Venues

[me]

As i've just started fly fishing i was wondering whether I should go to a lake or a river fly fishing to start off with?

[malevans]

As I mentioned in another post. I would go river everytime. I have been teaching my wife and son last year and I taught them exclusively on rivers.

 

Trouble is access to river trout can be limited depending upon where you live.

 

Reasons are:

 

Distance not very important, usually.

Fast current will correct the odd dodgy cast if the river is upland in nature.

Less consideration required of where in the water column the fish are. Less water column to think about, usually.

Fish take fly more easily because they have less time to make a decision.

Fish location easier to determine, because they will be where ever its costs them least energy to be.

 

Downsides:

 

May need to wade.

Backcasting sometime not as free as on some rainbow stock pond.

[Ed Matysiak]

:confused: :confused: :confused:

For a starter i would say a stocked pool! I have a few fly fishing vids that second this. I don't want to knock stocked pools (i fish them often), but it requires less skill to catch on a stocked pool than a river. On the river i found much lighter gear is needed (e.g. lighter lines) which makes casting harder. I also found there was less water itself so a bad cast resulted in a snag in a tree !!! On a lake you can't miss ! The current also makes it difficult to see little bites on the leader.

 

 

Ok malevans, if you have the correct teacher im sure its fine but i was mostly self taught. If this is the case, learn the basics on a stocked pool before you tackle flowing water.

[malevans]

Nathan you will have to pay your money and take your choice on this one.

I taught my wife and kids on a river for reasons stated (thinking about it i taught my brother in 2002 as well) based upon my own experience of being totally self taught and starting on stillwaters. I also think most beginners start with too heavy an outfit it is easier to "maintain form" if the effort level is not too high. I agree with Koi carp that you should go with an experienced "teacher" to either type of venue. On the river they will show you what features to look for and help get the odd fly out of a tree etc, on a still water they will advise on what depth to target and hopefully stop you trying to cast towards the horizon like the other anglers are doing. On either venue if possible get them to video you casting.....you will hate the initial results but you will improve more quickly and improve with less bad habits. My wife used video on me when I was learning to speycast, I returned favour last summer