BY GEORGE GRANT
Outdoors Columnist
“Never perspire over the minuscule.”
How’s that for polishing up the cliché?
“Don’t sweat the small stuff.”
Fly fishers really ought to project a classy image. It fits right in with our almost universal characterization as elitist snobs.
Of course that’s just the popular image. The truth is, I known quite a few fly fishermen with a charmingly homespun tendency to meet adversity with spectacular profanity. I include
myself in that category. In fact anglers are probably as bad about that as golfers especially when they’re sweating the small stuff.
The small stuff, flies size 20 through 26, is most often associated with our vulgar outbursts. The elite use the term “midges” for these flies. They’re trouble any way you look at it.
I believe midges even have spiritual implications. Catholic anglers undoubtedly pile up millennia in purgatory while midge fishing. I’m Baptist so I just backslide. Near as I can figure
I’ve backslid 523 laps, measured at the Equator, behind the nearest ax-murderer. I don’t know what midges do to Presbyterians but it can’t be good.
But I’m getting better.
Part of that improvement is entirely the result of better leader material. It’s easy now to find 6, 7 even 8X fluorocarbon tippet with excellent knot and break strength. That wasn’t always the case. When I first tried midge fishing only nylon tippet was available and its weakness in small sizes accounted for many of my transgressions. Fluorocarbon
monofilament hasn’t made me a Saint but I am gaining on the nearest ax-murderer.
I’ve also had a couple of revelations.
Short, slow, soft rods are miles ahead of anything else for delivering small flies. Short rods significantly increase your accuracy and midges must be placed precisely if you want to fish them effectively. When fish are feeding on the small stuff they hold just under the surface. They don’t want to expend more energy than their prey is worth when they move
through current to intercept it. That proximity to the surface leaves them with a very narrow feeding lane and any fly out of it by just inches is ignored.
Often there are complicated current patterns between your position and that narrow feeding lane. Slow rods give you the time to create optimum line placement on those currents using an in-air mend to minimizing drag and extend your drift.
Soft rods provide the maximum protection to a tippet after you hook up. They also give you significantly more feedback on the fight. Knowing when to apply pressure and when to let the fish run will keep you well within the limits of a light tippet.
We’ll be fishing the small stuff for quite some time to come. Don’t sweat it. It can be a lot of fun if there are no small children or deacons in earshot.
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