain, for instance, that there are many well established Danish and Scandinavian salt water flies that would do extremely well in tropical settings, if they ever made it across the pond. There are also plenty of patterns specific to a river, a lake or maybe a region that of course would do well in other rivers and lakes, and yet never seem to “move away from home”.

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Last Friday when my daughters were coming to visit me we talked about my childhood. No smartphones, computers etc, just playing with friends and some fishing. After that I started to think about which are my first memories about fishing. In FP photo is my first official catch when I was 2 years old. (I can’t remember that one) With fast check I couldn’t find so much photos about fishing even I know I have them somewhere. You know ones which are old fashion ones. But there is four memories which always popup on my mind when I think my fishing history.

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This Saturday will be the first BFCC Meeting in Yorkshire, at the Northern Fishing School run by Marina Gibson. We will be running the usual casting competition events starting with accuracy as this is always a good event to get everyone together and support each competitor. The tuition will be provided by some of our top instructors, who will be available during the day to advise anyone attending whether a beginner or experienced caster. It’s currently predicted to be dry that day, with light winds, but very cold, so hopefully we’ll have plenty of hot drinks available to keep us all warm.

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Last week we again caught several great pikes, a serious trophy one included!

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I'm pretty sure that you if you asked most fly fishers which freshwater method they liked best, they'd say dry fly. I'm not talking about most effective, but most loved. Folk seem to love watching a fish sip down a nicely presented dry, the literature is full of it and it's a passion that is driving the avian eugenicists to produce ever longer and crisper hackle. Not me though.

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I’ve been experimenting a lot recently with both popper design and setting the hook. When Flavio was here I managed to miss six Snakehead in one week. Or maybe it was five with one straightening the hook? Anyway, looking back over the past years there has been a large number of Snakehead missed at the strike.

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The pipe draws wisdom from the lips of the philosopher, and shuts up the mouth of the foolish: it generates a style of conversation, contemplative, thoughtful, benevolent and unaffected. ----- William Makepeace Thackeray

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When Paul got the first lumi lines over 15 years ago, we had a lot of fun with them and casting them in the dark was a bit of a revelation, even though they’re weren’t particularly easy to see and the luminescence didn’t last that long. We spent a lot of time running back and forth from the field to the big lamp to keep the line charged, but it worked and we had sp much fun.

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It's October, I've been fighting off my annual anticipatory depression about the coming winter for weeks now. The insane Indian summer we've been having has helped a lot - we had 2 days over 30 Celsius last week. (Actually it’s November, Martyn sent me this last month in preparation for the next free slot.... Mika is “tracking a wolf” today!)

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Now the clocks have gone back in the UK there’s no daylight left after work for any fishing or casting practice – unless using lumi-lines of course. This is far from my favourite time of year and will only get worse, soon I’ll be going to work in the dark as well as coming home in it. It’s about this time however that I start to think about what I’d like to target next year, it’s also when I do the bulk of my fly tying.

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We truly had a fantastic week catching around 500 pike during the past 14 days! Many great moments included!!!

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After almost an entire summer of practice, last week I put away my fun rod and decided it was time to switch over to a more serious fishing practice mode. I had spent quite a bit of effort lately on casting with my other hand and, as often happens after long periods of frustration, somewhere along the line things finally started to click. I wish I could identify just what caused the improvement but there was no major “A Ha” moment. Repetitions and dedication get the honors once again. Fluff casting with a tournament grade rod and long belly line sure is fun but I have found that it does not represent the tackle I use on the water very well at all. In fact, I find it is almost self-defeating to rely upon it for fishing practice purposes.

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You’ve just flown halfway around the world. Your guide has just set you up for the perfect shot. Up from the depths the Snakehead suddenly appears - it’s a big one, of course! Quick! Only 2 seconds! You lift, shoot, deliver - but on the fish’s back, or short, or 2 metres too far to the right, or left, or too long... what the hell??? And now your chance is over and it’s time to think about where you went wrong, while the search continues...

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Every year our local town has a handmade market for local artisans to sell their wares. Last year they decided to let kids participate as vendors, so my son Jackson decided he wanted to sell handmade flies. His first show was such a resounding success, so this year he decided to participate again.

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Headline tells everything. There is nothing about fishing now. I have been spending lot of time in outdoors and passing lot of rivers. Thinking about how to write this FP but when I got thought and red line…. Well then I have to conctrate for something else. So I tell shortly what I have been doing past 3 weeks. It is all about reindeer now.

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