The Shokuryoshi Experiment
A while back, I wrote about how one of the big changes I was focusing on last year was movement. In this article, I talked about how I measured my pacing on a stretch of a local stream and how I used that as a sort of “training grounds” to better grasp new concepts for myself and try out new ideas. You can find the full article here…
Combining both the movement and pacing mentioned in the post above, with being present and observant of what’s happening on the water is how I have found a better balance between spending too much time in one spot and skipping over too many potential lies.
Finding fish can be tricky sometimes, and I would say that there are times where I feel like I’m taking shots in the dark trying to find what exactly the fish are going to react to. This occurs more when I’m making my first few casts of the day, when fishing an unfamiliar river or section, or after some big changes in weather or water conditions from the previous few days.
When I crack the code and dial in what presentations the fish are going to eat, I take note of that - which leads me to the first topic I want to cover…
Find The Sweet Spot
As I place my casts into spots likely to hold fish, I make note of the characteristics of the water where I seem to be getting the most strikes, then try to focus my efforts into spots along the water with the same characteristics. Sometimes knowing what the trout are feeding on can help, but just being observant of where you get the most strikes and hook ups can too.
I like to cast into different sections to figure out exactly what characteristic of the water the fish are holding and feeding, then set my priorities based on the results.
As an example, maybe I’m getting the most strikes on the surface at the tail-out of a pool - I set that as my primary focus.
If I'm getting consistent strikes in the eddies off the side of the current, but maybe not as consistently as the tail-outs, I’ll set that as my secondary focus.
Everything else I mostly ignore, unless there’s maybe another characteristic that gets few strikes, which I’ll consider as a tertiary option.
From this point, I will focus most of my time on finding that primary water characteristic (the tail-out in this example) and maintain whatever presentation and fly pattern that was working when I set my priorities on this specific water type. I will stick with targeting these primary characteristics as long as the fishing remains good and consistent. When it does start to change, I come back to the idea of “Changeout Spots” and revisit a section where I noticed the bite seemed to taper off.
Splitting the Focus
Another thing that I’ve found helpful, especially in trying to keep a catch rate up last year, is to position yourself in a way that allows you to target your primary water, with the option to cast to a secondary hold.
In my early days of learning tenkara, I had learned pretty quickly that if a fish strikes at the fly on the surface, there will be a short amount of time that you need to give the fish for it to reset before casting to it again. Placing cast after cast in the same spot could also turn the fish off from going for your fly again, or scare it away altogether. In the time that I felt I needed to wait before making another cast, I found casting to another spot to be a good way to possibly catch another fish while waiting for an opportunity to catch the first.
Granted, I didn’t yet have this concept of prioritizing certain water types in my head when I started doing this, but, after merging the two ideas I have been able to refine it a bit more.
For the most part I look for the primary water characteristics that I’m targeting at the time, as well as the secondary if possible, or even the tertiary if there is no other option close by. I like to position myself in a way that gives me the best shot at catching a fish out of the primary water, with a relatively decent angle to cast to my secondary option (for the spot). This is part of the reason I prefer to fish cross stream in most areas, as it allows for access to several lies without having to move as often. I can then place more focus in primary spots that are at more of an upstream angle from where I’m positioned, and then fish cross stream to secondary targets - then if I do hook into something in the secondary, I don’t scare off any fish in the primary waters as I fight the fish downstream of the primary.
Present the Fly
One thing to note is that there may be a difference in how you present the fly between your primary and secondary (or even tertiary) water. This can be influenced by conditions in the different water characteristics, or even by where different species are holding if you’re fishing a stream with some cohabitation.
There was a day last year where a shadow cast across one side of the river by a ridge created a situation where I had to change my presentation just a bit depending on whether I was casting into the shaded side or the sunny side of the river. This is an interesting one to me, because I had primary and secondary water on both sides, but the main difference was how to present the fly between the two sides.
Along the lines of cohabitation, the local stream is home to a mix of brown and rainbow trout. I have found that the brown trout react more to movement in the fly when drifted near the far undercut bank, while the rainbows tend to prefer a dead drift or even a little bit of pon pon in a surface presentation. The primary focus on this creek changes a bit depending on which species is more active, or which species is more present at the time.
Keeping Score
One last thing I wanted to mention is that it does help to keep track of what was working when changing up your primary focus or even the presentation of the fly - or the fly itself.
If the bite dies down a bit, and changing the focus is what starts putting fish in the net, be sure to keep track of presentations that were working prior to the change. You’ll at least have a reference point as to what some trout may still be keying in on in the water characteristic that was the primary before the switch. You can then target that characteristic as your secondary or tertiary focus when moving forward.
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