My father-in-law and erstwhile fly fishing partner calls that "the stink" Sometimes you just have the stink on you, and you catch fish after fish, while the guy standing next to you with identical gear, fly, presentation, and experience catches nothing.
There's not much to do about it. At some point, your scouts will all of a sudden without really knowing why, set the hook and lo and behold there will be a fish on the other end. THAT will be the end of their lives as non-flyfishermen, and your work will have been successful. Good luck. Dan ----- Original Message ----- From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, June 23, 2002 4:03 PM Subject: [VFB] Fishing with Scouts > I'm responsible for a small troop of 14-15 year old Scouts, and luckily they > all like to fish. Of course liking to fish and knowing how to fish are two > things entirely, and I discovered quickly it is very hard to teach 8 boys how > to fly fish all at at the same time when on an official scout outing. So I've > decided to start taking them out in two's to our local river. These aren't > official "scout" activities", since a solo scout activity with boys is > politically in-correct. This is just two boys going out fishing with their > crazy fly fishing neighbor. > > Anyway, I really wanted them to have success, so I geared them up and took > them out to the Weber river to show them how to "pick pockets" This is > drifting a nymph and split shot through fishy looking pocket water with the > rod held high, keeping fly line off the water, sometimes feeling the strikes, > but more often seeing a slight hesitation of the line and setting the hook... > an easy method that doesn't require any fancy casting. Well, of course I > had to demonstrate the technique, and as luck would have it I caught a nice > Brown during the first cast. Now the kids are motivated, and follow my > technique carefully, but no fish! So I think "maybe I spooked the fish with > the one I caught", so I take the rod and with another short cast in the same > hole and catch another fish! This scene was repeated all day, putting the > kids in the most productive holes, letting them use my rod while untangling > theirs, trying my best to get them into fish... but no luck. It reminded me > of the story of the fishermen whose buddy kept catching all of the fish; > claiming it was just his "personality". Finally they kicked him out of the > boat, and fished unsuccessfully for a couple more hours until finally, just > before sunset, a fish comes up, sticks his head out of the water and asks > "Hey! Where's your friend? Anyway, the kids did have fun, learned to tie > some knots and get better acquainted with a fly rod... and hopefully next > time the fish will come as well.
