DRY-FLY FISHING 



with considerable regularity. I was interested to 

 discover which casts caused them to rise and which 

 casts were wrong. The place was on the Indian 

 River in New Foundland at the outlet of a lake 

 where there were a large number of salmon. For 

 a week previously they had bitten well, and we had 

 had good sport, but suddenly, overnight, the fish- 

 ing had stopped. Conditions had changed. The 

 water temperature had risen to above sixty degrees 

 Fahr. The fish were there, I could see them, so 

 there was no use going anywhere else. If I could 

 not get them there I had little chance elsewhere, 

 so I settled down to find out how to catch them. 

 The first thing to discover was what effect the 

 leader and its shadow had on the fish. To dis- 

 cern this, I tied leaders of various sizes, going down 

 to the finest gut made, .004-inch diameter and up 

 to regular salmon gut .020-inch diameter. I al- 

 ways carry a small gauge for measuring the size 

 in order to make the leader of the proper taper 

 so it will cast well. I soon found when the sun 

 was out I raised many more fish with fine gut, 

 and those which did come up, almost invariably 

 got the fly, while those which raised on the coarse 

 gut, very often turned away just before taking the 

 fly in their mouth; they seemed to see the leader. 



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