Aug 12 2008
I Love my Job, Teaching people how to Flyfish.
As my readers know, I teach flyfishing. I LOVE MY JOB!!!!!
Recently I taught a class to a very enthusiastic lady. She had been flyfishing for about a year, and had taken a short flyfishing class last year with a local flyfishing shop. She had some success, but wanted to brush up on a few things that were lacking in the first class that she had taken.
A few weeks back I did my Private class with her. That consists of 4 hours of theory on day one, and 2-3 hours of casting on day two. She was a VERY good student, writing down many of the small tips that I gave her and paying VERY close attention to my instructions during the casting lesson. She was a OK caster already, and after the 3 hours of class was getting 50′ out. Well, today I received an E-Mail from her, here it is; (E-Mail has been Edited for Privacy reasons) She asked some GREAT questions, and I thought that I would answer then here for all to see.
“Glad to hear/read that you had a fantastic B-Day. Somehow, I thought you were headed up the Sunshine Coast way. Regardless, it sounds like you had a great time - except for the bad food at the game.
I had a chance to put my lesson to use this past week while fishing at Anahim Lake. First thing I did was take a look at the water’s edge & find lots of shrimp, but not much else. Once out on the boat, there were tons of damsel fly/nymph shucks on the water. So, on went the damsel fly nymph & I had some success. Over the week, I caught & landed over 30 fish. Pretty good for a novice. I also tried the dragon fly nymph with no luck, even though there were dragon flies about.
Anyways, I had a couple of questions & opted to take you up on your offer that you were available to me to answer questions, should I have some. So….here are some of my most pressing ones:
1) My casting from my V-Boat wasn’t as good as it was when we were casting on dry land & I’m wondering if I’m slipping back into bad habits. Casting from a Pontoon Boat, V Boat, or float tube is more difficult then casting from a standing position. There are a few things that you can try. These will vary in success from person to person, but give them a try.
-Make sure to keep you arm in a higher position. This will allow you to keep the line higher off the water, and will help to not “slap” the water behind you.
-Try doing a more open cast. By this, I mean to have your loops a bit more open. This will allow you to cast cleaner while in the low profile boat, but will cost you distance.
-Make sure that you are set back in you craft. This way you will be sitting up higher, if you are sitting lazily in the boat, you will be sitting deeper in the water and this will make casting more difficult.
2) You gave me several flies during my lesson, including one called the “bushwhacker”. Well, it proved to be very, very popular with the fish on Anahim. To the point that it’s pretty much had it — all that’s left is a bit of lime green fuzz and a bit of sparkle :). Boy, those trout are rough on flies.
-This fly is deadly in the lakes of BC. A good buddy of mine developed it, and it has caught fish in EVERY lake that I have fished it in. The fly is called the Bushwacker, because of the nickname of the guy that first tied it (Bushman from FlyBC) It is a cross between a Scud and a small Dragon, Here is a Photo of it for My readers.
3). For fishing on shallow lakes, like Anahim which is between 10 to 14 feet deep, & wanting to troll about in a V-boat, what type of line would you select. I was using an Intermediate universal sink (a Type 3) I believe, I it worked OK but I wasn’t hitting the same strike zone as our friends who were trolling in a canoe using a sinking line that maxed out at 10 ft. I wasn’t hitting bottom (no snags on weeds) but wonder why they were that much more successful than I.
There are many different reasons for the lack of success you had while your friends were havening a good day.
-First and foremost, if they were using a line that maxed out at 10′ then more than likely they were using a “Slime line” or type1 sink. The slime line is a VERY versatile line and can be used in many different ways. It can be trolled shallow, it can be cast into shallows and retrieved slowly to keep it close to the bottom.
-Another BIG reason that they would have better luck would be that they were in a canoe. The biggest difference between the Canoe and the V boat is, in the V boat you are kicking you legs in a constant rhythm, in the canoe you are rowing and this gives the fly a jerky more natural movement.
4) I fish from a V-boat and, on occasion, I have to submerge the rod but end & reel into the water in order to untangle the fly line from the tip top. I may have to do this on several occasions over the course of a days fishing. I also go out on multi-day fishing trips. Is it OK to leave the rod & reel assembled for the full duration of the trip (eg: 5 days) or am I risking damage to my rod by doing so?
This is a common practice. I would not worry about it at all. The only time I would have a concern is in dirty water, or in water that has a larger algae bloom. In these cases, I would wash down my line and reel with warm clean water every night. Once you get home I would clean my line and reel as I show on my Podcasts that can be found here and here
thanks for helping me out with my questions
Looking forward to hearing back from you. ”
Well, I hope this helps with Dianne’s questions, and in turn helps my other readers.
If you have ANY questions, Please e-mail me at rick@rp3fishingadventures.com or just leave a response to any of my posts and I will write a blog post on it.
Tight lines & Fun Times
Rick Passek “The Flyfish Fanatic”™
