This is a question I've often pondered. Why, with certain fly patterns you seem to fish better, and thus, catch more fish?
Is it psychological? Is it a confidence issue? Is it ingrained memory? Maybe the flies are just fish-magnets? Or am I just loony?
Any opinions? :confused:
As always, curious Bob.
That is a very interesting question. I have extreme confidence in about five patterns that I fish on a regular basis. To tell you the truth, I'm not sure which came first, the confidence in these patterns or the fact that they consistently produce fish for me. There have been a good number of occasions where I've been fishing with one of these patterns and catching lots of fish and then give one to a fishing buddy or even a total stranger and watch them flail away with little or no success. I've even cut the fly off of my line to give to another person and told them where to cast and how to fish the pattern and they don't seem to have the same success. Who knows, perhaps it's just plain old fishing Karma. Jim Smith
Aah karma....I like that Jim! Also the juxtaposition of your success with your flies v/s others is very thought provoking.Quote:
Originally Posted by James Smith
I find the more I fish with a particular fly the greater the hookup success over time. It's a matter of taking the time to figure out how to present a particular fly. I guess you can call it confidence.
Those flies I have real confidence in are those that have proved themselves again and again. Quite often I'm given to a little experimentation and the popular ones here often prove themselves.
I think we tend to underestimate the value of confidence in fishing success. I put it at the top of the list, everything else flows from it.
Since (in my opinion) a great deal of fish catching involves having a fly in the water (as opposed to in the air, in the box, in the trees, hooked to the rod while one pontificates on shore...), having confidence in a fly and sticking with it keeps it where the fish can get it.
That being said, I am confident in the short list of flies I fish because I have caught a whole lot of fish on them over the years.
I' m with Jim Smith. I fish a fly I came up with and the only one that has had close to the success With it as I have is my Brother in Law. But he fishes with me a lot and knows what it will do. Anybody else will not stick with it like we do.
Knucks
Bobby,
hate to break it down to something like simple conditioning since it isn't anything near as cool or interesting as karma,but I suspect that's a big part of it. I think we get the feedback and then we probably focus more and tend to take in more information because we have an anticipatory set,an expectation to catch fish.greater focus and attention leads to picking up subtle differences --could explain why others fishing the proffered fly don't do as well.
we all have that favorite confidence fly. my only concern is that it may end up getting too stuck on it.
best,
Steve
As DG alluded to above, I think the fly will catch the most fish is the one you fish the most. It's chicken and egg thing -- do you fish it a lot because it catches, or does it catch because you fish it a lot.
Look at the other end of the spectrum: I've personally never caught a trout on a wooly bugger. Obviously they catch trout, but I only try one when I have already not caught fish on flies I prefer. The chances of a wooly bugger working when I've already not caught fish on at least several wet flies, several dry flies (or several nymphs, depending on conditions) and several streamers in which I have more confidence are pretty slim.
OTOH, flies that have miraculously caught fish after I've gone through my whole repertoire of usual suspects raise my confidence in them sufficiently that I'll fish them more, and therefore catch more fish on them. It's a vicious cycle. That first fish could have been pure luck, but the fly will get fished more.
Until the mid 1990's I primarily fished with spinning and casting tackle for bass. For years I would rarely use a spinner bait. I had read articles and in my head knew they worked. One day I was fishing a pond along side the Natchez Trace and tied on a spinner and left my tackle box in the car. I caught fish on the spinner and have used them ever since. Sometimes you have to let your head over rule your heart with lures and tackle. I plan to take the same approach this year with sink tip lines and streamers and see if I can find some larger fish.
I think it's a mix of things, that all come from confidence. How that confidence is developed though is another question. But once you have confidence in a pattern, you will stick with it when it's not catching "at the moment". You learn the right drift and how to handle that certain pattern better since you are spending more time with it.
I think it is because you will stick with your favorite pattern and fish it harder. In your head, you know that it is a pattern that you can always depend on to produce and if for some odd reason it is not producing at a particular time, you do not remove it and try another pattern. Instead, you keep fishing it and trying to determine why it is not producing. You may decide you are not allowing it to go deep enough, allowing it to go too deep, retrieving it to slowly, to fast or maybe start twitching the rod tip while fishing it, etc. Whatever you do, you do not take it off because you just know that it will produce as soon as you determine how to fish it.
Once we feel we have answered this great question, we need to answer why one of our "never fail" patterns, all of a sudden, stops producing no matter what we do.
I have patterns that work very well for me. But if they are not working after a short time I am trying other flies.
It may be that I concentrate a little more of the flies that I know work.
My best excuse is that the fish want to drive me nuts( my wife says a short putt).
I say those days are why it is called fishing and ot catching.
Rick
Most of my go to patterns have been given to me by more experienced fishermen or women that I have caught fish with very quickly with after being given the fly. Also most of them are some form of hopper or spider patterns.