When it comes to fishing, I can’t imagine many situations in which wind can be my friend.
Grasshopper season, certainly. Maybe even to put down an onslaught of mosquitoes. As for the rest of the time, it poses the greatest annoyance and challenge to success of any weather condition the Rocky Mountain region can throw at us – and that’s saying something.
Insect hatches we’ve awaited for months get blown away in a twinkling. Whitecaps keep us pinned to shore or at least doomed to discomfort. In every case, it thwarts our best efforts to catch fish.
On lakes, it confounds our boat control, blowing us off target and away from fish.
In moving water, we struggle to maintain command essential for a natural drift. No line control, no fish.
This challenge came into play on a recent trip to the North Platte River in Wyoming, where the wind blows a little. For a time, fishing seemed almost too easy. Large rainbow trout eagerly pulled down indicators, and anglers caught them from the farthest reaches of the pools.
Then came the wind, gusts strong enough to blow the horns off an antelope and turn yarn indicators into miniature kites. Times such as these, an angler turns to radical measures if he intends to keep catching fish.
* Shorten up. Remove as much line and leader from play as possible. Surface disturbance caused by extreme wind allows you to approach fish much closer than normal. Get your rod tip close to the water, with only a couple of feet of monofilament showing.
* Lose the indicator. Most of us have come to rely heavily on balsa or yarn for strike detection or even to improve drift in certain situations. But this quickly becomes a liability in high wind, difficult to cast and even more injurious to a dead drift. A powerful downstream wind causes water on the surface to accelerate; an indicator becomes an even faster-moving element in that process.
Underwater observers have noted that nearly half of all bites go undetected with an indicator, even when the wind isn’t blowing. With a shorter line, you’ll feel or sense the take.
This is the essence of the European system that’s sweeping the field in international competition.
* Add weight. The only effective way to present a fly to a deeply submerged trout in extreme conditions is to add enough weight to slow the drift. There’s no such thing as too much weight. If you can cast it, you can use it and the task becomes more manageable when using a short line. Just don’t forget to duck.
An extra split shot or two can make all the difference between catching and going empty. If using more lead frustrates you, consider your irritation at not catching anything.
In most nymphing situations, getting the weight right is the most critical element. If you keep changing flies and still aren’t getting bites, reach for the lead instead.
A severe wind condition demands equally extreme measures to combat it. The alternative is to go home.
