I realize this is a question with no single right answer, but I find myself curious today as to other people’s perspectives. I’m just a few hours removed from a trip to a local fishery where people frequently don’t give a very wide berth, but where one nimrod in particular really got under my skin today. I was working a run downstream, swinging a couple soft hackles, and rounded a bend to see a guy working his way upstream. Neither one of us was beating a path, but after a while, we closed within pretty close proximity to one another. We both continued fishing for awhile without getting any closer, and when I felt I had finished with the water in front of me, I reeled in and walked around the guy to continue downstream, making some small talk as I passed about how the fishing had been going, and then re-entering a respectful distance downstream of him. I took a second to change one of my flies, and as I was finishing up I heard footsteps behind me. It was the guy I’d just passed, now walking in downstream of me, close enough to where the end of a long drift from me and the beginning of one from him might have tangled. I couldn’t believe it. In one move, he’d cut me off from any further movement downstream, unless I wanted to get out again and go around him. Keep in mind he’d seen me working downstream before, and he had been working up previously, so there was no reason for him to come back down, other than the possible fact that I was a few steps away from one of the better pools on the stream, the one he’d just started casting to.
Anyway, I get home tonight, having mostly forgotten about this joker, and happened to see a thread on another forum where a guy was complaining about a couple of fishermen that were working their way downstream toward him on a stream, out west maybe, and he described trying to tell them diplomatically that he thought what they were doing wasn’t cool. When one of the other fishermen asked this guy what he expected, he supposedly told them they should give him or any other fisher 500 yards. My reaction to THAT was: 500 yards? Where in the world do they give that much space? It struck me that here’s a guy getting offended when someone comes within 500 yards of him, when my personal hopes are probably more like, I don’t know, 50 yards or less?
So hence the question, what’s considered crowding in your mind?
When we were fishing the Kenai in Alaska this summer if you got 20 feet of space you felt fortunate. Luckily, everybody was pretty cool about it when lines inevitably got tangled or someone hooked up (I’ve seen things get real ugly on the Salmon River in NY). My personal space definition varies when I’m out west. On well-known waters, especially in the summer, I’ll expect crowds although nothing like combat fishing mentioned above, and either slip in the cracks for a bit or head elsewhere; again, most folks are pretty easy going and will try to spread out as much as the situation allows. On lesser-known water, or places where a bit of hiking puts some distance from the pull-offs, I usually don’t see another person; if I do, I’ll give them a couple hundred yards, often more. On little blue lines, I hope I don’t see anyone.
If I want to deal with crowds, I’ll goto Walmart. I prefer to either keep driving or keep hiking. I don’t mind close quarters fishing with friends, but big crowds do not make for a relaxing day fishing for me.
50 feet of lee way is good enough for me, although of course, I always want more. The way I look at it is that they have just as much right as I do to fish public water. I don’t get mad about it, I just move on and recognize their right to fish there.
Obviously, it depends on the water and the type of fishing being done. John, you describe, I believe, a fishing method that does require a lot of water…fishing soft hackles or streamers ( I assume in a fairly long-line downstream method?). This method would obviously require more space between fishers…especially if you are wading downstream as you fish.
If you are 'parked" on a stretch of water like the Ranch on the Henry’s Fork. The fisher is usually static and casting dries to risers. This situation would require less spacing to be thoughtful of the other angler.
500 yards is obviously excessive. I would think 50 yards (width of a football field) would be fine in most situations.
I dislike combat fishing. My preference would be to not have anyone else in sight, but that’s usually not realistic. If there are miles of good water that nobody’s fishing, don’t set up right next to me please.
I agree with Byron that 50 yards is usually fine.
Swinging for Steelhead is a different situation. The routine is to cast, swing , then take a step or two downstream and repeat, working your way through a run. In this case it’s considered rude to step in below someone, on the same run, even if your 50 yards downstream. It is usually OK to start upstream and follow someone through (but polite to ask first).
When other anglers see me cast, they generally shy away a bit and give me some extra space. I’m pretty sure it’s their self-preservation instinct and not merely good manners…
Actually, that is one of the reasons that I actually prefer to fish warm water now in the Atlanta area. While there is some fairly decent trout fishing in the Hooch, it is almost always combat fishing with rude people crowding you sometimes actually casting over your line while you’re fishing. I don’t go fishing to get into arguments with rude people, so rather than hassle with them, I stick mainly with warm water. That said, I did have one occasion while I was fly fishing for crappie that sticks out in my mind. I was fishing a 110 acre man-made lake in a wildlife management area. This lake has peninsulas out into the lake to give everyone plenty of room to fish. There’s probably 1500 to 2000 easy access shoreline to fish and I was the only person at the lake. Another fisherman showed up and I watched in amazement as unloaded all of his gear (5 gallon bucket, two Zebco outfits etc) and lugged them all the way over to where I was fishing (about 500 feet) and set up his chair five feet to the right of me. I stopped fishing (mainly to avoid hooking this fool) and just stared at him. He just spread out his gear, cast out his line with a one ounce weight and sat down in his chair without saying a word. I was fairly well known at that lake for filling peoples buckets, especially with crappie, and I suspected that he wanted me to do this for him. I was catching plenty of fish, so I just moved about 50 feet to his right and started fishing again. Every time I caught another crappie, I would hold it up for a minute as I unhooked it and I could see out of the corner of my eye looking over at me expectantly. I would then say something like they’re biting pretty good today and toss the fish back in. Eventually, he got the hint so I move on to enjoy the rest of my morning. I was taught fishing etiquette by my father when I was a small boy but it still amazes me how some people choose to behave when they are on the water.
I prefer to never see a soul, unless it is someone i am fishing with. The place I fish the most, a warm water creek near here, i consider crowded if I meet a vehicle on the road in. My prefered place to fish is any stream in the Great Smoky Mountains. There I have never met a rude fisherman. At least so far everyone has always been nice and helpful. But I usually get up early and try to be sitting on the stream bank at daylight, but I’ve always enjoyed getting up early and seeing the world wake up.
Wherever you fish, you need to pay attention to the dominant etiquette. Nothing is worse than having somebody start fishing right across from me somewhere like the Gardner River, where if I see anyone else fishing the same section I am fishing (usually 1-2 miles in a 4-hour session), it’s crowded.
I won’t personally fish less than 100 yards from someone else anywhere. If conditions dictate fishing closer than that, I don’t fish there. This is the reason I haven’t personally fished Soda Butte Creek since about 2007 (though I still guide there if I have to).
I try to make verbal contact and agree on a course of action. I find most people are agreeable. The rare times I come upon difficult people I just hike far enough away to be ignored.
Good God, don’t ever come to any of the Lake Erie tributaries for steelhead. If you can somehow get a rod-length of open space on either side of you, it won’t last long. It’s not my preference… no matter what fish I might catch.
I used to fish the south Louisiana marsh with a guy who would leave an area if there was a boat within sight… even a mile away… But I do have to admit that it was nice to never have to look at or hear another soul while spending a day out chasin’ reds…
Where I fish in the Driftless area of Wisconsin if there is a car parked at a access area I move to another spot. Too many places to fish without people.
The Chattahoochee River tailwater trout fishery coming out of Lake Lanier at Buford Dam starts between Forsyth and Gwinnett, then goes down between Gwinnett and Fulton and then Cobb Counties. The total population of those five counties is something approaching 1.6 million people. Crowding is what it is, but it’s not usually much of a problem. This stretch has produced the last couple of state record browns, the latest last year around 20 lbs.