Tracy&James | Wednesday, 30 October 2024
It's been another typical week in social media land regarding competition distance casting, a lot of people don't seem to know or acknowledge that it even exists. This includes people who have signed up on pages that are dedicated to fly casting with absolutely no mention of fishing in the title or in the longer description of what the site is all about.
A great example of this was a video that was posted for comment. The caster was using a MED #5 using a stepped, '170' style cast unequivocally aimed at propelling the line as far as possible in a competition scenario. Actually the cast was pretty good and if you cut out the dross, plenty of good advice was offered from people who clearly understood what they were looking at. But oh, the dross!
Inevitably there is always a commentator who pops up with the hackneyed made up statistic that 82.5% of all trout are caught within 30ft of the bank. Now this type pretty much always mentions 'trout' as, by their thinking, trout are the only species which are fly fished for. They also have absolutely no concept of casting just for the hell of it, and even less comprehension of it being turned into a sport. Being capable of casting distance to them is inversely proportional to the number of fish the caster captures whilst fishing – and they can absolutely tell this from watching someone go for maximum distance over grass (or carpet). I have a feeling that type of character has the worst cast going, collapsing into poor loops, bad tracking and tailing loops as soon as the line is extended beyond simple lobbing range.
Then we have the 'ten-to-two-er'. This internet guru is very similar to the guy above in that they don't accept that fly casting is a sport in its own right (however niche it may be). They simply cannot understand that the '170' style can give anything other than big, fat loops. They've never seen a loop morph and would look at you all funny if you tried to explain it, even in the most simplistic of terms. This angler has used 'ten-to-two' since the day they started fly fishing and they're going to stick with it for the rest of their days (actually they're probably 3 to 9 if you show them a video of their cast with lacklustre stops).
Next is the caster from the 'thou should never look away from the fish' school, so stop watching your backcast. This opinion is usually accompanied with their qualifications as an ace tropics bonefisher, where, if you take your eyes off the fish for a microsecond, it will simply disappear, puff – gone! Now, I consider myself a half decent bonefisher (as does Tracy) and I'll let you into a secret here that flats fishers don't want you to know in order to maintain their air of superiority – bonefish are probably one of the easiest fish to spot out there. There, I said it – no more 'ghost of the flats' myths of apparitions that can come and go, where the capture is the ultimate combination of fish spotting and targeting. Those fish stick out like a sore thumb, on a clean flat it's quite easy to see fish at 40 yards, and maybe that drops to 30 over rougher ground. Hardly challenging, in fact personally I find it harder to spot, and thread, an eye of a size 6 gotcha than a bone cruising a flat. If you want a tough fish to spot try a river Dee brown trout! Apart from tiddlers in the shallows I've never actually seen one in all the years I have fished there. I've obviously caught loads, I've even stopped fishing and watched the rise pattern from a trout no more than a rod length from me. But, apart from the flash of a silver flank and yellow belly at the surface I've still not seen the fish until it's hit the bottom of my net.
Actually I was having a discussion about eye-sight with Mark a week or so ago. I mentioned that when flats fishing I often quite like to look away and then re-sight the fish. Now this isn't hard, because, as I've stated above, you'd have to be blind not to see one within casting range (in which case I'm sure your guide dog would bark to inform you of the fish's position). This looking away gives me personally a really good take on the fish's movement. I liken this to the strobe light effect in 80's night clubs (before they were banned for inducing fits in the e-popping ravers). Strobes really emphasise movement and is still something I work with in my professional life, although the time resolution is in the sub-microsecond range in this case and the image is less affected by mind bending drugs.
If you feel the need to make a comment on a casting video can I recommend you understand the intention of the poster first. If they're posting a 39 metre cast with a #5 MED looking for advice on how to gain that last magical metre to hit 40, then he or she probably isn't interested in your 30 foot, ten-to-two with no looking backwards trout cast!
Have a great week, James.