In flyfishing, you often hear of the “4 phases” of the sport that include (1) wanting to catch a fish (2) wanting to catch a lot of fish (3) wanting to catch big fish (4) not caring anymore about catching anything and simply enjoying yourself. While I agree generally with these phases. I think as this sport has evolved the phases have too. There is no doubt that the shift from phase 1-3 is spot on. However, I think a lot of long time anglers remain intensely committed, and don’t just give up at phase 4 to the point its boiled down and just about being out there. They just raise the stakes by targeting “the” fish they want to catch or take a more difficult approach to ensure the hunt remains rewarding. Its also worth mentioning that certain fish have limiting factors that make raising the stakes more difficult once you’ve taken a certain amount of top end fish. With regards to trout, it’s fair to say that once you have caught a legitimate wild stream bred trout over 25″, its hard to replicate that. Once you’ve taken that trout of a lifetime, you know you’ve likely reached the mountain top and will struggle to do any better than that moving forward. This causes many in this situation to work in other difficult to target fish into their routine. They seek out musky, saltwater species such as permit or roosterfish, and other unicorn type fish where its tough, if not downright impossible to reach the mountain top with regards to these species over the course of an angler’s life.
Resorting to this choice sounds logical but is something every angler struggles with committing to initially. You go from a certain comfort zone that you’re good at, to chasing a fish that downright deflates the ego and causes you to end the day empty handed on more occasions than not. And if you are being honest, it hurts. It hurts going to the fishing bar of choice and hearing everyone talk about great days during prime time, while you struck out trying to push things further. It hurts when someone at the barstool next to you tells you they landed numerous 24” fish on dries that day (true or not), and you have to say you got skunked to a suspected liar. But the longer I fish, the more I respect someone that can admit they got skunked. And any angler that has been in this game a while knows when someone was skunked because they were playing high stakes poker, rather than incompetent. And at some point, something overrides the angst that comes from those barstool conversations. The junkie in an angler and the desire to chase the adrenaline rush overpowers the need to claim another day of success. And that’s where phase 4 begins. In entering phase 4, it helps to have other comrades of a similar view to lessen the blow of newfound struggle. Other fishermen that also are junkies but don’t care if you don’t catch a fish just so long as you had a chance at catching one fish that was capable of getting the blood pumping. With camrades comes camaraderie, and the feeling that you are not wasting your time with a support group if you will that convinces you that your failures aren’t due to a loss of skill and touch. Just self imposed misery.
For me, permit have become my favorite “raise the stakes” fish in mixing up my regular trout fishing season. I started fishing for permit in 2013 and went in knowing the reputation they had. Smart. Limited opportunities. Reports of years chasing them without success, etc. I initially took those reports with a grain of salt thinking the challenge was overblown by guys that were cut out for bonefish and not really committed to chasing permit. And in some respects, I stand by that today. Permit are not as hard as advertised, and many people try to bounce between permit fishing and bone fishing when they initially come up empty and get heady. This approach doesn’t really work- and if you want to catch permit you need to commit to that idea and understand its a one fish trip with 2-3 fish being good to great fishing. That said, they are not a fish of 10k casts, and if you spend a week exclusively chasing them in a prime location, you should get one if conditions are decent with sun/tides that have the fish moving during the period of the day where sunlight allows for spotting active fish. If it makes sense, they aren’t as hard as advertised, but they were harder than I thought they’d be when going into it and trying to read between the lines.
The challenge with permit is similar to the challenge you see with most very selective fish- that being the difficulty of determining whether your fly or presentation is causing you to fail. Being one that always puts presentation over fly, I try to focus on that first and foremost but the reality is translating “good presentation” in the context of permit fishing means nothing more than a perfect cast 1-2 feet in front of the fish often at distances of 60 feet or greater and winds at 10-20mph. Not easy. So even on a good week you’ll only be able to honestly say you did that on 5-10 fish per trip. The perfection that permit fishing demands when it comes to casting is one of the reasons devoted permit anglers love the fish so much. Its the true test of your casting ability and there is something distinctly different about saltwater casting when compared to freshwater casting. The guy that can land a dry fly right 8-10x at 60 feet on a trout stream will not simply be able to do the same in a flats type setting. And a top notch saltwater flats fisherman when it comes to casting is extremely impressive to watch.
Just when you say to yourself “its all about presentation”, you see the other side of things on those perfect casts you do make. On most of your near perfect to “perfect” casts, the fish will follow and refuse, or downright ignore your fly altogether. These reactions cause you ask yourself “did the fish see the fly”, “hate the fly”, “was my strip speed off”, or something else that causes you to question your fly selection. I think tippet at 16lb fluro is standard and I struggle to ever blame tippet as the issue. However, on a fish that rarely eats, the question of fly vs. presentation and just being persistent with a proven fish catcher is a constant question the permit angler struggles with. Just like a musky angler struggles with fly vs. presentation after several fish that follow it to the boat but wont eat. Bottom line, its hard to figure out why you are failing on a fish that naturally causes you to fail most of the time.
Recently, I spent 5 days on the flats wade fishing for permit in Chetumal Bay Mexico and encountered these same questions and issues. I started the trip with wading a section of flats that I had been told by a local consistently had permit, and I found them. I threw local favorite “mantis shrimp” patterns, which were smaller and against what I had had previous success on via crab patterns. I found fish when wading on these occasions, and had several intense follows for 15-30 feet and sometimes all the way to my feet, without a strike. I was able to take one permit on a tan hybrid shrimp/crab pattern though I did not feel like this was the “dialed” in pattern after many more refusals and non-takers.
As I continued to explore different flats, I mentally went back and forth between “confidence flies” and local favorites. My confidence flies were crab patterns and were not working. Some of my best casts and presentations were with local favorites though, and also led to follows, but not strikes. Hence the head game. All said and done, I went 1 fish for 5 days fishing, despite having perhaps 50 legitimate shots at permit over the course of that 5 day time period. Results like this cause you to again question yourself. Am I doing something wrong? Is this just a hard fish and I need to accept that? Or something else? The sportsman in you says there has to be a perfect fly, or a better approach. But the experience you gain with more time out there gradually convinces you that maybe this fish is as hard as advertised. At the end of the day, reconciling all of this and boiling it down to the fact that its likely a combination of the two, is why the fish is fun. Its hard. A couple of feet off the mark is a “horrible cast”. A few seconds late in spotting the fish is a “blown shot” and spooked fish. The opportunities are limited on a daily basis and the margins are narrow for what you can afford to be off by on everything. And when you look back at a trip and a fish like this, you realize it is exactly what you came for. A fish that will leave you always double guessing yourself. A fish that will always push you to improve, and even if you do, never let you succeed more than you fail. And even if you do improve, there will always be far bigger and wiser permit that you know are out there that you’ve blown on prior occasions. The fish provides you with a life long challenge that you can never master, only improve at. And a phase 4 angler’s excuse to keep trying.
You must be logged in to post a comment.