NOW ABOUT YOUR CASTING

March 29, 2010

Every once in a while something on our Bulletin Board will really stir up all sorts of thoughts, especially when someone else suggests a person might do better by taking casting lessons. Oh my. That can be a very tender issue.

If you’re coming out of winter and you haven’t cast a fly rod for a while you darn well know you are going to be well, let’s say, a bit “rusty.” That is really generous. Your first time back on a stream or lake and you will remember just how much you don’t know about casting.

Oh sure, eventually you’ll get it together, more or less, enough that you aren’t embarrassed to fish with a friend (providing he isn’t a really fine caster.) In which case you’d probably prefer to hide behind that bush just around the corner.

I really would like to see you take a casting class - but at the moment I wouldn’t guarantee one place in the U.S to teach you best. We have a bunch of “FFF Certified Casting Instructors” out there and their methods lack standardization, which is one of the things which that is wrong with the program.I have thought for years that the FFF casting program needed to be standardized. In other words, no matter where you take your instruction you will learn the same basics so you can fish anywhere in the world. That also encourages fly fishers to do some traveling which is good for all of us. You are more willing to fish somewhere outside your comfort zone if you know you can handle yourself with your fly rod. I will say Orvis has been offering casting classes long before FFF certified anything, and LL Bean is also doing it - but again, I haven’t been to either so I can’t recommend from experience.

Being a fine caster is a work in progress. No, we aren’t born with it. We might have some genes which make us more likely to want to spent considerable time in the outdoors, but the motions which make up a cast aren’t automatic. But that is exactly where you want to be - for your casting to be absolutely automatic. Not to have to think about it, not to have to think about how making a particular movement because the wind is blowing, or should you use a curve cast or a steeple cast or roll cast. To be so well practiced that all the parts of producing the cast just happen. All this in the correct order of course - and that includes doing the double haul or roll cast when needed. If you are spending all sorts of time thinking about what you should do in each situation you need to get help. Or just practice until you arm feels like it is going to fall off.

I fished with a little bait casting rod when my grandfather would take me fishing with him. I spent many summers with my grandparents in Rogers City, Michigan, but my home was in Bay City. During those years Polio was a big threat especially in summer.  So the day after school was out my mother put me and my suitcase on a Greyhound bus for Rogers City, and I would stay until the end of the summer. It was a wonderful childhood - the best part was bumming around with grandpa.

He was an immigrant from Germany who came to his country as a young man with his brothers. His fly fishing was done with a telescopic steel rod and using flies from the hardware store. He didn’t tie flies, but he wasn’t against ‘improving’ them with a pair of clippers. At any rate, I was a little kid who loved her gramps and wanted to do what he did and he fly fished.

When I was eleven he decided he was tired of me saying, “Please gramps, can I?” It was at that point that he taught me to cast. He placed a hard cover book under my right elbow as we stood in the water, put the heavy rod in the right hand with thumb on top and explained how the motion was made. Then he said, “And we aren’t going to get the book wet dear, are we?” It wasn’t easy, but I managed to get a couple of casts out. From then on he would let me fish a little with his rod on each trip. It was wonderful.

Years later I got another lesson. My first husband was a fly fisher, and I will give him credit he bought me my first fly rod. I had used grandpas, my dad’s bamboo, but never had my own rod.

He bought me a Heddon Black Beauty. I still have it. It came from a little fly shop in Saginaw Michigan, named Wanagas, which is Saginaw backwards. Don’t blame me, I didn’t name it.

Anyway, the owner of the shop was an engineer by trade who loved fly fishing and had the only shop of its kind in the region. My husband didn’t like how I cast. He said it looked “foreign” well duh, it was, (probably German like gramps) so he asked the shop owner, Art Newman to give me some casting lessons.

Everyone has their own style, and Art was no exception. Instead of putting ones thumb on top of the grip, Art put his index finger on top and explained one’s accuracy was much better that way. Okay, makes sense, and I can do that. And I did. Some twenty years later I learned Art had severe arthritis and could not bend his index finger. It is a more accurate grip, especially if you start your cast with your casting hand directly in front of your face, (just in case you’re ever in an accuracy contest.)

Time forward, my second husband, the late James Birkholm (Castwell) really didn’t like the way I cast. The index finger on top was not nearly as strong as having ones thumb on top of the grip.

Since we were also fishing for steelhead and salmon in the Great Lakes, having strength to control the fish was important. So I made the change, again. Castwell really was a wonderful casting instructor. He had the ability to see what was wrong and know how to fix it. Over the years he was able to help many improve their casting, and taught hundreds, perhaps thousands how to cast. 

Over time I learned how to do the double haul - and that too can become automatic. Even if you don’t cast long distances, it helps to divide the work between two hands (helpful if you have a bad shoulder) and allows you to fish in winds which would prevent others from enjoying the day.

Not to mention things like bonefish, barracuda, permit and tarpon.

I can’t tell you what the mechanism is which allows your brain to turn a series of motions into something which combines them with the intellect to change the motions to fit the circumstances.
I can tell you that once “it’s in there” your life as a fly fisher will improve to the point it will amaze you. It takes the work, the chore, and the difficulties of fly casting out of the picture. That then allows you to concentrate on the really important stuff like where the fish are and what are they eating.

If your casting is not what you would like it to be, now is the time. This is the time, the year to get it done. If you don’t know how to fix it, or where to get help, drop me an email and I’ll do my best to get you help. Don’t put it off one more season. I know it’s trite, but just get’er done.

LadyFisher

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