Q: Would you please tell us why you wrote Trout School?
The book is about my relationship with Mo Bradley, a former fly-fishing guide, and innovative fly fisher in Kamloops British Columbia.
I was up fishing in that area and came across a little pamphlet that he had written. who wrote a pamphlet for all the kids he was teaching to fly-fish. This was simple paper stapled between cardboard covers.
He wrote this to help his fly-tying students. He helped kids and anyone in Kamloops interested in how to tie flies.
When I read that little pamphlet, I thought it was such a great distillation of fly-fishing knowledge, I wanted to bring it to a larger audience because he had only printed a few hundred copies.
I wanted to share that with people so I sat down with Mo and said we should republish this. But when I talked to book publishers they said, we need a bigger story.
Over the years for more than a decade, whenever I fished with Mo I interviewed him about his techniques and methods. I learned a lot from Mo. I tried in the book to pass on that knowledge.
What I really wanted to do is to encourage people to go fishing because it is such a restorative experience. And for those who fish already, I wanted them to slow down because that is one of Mo’s key’s to success. He moves so purposefully on the water and observes everything.
As you know from forest bathing and walking in the woods, if you slow down you see more in nature. And in fishing you just become a better fisher. You see the insects, you become aware of the different life stages they are at. You start watching the birds – which a lot of people are not aware of – share a common food with the fish. So if you can figure out what the birds are eating, you can figure out what the fish are eating.
When I advise people to slow down in fishing, I am doing the same thing that you doing in your book, for physical and mental health.
So it has been very satisfying for both Mo and I, and we have heard from a lot of people that they are going fishing more, or a lot have taken up fishing because of the book.
Q: A few of our listeners might be fly fishers, some that might try in the future, and some that would just like to know more about it. For those of us who know nothing about fly fishing can you give us little primer please? How and why does one fly fish? Is it always for trout? Catch and release? Fish barbless?
Yes absolutely. It is kind of a daunting sport if you don’t have somebody to show you – hands on. It is a bit intimidating because you watch people fly fish and it is so graceful – and it’s like am I going to take up ballet at this late stage of my life?
The technical aspects of fly casting are actually very easy to learn. When people ask me to show them, I have it down to 5 minutes. So if you are interested in fly fishing don’t let learning to cast put you off. In medium sized or large cities, they have fly casting lessons available right in the shops.
The other side is the fishing side of it: learning all about fish and nature. I like to tell people:
“ I can teach you to fly cast in five minutes, but you will spend the next 20 years learning to fly fish.”
There is a lot of joy in that learning because you are out on the water.
People can certainly learn what is in the 5 minutes by going on youtube.
The equipment first. The rods are very long and slender. Very flexible. The line itself is what carries the weight. The fly is like a feather. It weighs almost nothing.
This is different than spin casting where the lure is heavy and it pulls the line off the rod.
When casting, like I taught my kids, just pretend you are standing with your back to a barn door. And when you lift your rod back, you don’t want to hit that barn door.
You stop your rod sharply.
The line lifts up and unfurls behind you. And then you throw the line forward.
And once you learn that, they you learn about flies and depths of water.
And the big thing: where are the fish and what are they feeding on? Because you want to match the fish with the food source. They call that “matching the hatch.”
I do a lot of catch and release, but I do like to eat wild fish. When I do kill fish, I do it with some reverence. I let most of my fish go. For me it is mostly the joy is in the experience of being out on the river and the lake.
We squeeze the barbs down on all the hooks so they are barbless. I had to discuss this with my girls. They wanted to know if the fish were being hurt. And we have to admit on some level they are. But I have handled thousands of fish and very rarely do you see any sign of pain. The flies themselves are very small and they are barbless. And if you do it right, you are hooking the fish in the tough cartilage around the mouth. And I don’t think there is much in terms of nerves in that part of the fish. You can hold the fish in your hand and it has got a hook in its jaw and the fish is completely calm. With the forceps I carry, I grasp the hook and with just a flick, it is loose. And when I hold the fish in the water in my hand, it is still, and then shoots off into the deep. I have caught the same fish more than once. There are studies that say over 90% of those fish that are released live. It is a pretty conservation minded way to go.
Q: What do trout like to eat? In the appendix A: flies like bloodworm, chironomid, mayfly nymph, damselfly nymph, dragonfly nymph, sedge, caddis fly, leech, shrimp, doc spratley, glassworm,
Appendix B: Insect Life Cycles – eg April ice off = shrimp, leeches, dragon flies with drawings and beautiful illustrations.
You can go for any fish – it does not have to be trout. It can be any species. Out here in BC we do fish for trout and salmon. And the Kamloops trout is a fish that comes readily to a fly – feeds heavily on insects under the water and insects on the surface of the water.
Where you live in Manitoba, it would be pike and bass. Maybe not pickerel because they are bottom fish and you would have to get right down on the bottom.
Re Flies in Appendix A of the Mo honed the number of flies down to about a dozen or so. He thought if you had those flies for Kamloops trout or any trout in North America — you are in business. They will be eating one of those versions of insects. And different fish have different appetites.
On the chironomid: Mo and his group of fly fishing friends were instrumental is figuring out the insect the Kamloops area about 40 years ago. They did that by netting the insects, put them in aquariums in their basements, watched them hatch, and go through different stages of life. And one of the insects that they really studied a lot was this chironomid. It looks like mosquito. It is not biting insect – looks like a little gnat of some kind. I say they are like the comma in a sentence – about that size and shape. They rise up from the bottom and hatch on the surface. And these guys figured out that the fish are eating these insects on the way up before they hatch.
So they started just tying these tiny little black flies that they would just cast out, and let hang a few inches below the surface, with very little movement, and the fish would come along and pick them up. It was quite a revelation and revolution in fly fishing in Canada. Same things were happening in England and the United States too.
Chironomid fishing is kind of a religion. When you watch these people fish. They will cast out and then just go into a meditative state and wait.
I like the physical aspect of casting so if you are casting a dragonfly nymph or a damselfly nymph, you are casting that out, letting it sink to the depth that you think the fish are on that day, and move it a little to give it some life. I find that casting a lot is also meditative. I like that kind of fishing.
My absolute favourite is when a sedge comes to the surface and the fish are feeding on the surface. That is fun because you see the fish feeding along the shore and rising. You have to lay your fly in front of it and hope that you have the right pattern on it and that the fish will rise up and take that fly. That is “dry fly fishing” and is really a lot of fun.
Q: In your book you show us that fly fishing teaches us to pause, take time to reflect, to see and observe. You say about Mo, “Throughout the day he frequently leans over the side of the boat to peer into the water and see which insects were moving. ” You make changes based nature. Noticing, curious, observation, notice how a damsel fly swim (tail wagging motion) – yellow headed blackbirds…
Re the drawings of insects in the appendix: We wantedd to give people a good grounding in fly fishing and understanding insects.
But the big thing we pushed is to “slow down and observe nature”. Since writing the book we have heard from experienced fly fishers that they are catching more fish. They say it is the flies, we say it is that they have slowed down. Mo was such a joy to fish with. There is no hurry in anything he does. When you are with Mo, he is looking over the side of the boat a hundred times a day. He is looking into the water to figure out which insects are hatching or are about to hatch — how they are moving and what colors they are. Even about birds. Yellow headed black birds love to eat damsel flies.
Q: Seasons of Trout/seasons of nature? With your girls, small lakes, hiked into – birds, loons, owls, grouse, grebes, fly catchers, marsh wrens. Pacific tree frogs. Part of your childhood too?
I was listening to the podcast of your boys. In my family it was my mom that took us on nature hikes. We learned from her. I was lucky to have her.
The best time/season to catch trout? Probably spring and fall.
Q: You write about fly direction, speed, depth, and the influence of light on fish. And you keep your fingertips on the fishing line. Will you talk about that a little?
Fish are light sensitive. Light and warmth also affects insects. It is when those insects move that they become active. Those chironomids that we were talking about leave the bottom and move up through the water column in order to develop their wings on the surface.
River insects come out from under the rocks in ‘a drift’ and become open and vulnerable at that stage. The fish will really snap on to that moment – which might last 15 minutes or a couple of hours. But the fish are like this is happening now, so I am going to grab every chironomid I can.
So you might have a fly on from the last weekend that worked well, but now the fish are feeding on something else.
Light: When I was with Mo, when the clouds come in and the light really drops, the fish will become less wary and they will move into shallower waters. Those fly fishers that understand this will change their flies and lines to different depths depending on the light.
Going slowly: Mo told me to watch how slowly a leech goes. Then I realized that my fly was going ten times faster than that leech. No sensible fish wants the fastest leech in the lake, he wants the slow one.
Touch Receptors in finger tips: You know you have a fish on before something happens, and I always wondered about that. Then I looked at the science and the sensory receptors that we have in our fingertips. Remarkable how sensitive our fingertips are. I hold the rod in one hand and I always hold the line in my other hand. So I think by doing this you are picking up the tiniest movements of the fish and you know that there is a fish there.
Q: Question: What’s your next book about?
My next book has a working title called “Reading the Water.” It is a memoir on fly fishing and fatherhood. It is about how I learned to fly fish and how teaching that skill to my daughters helped them enter into nature, and how it became a bond between us. I know they do not have the same obsession with fly fishing that I have but they do love being out in nature. I know you have that bond with your boys too. I know your boys and they are so well grounded and I think that has a lot to do with it.
Q: Anything you wished I would have asked you? Where can readers find you online?
Amazon is best now. All my books are there.
Yes listeners do pick up Mark Hume’s Trout School – Lessons from a Fly-fishing Master for beautifully descriptive stories of times on the water, to learn how to get the right fly and to fish in the right way. Fish slowly. Even if you aren’t fishing you can still apply these useful observational skills. Notice that in the bright light fish go deeper, with clouds and dim light fish are closer to the surface. Think about those 17k touch receptors on your fingertips when you touch a leaf or if your fingertips are on the fishing line. When you are outside fly fishing or being in the company of a fly fisher – watch the birds, the weather, the water. Think fishing ecology.
So listeners thank you for listening to the end. Please check out my book Take Back Your Outside Mindset: live longer, prevent dementia and control your chronic illness, and go to my website Treesmendus.com for more free resources. Please subscribe, rate, and review this episode and remember when you are outside noticing new things is the key. Keep practicing new ways of noticing to fire up the neurons in your brain ..because if you ask me… we all need a little more of Your Outside Mindset.
