TROUT FLY-FISHING IN AMERICA 



rent or up stream, except when going with the current 

 down stream. 



All trout have a wide range of vision due to the posi- 

 tion of the eyes in the head and the way they are set. The 

 range covers very nearly, if not quite, 300 degrees of a 

 circle, with the greatest vision to the front and sides and 

 the least and none at all directly to the rear. 



It is on account of the wide range of vision in trout, 

 together with the fact that they always head up stream or 

 toward the current that dry-fly advocates and some wet- 

 fly anglers have insisted that the proper way was to cast 

 "up stream" whenever it was possible to do so. 



My experience leads me to believe that no hard and 

 fast rule can be made and observed with success as to the 

 direction a wet-fly should be cast when fly-fishing. There 

 are too many circumstances and conditions which have 

 to be taken into account to say absolutely that a wet-fly 

 should always be cast "up stream," or even say, as a gen- 

 eral proposition, it should be so cast. 



On the other hand, the very nature of dry-fly fishing is 

 such as to make "up-stream casting," as a rule, "the proper 

 and generally accepted way" that it should be done. 



As it is the current of the stream and not the angler 

 that "fishes the dry-fly," it is at once apparent why "up- 

 stream" casting gives to this method of fly-fishing its 

 greatest opportunity for success due to the longer travel 

 of the fly upon the water in the direction the trout are 

 heading. 



The wet-fly angler who fishes by rule seldom if ever 



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