In our last lesson, we discussed how to add line during the cast. But what do you do when you can’t make an overhead cast because there’s no room for a backcast? In many situations, bushes, parked cars, or even people make it impossible to throw the line behind you. That’s when you need to break out the roll cast. . .
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Tuesday Tip: Adding Line to the Cast
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In our last lesson, we learned how to control the line hand during casting, as well as how to “shoot” line by releasing the line at the end of the forward cast. After shooting the line, you then pinched the against the cork handle in what we call the “fishing position.”
Now we’re going to put lessons 1 and 2 together to learn how to add line to the cast during false casting. This is the skill that allows you to lengthen your casts after you’ve stripped line in.
Read MoreTuesday Tip: The Line Hand and Shooting
Last week we discussed the basics of the front and back casts, using a simple pick-up-and-lay-down drill with the line pinched against the cork grip. Now it’s time to add the “line hand,” the one that controls the fly line during the cast, and discuss shooting line to lengthen the cast.
Read MoreTuesday Tip: The Basic Cast
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Step 1. The Basic (Pick-up and Lay-Down) Casting Stroke
Tuesday Tip: Maximum Efficiency
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photo by Jay Morr |
There’s an old saying among fishermen: You can’t catch fish if your line isn’t in the water. I believe that this is one of the reasons that wives often outfished their more-experienced husbands on float trips when I guided on the Yellowstone and in Alaska. Whereas the husband recognized every great trout lie the boat floated past and felt the need to cast to all of them, the wife was generally more content to keep a given drift going as long as possible. Every time the husband picked up his line and started false-casting, he was taking himself out of the game.
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