Ask anyone who has paged through a catalog, or browsed in a fly shop: there are tens of thousands of accessories/items for fly fishing. At a recent women’s fly fishing course that I was helping out with, there was a classroom segment in which a fellow instructor shared the contents of her fishing vest/wader pockets. It seemed like a magician’s hat—she kept pulling out item after item, so many that there was seemingly no way all of that would fit in there. She had three kinds of desiccants (products to remove moisture from the fly) alone!
As nice as it would be to have a magical vest that would hold unlimited quantities--and the financial means to purchase all those useful gadgets and potions—it made me think about how that part of the presentation might be received by the various participants. Some were very interested and wanted to know where they could buy or order the items; others, based on what I heard in conversations after the class, shared that it was intimidating, or, at least discouraging, that they still had such a long way to go to have a fully-stocked, “proper” vest.
This got me to thinking: what is “essential?” I get sad when I think about someone NOT going out fishing because they’re afraid they don’t have all the necessary stuff. Perhaps because my own fly fishing education came about so organically (I simply started following my dad around, at a very young age, not catching anything—except minnows in my cupped hands, and the occasional grasshopper to throw in the water to watch a trout come up and eat) I have always had minimalist tendencies when it comes to fishing.
My personal approach is: Bring the least amount of stuff out on the water that you can get away with.
Let me clarify—we all collect fishing gear and accoutrements over the years that may come in handy; by all means keep whatever makes you happy and bring however much stuff you want in the car to your fishing destination. What I am talking about here is what you carry with you, on your person, out on the water.
Now, if I were a sponsored fishing guide, this whole blog post would be blasphemous—after all, my end of the bargain would be to get people to buy more stuff, specifically my sponsors’ offerings. But, I don’t yet have any such arrangements, and with frugality in my DNA, my desire and aim as a guide is to make fly fishing as accessible as possible to anyone who is interested in pursuing it. And, one last disclaimer: I am talking “vest essentials” (not clothing, eyewear, nor hydration) in terms of fly fishing for trout on Western streams, in the summer.
Without further ado, Kristy’s Bare Necessities:
- I have jettisoned the vest (or the pack.) Instead, I have a Scientific Anglers fly box that someone gave me at least 15 years ago. It has a small tab with a hole on each side of the front flap to open and close the fly box. I could fit a ¾-inch diameter metal wire ring through each tab. I got a round shoelace, and looped each end of it through a ring, so that I can wear the fly box around my neck.
- I have attached to that shoelace these three essentials: 1) a nipper, similar to a nail clipper, but it has a ¼-inch long needle point on the opposite end of the clipper blades, 2) a small plastic bottle of liquid floatant (I like Gink) in a holster (mine’s made by Orvis) that holds the bottle upside down so that the floatant flows out more readily, and 3) a hemostat (some call it a forceps, or a pliers) that is attached to a pin-on retraction cord. This tool is essential for pinching down barbs, and sometimes for removing the fly from a fish.
- I have a length of old fly line that is looped through my spools of 3x, 4x and 5x tippet (that all attach to each other) that I wear like a necklace.
- Fly fishers have unlimited systems and preferences on how they organize their fly boxes. In this particular box that I have described above, I keep an assortment of all types and sizes of flies: dry flies, nymphs, terrestrials, streamers—you name it, they’re all in there. Not large quantities of each fly, but a wide variety of patterns.
The less hassle it is getting ready for fishing, the more likely you’ll take advantage of opportunities to get out more often.