What the Bass Boys Taught Me

What the Bass Boys Taught Me

It’s funny how anglers like to embrace their own brand of fishing as high art and dismiss the others. Bass anglers may shun the fly rod as a buggy whip, while fly anglers may think of bass fishing as bubba fishing.

Both are wrong. Fishing is fishing.

Ultimately, what separates the contenders from the pretenders is the ability to read water, and that starts with understanding currents. Then know what the fish are eating, and how to present it to them.

It’s all essentially the same. The only difference is the stick used to make the cast, and that’s not worth making a big deal over.

Having written about and fished with a number of bass pros, I’m always amazed to find out how many of them have at one point or another fly fished. In fact, I pick up some of my best fly-fishing ideas when I’m bass fishing with these guys.

Gary Klein, who has qualified for the Bassmaster Classic 28 times and is still rolling, credits fly fishing in part with his understanding of currents, structure and how fish behave around them.

“Once you understand how moving water behaves, and creates currents, you learn where the fish concentrate in the water, and that’s the same whether you’re throwing crankbaits around a windblown point on a reservoir, or a dry fly in a river,” said Klein.