Hello
friends and thanks for checking in at the O’Grady Fly Fishing Adventures. Well
we made it through the January doldrums way better than expected and now we are
quickly getting into my favorite three months of the year, yep it is sight
fishing time and the season that separates the men from the boys. I will never
forget my first real experience with sight fishing and will always be grateful
to my mentor Tony. I felt as if I was a pretty solid angler and had confidence
in most situations but watching Tony sight out fish showed me how much I was
missing out, it was the beginning of my obsession. I wanted to write this blog
to give out a few simple tips to help our readers find the obsession that is
sight fishing.
The first tip is just the sighting out
of the fish. Now to start, I’m not talking about the Taylor Hogs resting above
the bridge and emphatically not talking about the spawning fish sitting on redds
in six inches of water, I’m talking about the fish feeding in riffles and other
feeding lanes. The feeding fish are usually the most difficult to see but have
the greatest reward. The way to start is take some time at the river looking
into riffles and try to look at the bottom of the river. When you begin to see
the bottom then look for abnormalities. Yes, I have been fooled more than once, but I would rather cast to a broken wine bottle than spook the fish of a
lifetime. A great way of thinking about seeing the bottom is comparing the
river to the posters that were around when I was younger, it just looks like a
design but after looking for a while, a lion or whatever shows up and you can’t
figure out why you didn’t see it from the beginning. The second thing to look for
is color, with the fish beginning to spawn, on the sunny days look for red
stripes and on cloudy days look for purplish hues. Now after you begin to see
the pure number of fish in the river, next we talk about how to feed them.
One of the biggest difficulties I see
with anglers is fly placement. With many clients over the years we have spotted
out a monster big red stripe and after calming the nerves the client casts and
the indicator lands at the head of the fish. I normally take a giant internal
gasp and then we talk about where the flies are, compared to the indicator. Its
great when the light comes on and the next cast has the flies drifting right by
the mouth of the fish. So, one of my best tips is to think about where the
flies are, it is rare to catch a fish with your indicator. And lastly, as the
river begins to open up and look more like a 55inch HD TV and less like a kaleidoscope,
start watching the mouth of the fish as the fly drifts by, but I have to warn
you, once you watch a fish eat your nymph, January will never fish the same.
Now if you don’t have the time or the
patience to learn this on your own, find a guide that can take the time to teach
you these techniques. I know a pretty good one here in P-town and you can reach
me at the Drift, come see what you are missing. And to finish off the blog I
wanted to talk a little about spawning Redds. I started seeing them just over
the last few days and they really should be filling the river over the next few
weeks. Redds are clean splotches on the bottom of the river where you can on
most days see big fish in a few inches of water. Think of these fish as your
friends and if your friends were only in the mood once a year, wouldn’t you
leave them alone. There are plenty of fish that are eating. And lastly, when
you do catch a fish from a feeding lane take extra care getting any pics and
get them back in the water as quick as possible. Our last two years have had
really successful spawns, but we had a little more water hiding the redds. As
always, Connell, Cat, Winston, and the Drift Fly Shop want to thank you for
reading…….
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