“Fish it”

A reminder to slow down, take a breath, be patient, and fish your cast, wherever it lands.

We are all guilty of it, we see a pike, determine which way it’s facing, load up the rod and launch a cast, intending to land the fly right in front of its snout. But instead of the fly landing in front of the fish, it flops down behind it’s tail, so now what we do? Do you immediately pick the fly up and reload the cast or wait and see if the pike detects the flies presence, and maybe turn around?

As a guide who spends his days watching anglers cast at various targets, the knee jerk reaction to immediately pick up and re-send the cast is often, in this guides opinion, a mistake. It often pay’s off to wait and see if the pike reacts in the moments following the fly landing, be it behind or anywhere off target but still near the the fish. When the target is say a basking pike, accuracy is key, you want to lead the pike with the fly offering, but sometimes the fly ends upon the wrong side or just out of position. When anglers find themselves in this situation and have made an inaccurate cast, the best thing you can do, is “fish it”!

Early in my guiding career I had the pleasure of sharing the boat with a father and son fly fishing duo targeting pike on the fly. The son, who was in his early teens at the time, was a good caster, but still learning the ropes from his father, who was an accomplished fly angler in his own right. Over the course of 4 days fishing together, every so often the son would send an errant cast that fell short, dropped out of the air, he stepped on the line stepped on or whatever the case may have been, his father would calmy say to his son, “fish it”. Instead of the young man getting frustrated, or immediately water loading and launching a replacement cast, he would dutifully fish the cast back to the boat, then make the next cast, which inevitably improved on the previous one. The gentle nudges from the father also helped keep his young son grounded and not let him get frustrated. The phrase helped keep the youngster focused and fishing. Those so-called errant or off-target casts produced lots of fish for the young angler, and a few big ones over the 4 days. It always garnered an extra chuckle when he would catch a pike after stepping on his own fly line! Many pike that trip that may have otherwise been missed, if the cast’s weren’t fished out. Sometimes, before we decide a cast is “bad” and remove it from the water, give pike a chance to decide for themselves if they agree with you. As the guide in the back of the boat observing all this, it was a lesson that stuck not only with the son, but myself as well. Years later now, I often find myself saying to fly anglers in my boat, after they missed their target or had their line wrap around an ankle, to just “fish it”.

Sight fishing for pike, as stated, requires good casting accuracy, and being able to tell which way the fish is facing. As a pike guide I would often prefer an accurate caster over the long bomb casts. In a perfect world we spot a basking pike, lay a cast somewhere in front of it’s nose, and the pike slowly or abruptly moves towards the fly, and engulfs it. Guiding has allowed me thousands and thousands of opportunities, to visually watch this all play out. One particular point worth noting from these observations is that if and when a pike does make a move on your fly, there may be one, and only once chance to get it to bite. If the pike closes the gap and refuses or misses, there aren’t always second chances. When I watch an angler make an inaccurate cast, say behind the fish, if they take the fly out of the water immediately, in an effort to re-locate the fly nearer the head, by the time the fly is back in the water, the pike can now be looking at the original landing spot, and the second cast again ends up behind the fish. Other times the pike turns to move on the original cast, see’s nothing or see’s the boat and scurries away and the opportunity is gone before the do over cast gets back in the water. Too often in these scenarios just a little extra patience, maybe only a second or two longer and the result would have been a photograph..

You also should have an idea what to do if a pike does not react in any way. Say it’s a motionless pike laying there, if the fly lands near the fish but it doesn’t react in any way, the angler should fish strip the fly clear away from the pike and only then reload and try to place a cast in front of the pike. If the pike is in motion and swimming in a straight line, but your fly lands behind it, even now you need to give it a second to allow for a reaction. If the fish continues on and away from the fly, you can generally pick it up or strip in to be able to recast, if you have a good angle, try to course correct the next one. Remember though, bad casts can still lead to good results!

Before we decide a cast is “bad” and remove it from the water, give pike a chance to decide for themselves if they agree with you…

We all want the perfect cast when we see those pike laying there or swimming by, and to be rewarded with the strike that affirms our efforts. We have to remember though, strikes are not always a result of a perfect cast! Pike are often aggressive, which is one of the main factors that make them such a wonderful quarry on the fly rod. A pikes aggression can help fill the gap between skill and luck by turning an errant cast into a successful one. At the end of the day the goal with any cast is get it out there, and hope a fish strikes before the fly makes it back. Anglers and guides alike can get upset with a poor cast missing it’s mark, but if a fish still eats on that cast, was it ever really a bad cast to begin with? At what point is the cast a bad one?

The target doesn’t need to even be a specific fish, It could be a log or rock, maybe a weed edge, again, take a breath, fish it out, and try to hit the target on the next cast. We don’t see every fish but a pikes lateral line is extremally sensitive and they can travel a long way to find a fly. It’s better if the the fly is still there when they do mosey over to investigate the commotion.

One of the reason is believe it is important to allow a fly to stay in the water once it has landed comes from observing pike in a small lake where fishing is prohibited. There are a few 20-25 inch pike in this clear little lake, people will feed them worms, tossing them in the water. I have watched pike many, many times, react to the small waves/rings produced by a worm landing on the water, 20′ plus away, while facing the opposite direction. On a calm day in shallow water the rings slowly make it to where the pike is, they pass over the fish, the pike detects it, they then turn and go directly over to the source, that is how efficient their lateral lines are! If you put a fly close to a pike, even if they don’t see it, they may still detect it via lateral line, which is why you need to fish the fly!

I often remind anglers prior to casting to a specific pike we have visually confirmed, and are about to target, that once the fly hits the water, keep it in the water until we see the pikes reaction! I try to preempt any knee jerk reactions by saying that wherever the fly lands to see it through to the end. If there is no reaction from the pike, fine, no harm no foul, now you can take the fly out and reposition it. If the pike spooks off, it’s a reminder to practice your casting accuracy more. If the pike detects the fly through it’s long lateral line, it may just do a 180 degree turn, inspect and even eat it.

Remember for the next time your cast goes a little sideways, pause, take a moment, let the pike make make ups it’s mind before you do. If there was no pike as a target and you simply missed that log by a couple feet, it’s ok, the pike hiding under the log may not know the cast didn’t go exactly where you wanted. There is only one way to find out though, and that’s to “fish it”…