Bernd Ziesche | Wednesday, 24 June 2015
In my experience there are several species of fish, which I think are the most desired ones for us fly fishermen. Those are: Steelhead, Atlantic salmon, Sea trout, Tarpon, Bonefish, Permit, Redfish, Striped Bass, Pike, Brown trout, Rainbow trout, Cutthroat trout, Char, Bass and Grayling. Sure there are far more species of fish we fly fish for! But I think most fly fishermen would find one or two of their favorites in between these species of fish. Most of these species I never saw to be caught during any of the world championships – following the pictures published in social media that was.
I was asking myself what exactly it would take to become the world champion in fly fishing!?
Would it be about catching the biggest fish in the field? Or would it be about catching the most? Would it be about having chosen the most effective technique out of all our different techniques like nymph fishing, dry fly fishing, streamer fishing, emerger fly fishing, down stream swing fishing and so on?
Personally I find WORLD CHAMPION FLY FISHING to be quite a big shining title. So I asked some of my friends who work as professional fly fishermen either, if they knew about the details behind that title. None of them could offer any specific information. So I checked via internet.
What I found first were several youtube videos presenting fly fishermen catching very small fish (few inches in length). They were lifting the fish into an average sized net and then running a serious distance out of the water to the land where a controller was measuring the length of the fish. In one case it seemed as if the controller wasn’t able to measure the fish and a second (supervising?) controller had to be called to re-measure the fish. After the whole procedure the fish was brought back into the water and the fly fisherman was running back to his fishing spot in order to catch the next fish. It seemed obvious to me, that the fly fishing world championships were about catching the most fish though.
After having seen those videos I was asking my (professional fly fishing) friends, if they would be interested in participating in this kind of world championships in fly fishing? They all denied.
Besides those videos I also found several discussions about the world championships in fly fishing and how everything is organized. Quite some of these discussions had a negative attitude. It seemed to me like the big shining title of that event polarized a lot of fly fishermen since it (the event) included only a very small field of our fly fishing world. Also the way how very small fish were treated on their way to the measure seemed to be a significally polarizing part of the wc.
How about you - do you want to become a WORLD CHAMPION in fly fishing?
I wish all of you such a superb fly fishing as I had it during the past week teaching fly fishing for Brown trout, Grayling, Rainbow trout, Pike, Döbel and more. You may find some pictures below. ;)
All my best
Bernd
