I recently bought a beginners outfit but I believe I made a huge mistake. I can not for the life of me make a cast farther than a 12-15 feet. I understand the mechanics of casting but the line will not travel through the guides unless I feed it through and them make a cast. At the very least I am sure I need to change lines but are there any other tips you can offer. I am near the Derby City Fly Fishers but they meet during my work hours so no help there.
If I understand what your saying; you are trying to cast the line while it is inside the rod. This is the wrong way. You should start with say 30 feet of line outside the tip top or end of rod. Cast the entire 30 feet. If I didn’t understand what you posted correctly disregard my comments.
I was casting (trying) with the leader and maybe a foot or so of line out of rod.
Hooked,
That won’t work. As indicated you need to have some line out, 20 feet or more to start with. The power built up in the rod carries down to the line which casts your fly. If there is no line out then there is no way for the power to build to begin with and nothing to transfer it to.
Strip out 20 to 30 feet of line, not counting the leader. Flip it out onto the grass in front of you. Pick it up and cast backwards, stopping at say the 1 o’clock position behind you. Wait a second then cast forward and stop at the 10 o’clock position in front of you. When you stop that is when the rod will send the power of the cast, if the rod was loaded, down the line.
But first, before you do anything else, go to you the library here on FAOL and search casting or go to You Tube and search fly casting. Watch some videos so you will have a basic idea of what to do. Please.
Larry —sagefisher—
That’s the problem right there. You need to have a lot more fly line out at the start. It is the weight of the line that carries the fly forward rather than the line being pulled out. Rather than subject you to my less than good description, I’d recommend going to YouTube and check out videos on fly casting, or find good reading material. A quick search found this video…there are many more.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Y4BGltw-Hs
(whoops…Larry beat me to it!)
You will get the hang of it, I promise, and it will be a blast. I was self taught (not ideal), and I can still remember the incredible feeling the first time it all came together…and it was after a bit of frustration, too.
Well I am embarrased and feel quite stupid. Thanks …I guess.
Larry made a statement that most people would overlook! "Pick it up and Cast Backwards"! A backcast is just a forward cast in the oposite direction.
Hooked, feel no embarrassment at all…you got your rig and did the natural thing…you went out to give it a try asap! No shame in having a little enthusiasm.
Basically, I tell new casters to start the casting stroke with a slow acceleration to a rapid stop. JC said it best when he said to start slow and end your cast like hitting a brick wall. Place your free hand out in front of your face, palm facing you with fingers extended upward. Start your forward cast slow, and end it fast when your casting hand HITS your free hand. It’s the STOP, that propels your line. SLOW TO FAST & STOP, SLOW TO FAST & STOP.
I hope this helps.
No need for either. There’s a learning curve for everything in life, even learning to walk.
Dave
As you make your backcast, you should feel the rod load at the end of the line unfolding. At that point, start your forward cast.
Also make sure your rod guides are lined up. Those are the little metal loops on the rod that the line is threaded through. You need to connect your rod so that they are in a straight line.
I’m glad you asked your question. The next time someone tells me they are learning to fly cast I’ll remember your difficulty and give them the tip.
ALso,
If you are using a weight forward line, make sure that you loaded it on the reel correctly. The front section (10-12 feet) of the line is thicker and therfore heavier than the remainder of the line. To check this out, strip some line off of the reel and you will be able to see it get thicker and then taper down to a thinner line. If your line is the same thickness, then you have it loaded on the reel backwards, making it very difficult to cast. Just one other possibility.
Jim Smith
Hooked-
Check your private messages. I’m in Louisville and those Wednesday night meetings are not the only time to get connected with Derby City, either formally or informally. I’ll send you some contact information and we’ll figure out a way to get you some assistance. Hang in there, it’ll get much easier!
Any one of these guys can tell you better than I can how to cast, but don’t feel stupid. Your assumptions are quite normal and natural. I have been at this for several years and can’t cast, but I have a heck of a lot of fun.
Some fly shops have free casting lessons. Bass Pro Shop holds free sessions most Saturdays. There are lots of places to get free or low cost lessons for the basics. Check community college catalogs, too.
As you likely can tell from my 1st post I am not much of a teacher and I surely do not want you to feel stupid. As others have said everything takes time to learn. Watch some videos, do a bit of reading, and if possible have someone help you learn how to cast. It really is a lot of fun. Although be forewarned if you take a liking to casting and fly fishing you maybe doomed to spending all of your spare time and money on it.
Wow, Hooked! I can imagine how frustrated you must have felt from that experience! I’m glad you posted here instead of just walking away from the sport. there are lots of folks here who will be happy to help you along the way to becoming a successful and non-frustrated fly fisher. I know that for a fact as this is where I came with all of my newbies questions as I was learning.
I developed along the say to write an instructional fly fishing book written from the perspective of someone learning the sport. I had a lot of help from folks on this board as I did that. But I had a bunch of significant things happen in my life along the way so it took a while to get the manuscript completed. Meanwhile, the amount of info available on the Net for people like you grew incredibly. In the end, I reluctantly decided not to try to get this book illustrated, published and sold.
But, the manuscript still exists and I’m going to show you the casting part of it. I’ll start a new Casting Basics thread to do this. LadyFisher, this thread is available to the board for free if you want it. Indeed, the whole manuscript is available to you if you want it. And, for the rest of you, please feel free to add to or edit this thread any way you feel will improve it --or to delete it if you think it will get anybody off to a bad start.
I thank you all for the replies,PM’s and such. I have read several books before I bought my gear and NONE of the ones I have mention starting with several feet of line before casting. It makes sense now because I understand the fly or in my case the poppers I was using isn’t helping propel anything. Hopefully things will come together soon.
Hoked, you’ll do fine, just stick with it. If I can learn on my own ANYONE can…and I was only 14 at the time!!!
When I saw your post I did a quick search to find a video or resource that explains it well and I was frustrated to find that nearly everything that came up skipped right past that point. I know the info is out there, but I didn’t expect to have to dig very hard to find it.