What was your moment that inspired your transition to flyfishing?

RCF

RCF

Legend
Forum Supporter
Mine was more of a transition/evolution. No ah-ah moment.

My dad taught me where fish could be holding on moving water. He was a gear fisherman primarily but would use bamboo once in awhile. No worms and Power bait was not invented yet. It was more about nature's splendor and fish were secondary. Best thing I ever learned!

On the lower Dose, caught my first fish on a fly. My Dad's bamboo bass tapered rod It was a steelhead too!

When hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, used my Wright McGill 7 1/2 ' spin/fly rod. It was lighter weight-wise. No clue what I was doing. LOL!

Continued gear fishing. Stayed at a place on Fish Lake near L. Gear fished. The campground store owner tied a lot of Carey Specials and suggested I troll them on my gear rod with a banana weight. Caught 2 Browns over 21". Opened my eyes. Catch fewer fish but bigger ones. Sold!

A month later bought my first fly rod. A Loomis IM6 9' 5 weight. Still have it and it is very, very well used.

Right after that I sold or gave away all my gear (over time).

Best decision I have made decades ago.

My BIL who lives in Montana helped introduce me to the nuances of flyfishing. Learned a lot from him. Been learning ever since. Still am!

The most important thing I have learned it is not why you transitioned nor when, it is that you have. Flyfishing is much more than catching fish, it is about getting out, enjoying your surroundings and becoming a steward of it, and the continual learning that is involved. Sharing our experiences is also important. I hope that I am doing that, too.
 
Growing up in the Boston area, I did some bait fishing in a local tidal river for tomcod (and eels accidentally) and off the rocky shores for tautog and cunner. With my BA in hand, I moved across the country to Santa Barbara for gradual school. My Ph.D. advisor and several of his graduate students made an annual week-long trip to fish for golden trout in the Kern River. Another PNW friend grew up flyfishing in the classic rivers of the Catskills. But at that time I was obsessed with scuba diving.
On a drive across country from Cambridge where I did part of my Ph.D. research to my home gradual school at U.C. Santa Barbara, I passed through Rocky Mountain National Park. After setting up camp in RMNP, I headed out to do some exploring before dark. In the perfect evening light, I watched a flyfisher in a float tube casting elegantly to rising trout in a gorgeous lake. I was hooked.
[Side story. A herd of elk was grazing in the meadow near the RMNP lake. The next morning, I hiked back to the lake and meadow. I ran across a dead elk just off the trail; one of its front legs had been torn off and was totally gone. I don't know if the predator was a black bear or a cougar (more likely). The hairs on the back of my neck stiffened when I thought that there might have been a hungry, dangerous predator lurking in the nearby trees watching me while I hiked in the twilight the previous evening.].
Once I reached Santa Barbara, I mail-ordered a chea- 6wt. rod-reel-line package from Cabelas (the rod and reel are now collecting dust in my office) and I began to practice fly casting into the saltwater lagoon at the U.C.S.B. campus. When I headed up to the PNW the next summer to continue field work, my Catskill friend took me under his wing. The first trout that I caught was a brookie from a small creek near Carnation (now a subdivision...).
Three things give me joy when flyfishing. First, flyfishing brings me to amazing places: pristine cold mountain lakes and lily-pad choked musty ponds, mighty rivers and tiny creeks, rocky shores, offshore chasing albacore tuna, casting to spooky bonefish on a tropical flat. Second, when I'm flyfishing, I develop total tunnel vision. I become a single-minded predator. NOTHING else enters my mind, no matter how many other stressors may be in my life. I am totally in the moment. Third, I appreciate the intellectual challenge of tying a fly that matches the hatch and then skillfully dropping that fly into a tight lie that elicits that explosive surface strike.
Steve
 
Last edited:
Started fishing at a very young age always gear fished. Dad never really fly fished. I remember trying fly fishing a bit about 13 or 14 with a $20 combo. Caught a few bluegill and tiny bass and one trout, kind of gave up and went back to a spinning rod. About when I was 19 I started almost exclusively fishing for trout. I recall seeing a group of retired guys consistently out fish everyone else with their fly rods. After several years of watching the old fellas catch fish while everyone else sat around waiting for a bite on our bait rods. It got the gears turning in my head. At about 23 I decided to give fly fishing another try. I borrowed a fly rod and went to one of my favorite spots I gear fished for trout. I was stripping in a wooly bugger and hooked up on what I thought was a big 5 lb rainbow, got it up to the surface and it was a average 12" fish. I caught another a bit later and it felt just a powerful. That was my inspiration moment that fish just feel bigger on a 9' 5wt. Even a on a small trout, Feeling those head shakes all the way down to your wrist was addicting. I soon was leaving the spinning rod home and have never regretted taking up fly fishing.
 
I believe that it was the moment I was born into a fly fishing family . . .
 
Not really a transition for me because I've always "swung all ways" so to speak. Some friends and I took to catching trout in some blue lines close to home in Central WA with fly rods when I was in middle school and it just stuck. Nowadays, I've transitioned to mostly preferring fly rods for warmwater species as my interest in trout fishing fizzled over the years (these days, that's also fueled by there not being much of any decent trout fishing within close proximity).

Fly fishing always has been and continues to be one of many fishing methods I enjoy.
 
I happily started fly fishing at age 11 once a fly rod was handed down to me and my younger brother (we shared it). Spinning reel mono backlashes were a pain. I wanted the simplicity of fly fishing. It was also way more effective catching trout. Fly tying started a few years later once I had my driver's license and a little bit of cash.
 
At an early age I was a spin fisher, but I started spending my summers with my Granduncle in Vermont. He was a cane fly fisher and taught me the fly fishing starting when I was about 11, or 12 (that would have been the summer of 1962, or so). He tied his own flies and taught me that art too, but I have never achieved his level of expertise, even after 70+ years of trying (full necks at that time were less than $3 and could only be found via mail order). He had a great set of Orvis Bamboo rods that we used on all types of water in Vermont & Eastern NY. Unfortunately, after his passing my cousins (his grandchildren) who did not fish denied me the chance to either give me, or let me buy the rods. The irony is that they sold them for less than 1/2 they were worth as a "friend" advised them about their value.
 
I grew up in North Seattle fishing Thornton Creek. From Jackson Park, Northgate and Dahl field all these little streams fed in. I had a 5' spin pole and we fished worms when we had them or Pautzkee's Balls O Fire.
Now you think a short rod would be good for brushy little creeks, but no. You need to reach, or swing that rig, or hold. Line handling. Dad's old 8' fiberglass fly rod worked way better. But the mono always hung up on the spin reel handle the way I held it in my off hand. Solution, one of dads old fly reels loaded with mono.
One day we were dropping rolly polly's off a bridge and watching the fish eat them. We crimped a split shot to a hook next time down, and it worked. In seventh grade our shop teacher, who was a fly tier, started teaching us real stuff. He took us to Lenice that spring.
We realized really young we would have no fish if we brought them all home. Always been working on releasing fish for next time. Plus I hate to clean things. One reason I don't hunt anymore. And I don’t really care to eat fish.
Probably explains why I enjoy the modern tight line technique so much.
 
I've fished for nearly my entire life. Picked up a fly rod in late HS/early college with a friend of mine and we basically taught ourselves how to do it in all of the streams and creeks around Walla Walla. Mostly dries for trout....

Fast forward to now, I'm mostly interested in warm water species both easy and difficult and tying flies that emulate specific actions that various lures impart. I also have gotten back into some gear fishing for certain situations too.

All present their own challenges (some more than others), but it's all really fun. That's why I fish, period.

Edit: all that said, I absolutely love species that are (or were) often looked down on....enter whitefish, carp, etc....
 
Last edited:
Breck said:
You've heard of the Deschutes, right?;)
Click to expand...
I fall into a small number of fishermen who doesn't enjoy that river. I've tried, it's just not my bag. That, and by "close proximity" I'm meaning closer than that even. A lot of my fishing I do is within 20mins of my house as a vast majority of my windows are like half day deals at best. I save my limited day trips for the ocean.
 
Apologies. I didn't mean to hijack the thread.

My fishing journey began pretty much as soon as I was able to hold a rod. My dad was (still is) a lifelong angler. He would use spinning gear from time to time, but his true love was fly fishing. He is also a skilled rod builder. He made me my first spinning and fly rods when I was around 5 years old. I grew up fishing the streams, creeks, lakes, and beaver ponds in the Utah mountains and deserts. We would go to a park near my house that had a pond that held warm water species. This is where he taught me how to cast. I still love fishing for crappie, bluegill, bass, etc.. While I do a lot of gear fishing, I still prefer fly fishing. It just hits different.
 
Evan B said:
I fall into a small number of fishermen who doesn't enjoy that river. I've tried, it's just not my bag. That, and by "close proximity" I'm meaning closer than that even. A lot of my fishing I do is within 20mins of my house as a vast majority of my windows are like half day deals at best. I save my limited day trips for the ocean.
Click to expand...
I was just breakin' balls. :)
 
Last edited:
Breck said:
I was just breakin' balls.
Click to expand...
Alllllll good. As someone who doesn't enjoy the Deschutes, you may or may not be surprised how frequent it is for people to suggest it to me as a "solution" to a problem I don't consider myself having.

Not being excited about trout fishing isn't a problem for me, but fly fishermen think of it as kind of a default that all fly fishermen are or should be into. So I often get suggestions to "fix" me 😆
 
I remember the first time I ever saw a fly rod in use. It was at the neighborhood pond/stormwater receptacle that I grew up fishing for sunfish and the occasional bass and catfish. We had some busted up and repaired rods with Daiwa copy Zebco 33s and I mostly fished with red and white bobbers and a small gold hook, usually tipped with corn. A can opener was a key tool in the tackle box. This upstate SC pond was, looking back, overpopulated with small sunnies, and it was also a popular spot to feed ducks. When people would walk up to the bank, flocks of ducks and schools of sunnies would approach for feeding time. There'd be 200 sunfish looking you in the eye as if to say, "C'mon now, get with the program and let's have some bread!" Well once, when I was maybe 8 or 9 years old, my friend brought down a fly rod with a little popper on it and started whipping that popper onto the water, SMACK! All the fish would flee. SMACK again! I thought this seemed counter-productive, but he assured me, "That's how you have to do it!" I don't recall anything getting hooked on fly.

Fast Forward to 13 years old and a family friend from the same neighborhood took me and my dad to Cataloochee Creek in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Cataloochee is a stream he grew up near and had family history on and he wanted to share fly fishing for trout with us. (RIP Jim, and thanks again) A quick casting lesson along with an intro to the concept of the "dead drift" and he sent us off to whip the water. I had trouble seeing and tracking the fly at first (a traditional Adams) but eventually sort of got the hang of it and sure enough, ended up hooking and landing a little brown trout. That's how I started.

It took some years, but eventually as a young adult, out of school, I started fly fishing several times a week, usually for trout, but sometimes for bass and bluegill in summer, and then I started getting the magazines, and waking up to the incredible, wide and wild world of fly fishing possibilities. And then I made friends with people who are pretty good at catching salmon on conventional gear, and I started enjoying that type of fishing, too. I'm back to just liking to fish, but I do like fly fishing best, most of the time. I think living in the PNW with our variety of waters and species to target can facilitate development of a "well-rounded angler" for those who find interest in such things.
 
In my 20's I lived in Seattle and was in to gear fishing for winter steelhead but commonly found the rivers blown out or got skunked. A buddy invited me to go to the Yak and try nymphing... Got a few fish on a GRHE and the journey had begun.

For some reason I never use that pattern anymore...doh!
 
I took a multi-week trip to Idaho. Brought a long about 10 different rods. One of them was a Cabelas LSi 5wt that I got for Father's day (I still have it). First day onsite I took the LSi to a stream near our cabin, didn't catch but rose several trout on some fly called an 'elk hair caddis' -- the guy at the shop told me to use it. I didn't fish anything but that LSi for the rest of the trip. I fish with 'gear' once in a while, but 98% of my fishing has been on a fly since then.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top