Tips for Spooky Trout
Posted By Kent Klewein on November 17, 2010
Photo By: Louis Cahill
Do you ever find yourself sight fishing to trout with water that looks like this? It’s as clear as water can get and flat as can be. There’s plenty of trout that you can see but they’re super spooky. What can you do to increase your odds at catching trout in locations like the one pictured above? Below are some tips that should help out greatly.
Tips for Spooky Trout
1. Use a long and fine leader.
Your standard nine foot leader isn’t going to do the job in most instances. Your better off going with a 12′ leader or even longer in some cases that will allow you to lay out your fly super soft. The longer leader will also help keep your fly line out of view from the spooky trout.
2. Downsize your Tippet
With water pictured above I wouldn’t start out using anything lighter than 6x tippet. However, you also better be prepared with a spool of 7x and 8x tippet.
3. Downsize the weight of your fly rod (4wt or lighter).
The lower weight fly rod will help you to lay out softer casts, but even more importantly, the fly line itself will weigh much less and not be so loud when you present your cast. This is one of your biggest problems fishing to spooky fish in flat water.
4. Approach the stream from the right side.
Take the time to find out where the sun is located so you don’t end up casting shadows on the water and spooking the trout before you even make a cast.
5. Be extra stealthy.
If you’re not patient and willing to move super stealthy your odds are going to be stacked up against you. Spooky trout call for fly anglers to move two speeds slower and often sit and wait for a good while once they get into position before making a cast. Doing so will allow any trout that might of been alerted to your presence to calm down and resume feeding. Don’t forget to wear your earthy tone colors as well.
6. Fish to singles.
The more trout eyes looking up the more chances are one of them will get spooked during your presentation cast. Often you’ll be more successful if you fish to individual fish instead of packs of two or three. This is quite the opposite in most fishing conditions, when you actually want to target the numbers.
I hope this helps a few anglers out there encountering water with spooky trout. Please feel free to comment or add additional tips about the this topic.
Keep it Reel,
Capt. Kent Klewein Reel Job Fishing, LLC www.kent-klewein.com info@kent-klewein.com 770-330-7583
Kent, I think #4 and #5 are the most critical, but each of these is important. Wearing drab olive, brown or gray clothing helps too. I can’t tell you how many new anglers I’ve seen with bright orange or white hats and a bright yellow fly line. Of course, your fly line shouldn’t be going over fish you hope to catch, but with beginners that can sometimes happen and you won’t get a second chance once they see that hot yellow fly line zipping overhead! Another great post. Thanks!
Owl,
I new I forgot something, which often happens with my A.D.D. Yes, stay away from the fluorescents and good call my friend. Thanks for your comment. Glad you liked the post.
Kent
Excelent post Guru!