Fly fishing is fun, I had forgotten

I’ve fished since I was a child, but I didn’t get hooked until I started using a fly rod.

I was probably 12 or 13 when Dad showed me how to cast tiny foam-rubber spiders for bluegill. It wasn’t long before I got the hang of it, and could put that spider where I want-ed. I’d twitch it a time of two, then raise the rod tip when the bug was engulfed by a rising fish, and feel the line go taut.

It wasn’t the way most folks fished in Indiana, but it gave me a leg up when I moved to Montana. A lot of folks out here considered it the only way to fish.

I brought my meager fly-fishing skills West when I was 18, switching out the foam spiders for caddis flies and wooly buggers.

For years all I fished with was a fly rod and all I fished for were trout. It was a combination that went together well. It still does.

Then a decade ago I moved away from mountains and trout to the prairie. Out here spinning rods are the angling tool of choice. I learned to catch walleye and northern pike on the larger reservoirs using crank baits and bottom bouncers. And while both species can be caught on a fly rod, it seemed a bit forced to try.

So with the exception of an annual trip to the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, I didn’t much use the fly rod anymore.

Then a couple of years ago I started fishing stock ponds and small reservoirs scattered across the prairie with a lightweight spinning outfit. The fishing was fabulous for largemouth bass, bluegill and northerns.

I would often take the fly rod along, but I seldom used it. A little spinning rod usually did the trick, and I’d convinced myself it was less trouble.

Earlier this summer I was fishing a bass pond near the Canadian border from my kayak when I lost the little spinning rod out of the rod holder. By the time I realized it was gone, it was too late to even dive for it. I had no idea where it fell out.

Fortunately, I had a fly rod and a box of wooly buggers in the truck. I strung the rod, tied on a bugger, climbed back in the kayak and in the next hour had more fun fishing than I had in years.

Fly fishing isn’t always the best way to catch fish, but it’s usually the funnest. I’d forgotten that.

Parker Heinlein is

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