GETTING STARTED
With spring lurking just around the corner a young man or young woman’s thoughts turn to thoughts of taking up fly-fishing. Well, maybe it’s the second thing that they are thinking about as winter turns to spring, but perhaps they are thinking about fly-fishing somewhere in the order of thoughts that come to mind this time of the year. If this describes you or someone you know perhaps I can offer a bit of sage advice about how to get started.
In 1992 Robert Redford brought Norman Maclean’s rather obscure book, A River Runs Through It, to the silver screen. Suddenly it seemed that everyone wanted to become a fly-fisher and the angling world was suddenly flooded with a raft [no pun intended] of new anglers. Now, nearly 20 years later, many of those ‘would be fly flingers’ have discovered that fly-fishing is not quite as romantic as it seemed, and I suspect that there are lots of expensive fly rods and reels gathering dust in closets across this great land. So before you run out and spend your college tuition on a fly-fishing outfit it might be judicious to start slowly.
First, check out the people that sponsor FAOL. We have sponsors that sell fly rods, reels, waders and all kinds of necessary stuff at reasonable prices. We screen our sponsors and endeavor to make certain that they sell quality stuff and that they stand behind what they sell. We currently have 3 major rod manufacturers on our sponsor page, several fly shops, a major hook manufacturer, outfitters, lodges, and fly tying material suppliers. Check these people out and let them know that you saw their ad on FAOL.
If you are a beginner I would suggest that you start with quality gear. Quality gear does not translate to the most expensive stuff. In checking our sponsors I found fly rods, from a major manufacturer, that cost less than $40.00 dollars, and they even have a one year warranty! Granted they don’t have a rod case or a rod sack but they are constructed from quality graphite blanks with quality hardware. If you are a beginner you will not feel so bad if you break a $40.00 dollar rod, but you will feel real bad if you break one that costs $600.00.
Somewhere in my tackle storage closet is a large green plastic rod case that contains my first ‘serious’ fly rod purchase; an 8½ foot fiberglass fly rod. In later years I described it as something better suited for poking bats out of a chimney than as a fly rod, but I caught a lot of trout with that rod, and given the technology of the day it wasn’t a half bad. After using that rod for a couple years I could then justify purchasing a ‘better’ rod, but in the interim I discovered that I loved to fish with a fly rod and I perfected the necessary rudiments of fly casting. When I graduated to a better rod all that practice I had using that old fiberglass stick just made me a better caster.
One place where any angler can shave a few bucks off the fly-fishing budget is on fly reels. If you are going to be spending your time fishing for trout, bluegills, crappie, and bass it is unlikely that you will need to purchase a fly reel that costs in the excess of $100.00. The fly reel is basically a storage place for your fly line, and a reel with even a marginal drag system is more than adequate for the fish that most of us are likely to catch. Again I checked our sponsors and found fly reels that will do the job nicely for most anglers that range in price from $25.95 up to just under $100.00. The less expensive models do not have a case but they are reversible for right or left handed use, and have a one year warranty. [Hint – they are made by Pflueger] In my reel collection I have several of the old fly reels that I owned when I first started fly-fishing and I still regularly use many of them. They were all inexpensive reels when I bought them, but they have served me well over the intervening years.
Fly lines can eat up the family budget in short order, but, once again, it is not necessary to break the bank to buy a fly line. There are several quality fly lines on the market that sell for under $30.00 dollars and that includes not only floating lines but also sink tips, intermediates and full sinking. I would recommend that the beginning angler purchase a full floating line with a weight forward taper. In combination with various length leaders and weighted flies the beginning angler can successful fish from the top of the water column down several feet with this combination without springing the extra bucks for another fly line and another spool for their fly reel.
While the beginning fly fisher is confronted with many potentially expensive purchases the beginning fly tier is faced with even more expensive ‘must have’ items. Must have items consist of a vice to hold the hook, and then there are hooks, a vast body of material from dubbing to hackle, a staggering variety of tools from bodkins to scissors, not to mention adhesives, wires, tinsels, threads and all manner of stuff that might be necessary to tie that one killer pattern.
Fortunately, there are many inexpensive options for the beginning fly tier to chose from to help keep the initial cost of fly tying down to a minimum. I tied many flies on an inexpensive Thompson vice and these types of vices are still available. There are some inexpensive sets available that contain a vice, scissors, bobbin, whip finisher, and hackle pliers that will prove adequate for the beginning tyer. I urge the beginning fly tier to begin slowly and purchase only the bare essentials. If possible a beginning tier should find an experienced fly tyer to help guide them. The fly tying forum on FAOL offers the beginning and the more experienced fly tier an excellent place to exchange ideas and get help with tying questions.
Although most of the advice in this column has been directed at the beginning fly angler/fly tier in an effort to help them minimize the initial outlay of resources necessary to get into the sport there are valuable hints for more experienced anglers when faced with the purchase of a new piece of equipment.
I would hazard a guess that all of us have more than one piece of equipment in the back of our angling closet that was a ‘must have’ item when we made the purchase, but hasn’t seen the light of day in a long time. While some of these purchases may have been relatively inexpensive, a gadget of some sort that failed to perform as advertised, there are likely some more expensive ‘toys’ that include a fly rod or two and perhaps a couple reels. When considering upgrading to a newer and improved model a careful and comprehensive investigation of the potential purchase will save you having another unused piece of equipment hiding in the back of your closet, and might just allow you to buy that Grade 1 Grizzly hackle cape that you have been coveting.
Owning a top of the line fly rod or reel from a top notch manufacturer is certainly satisfying, but the beginning angler needs to understand that there are many satisfactory substitutes that will allow them to enjoy the sport of fly fishing. When I make a good presentation with one of my old fiberglass rods and hook and land a good trout using a fly reel that was inexpensive 40 years ago I silently congratulate myself on having made such a good purchase all those many years ago.