DOWN STREAM UP STREAM DRY FLY. 23 



any rise or suspicion of a movement near your 

 fly. The dropper is very likely to account for 

 a yellow half-pounder, and great will be your 

 joy at your first experience of a fish caught in 

 this method. You will feel that you have had 

 a far greater hand in the capture than in merely 

 holding the rod while the stream trails the fly 

 along for you. Needless to say the amount of 

 casting is trebled as you cannot afford to allow 

 the flies to remain long on the water. Thrown 

 above you either on to rain-dappled stretches of 

 quiet water or into sparkling runs and stickles 

 they travel towards you at a brisk rate, and you 

 cannot allow them to get too close or the line 

 becomes unmanageable to raise, being too slack 

 to respond to the lifting action of the rod. 



Upstream casting over rising fish is half-way 

 towards dry fly fishing, and forms a very great 

 advance on the elementary style you have 

 hitherto tried. One fish struck and hooked 

 above you will soon give more pleasure than 

 three which attach themselves below stream. 

 Besides this the upstreamers are as a race 

 considerably better in size. Half and three-quarter 

 pounders will be taken in lieu of medium sized 

 herrings. Facing up stream as all trout do 

 they see no arm-waving angler above them nor 

 do they shy suspiciously as at a fly travelling 

 far slower than the current. Their standpoint 

 shows them a drowned fly travelling at normal 

 pace downstream, and, not detecting the gut 

 attachment, they rise and swallow it. Another 

 obvious advantage the fly when struck is not 



