‘Tis the season! Give the gift of a class or guided trip

Dec11

I don’t usually make posts like this. But if people want to know what to get you for the holidays, and you’re struggling with gift ideas, here are two suggestions.

Book a guide trip with me for 2025. There’s no real gift certificate, but there is the promise that we’ll go out fishing for four hours next year. Your gift giver pays now, but it’s at my 2024 rate (rates usually go up every few years). I build a 20% gratuity into the price, so all you have to do is show up with your gear on a mutually-agreed-upon date and time and we have at it. If you’re interested in wet flies, we’re looking at a May-Juneish window. Because of the book writing process, I will be limiting my guide trips in 2025, so this is a great way to lock in. Easy-squeezy…

Take a “Classes With The Experts” with me at the Fly Marlborough Fishing Show. With this, you get almost instant gratification. Two choices: Saturday, January 18, 2pm-4:30pm, Tying and Fishing Wet Flies with Steve Culton: Watch Steve tie classic North Country spiders, winged, and wingless wet flies that trout can’t resist, and learn how to rig and fish them. The course also covers basics like leader construction, matching the hatch, fly selection, where to fish wet flies, and how to fish them. All levels.

Or, Sunday, January 19, 8:30am-11am, Beyond Cast & Strip – Presentation Flies for Stripers with Steve Culton: Learn how to tie (Steve will demo) presentation flies – traditional New England-style flies that create the illusion of life even when at rest – and how and where to present them. All Levels.

For the Fly Fishing Show classes, you cannot register and pre-pay through me. You do that on the Fly Fishing Show Site, which is here.

I’m hoping to be offering the same for Edison on January 24-26, but that schedule has not been released. Stay tuned for my full Marlborough and Edison schedules.

2024 IFTS Redux

Dec6

The 2024 International Fly Tying Symposium has come and gone, leaving in its wake many fond memories, new tying swag, and new acquaintances made. The event runs from Saturday to Sunday; Saturday is typically the busy day, with crowds dwindling by Sunday afternoon (it’s hard to compete with the NFL). If you’ve never been, you should, because it’s a tremendous opportunity to watch some of the best tyers in the world in action. You can meet them, watch them, talk to them, ask questions — I do all of that when I take a break and walk the room. There are private classes where you can receive personalized instruction. There are seminars that are included in the price of your ticket. And four times a day, featured fly tyers who tie and present to a small audience.

On Saturday night there’s a banquet, and everyone who attends gets a goody bag of fly tying swag. Thread, tools, materials…it’s all good stuff. Post-dinner, I hosted a little wine party attended by several luminaries in the fly tying world. Properly hydrated, Sunday went off without a hitch. Here’s some of the weekend in photos. Check out my Instagram @stevecultonflyfishing for more, soon.

The first thing I did Saturday morning was put on my fanboy hat and go meet Jeff Blood. Jeff’s the originator of the Blood Dot Egg, my favorite steelhead egg pattern. Jeff was warm and welcoming and it was invaluable to be able to discuss steelheading and Lake Erie trib fly fishing with him. Jeff gave me some braid we use to tie the White Death Zonker, another favorite pattern of his. Later, I returned to my tying station to find two dozen Blood Dots and another package of White Death braid on my chair. Wow! Thank you, Jeff!

I’ve also wanted to meet Son Tao since I read about his Caddis Emerger pattern in Pat Dorsey’s book *Favorite Flies for Colorado*. I shared a table with Bob Lindquist, Delaware River guide extraordinaire (and contributing photographer for my upcoming Farmington River book). Son was one table down the aisle, so it was easy to chat. He is one heckuva skilled tier. Also a shout out to David White who sat at the table next to me. Great to meet you!

Not too shabby company! I was so honored to be included in this roster. This was my first time as Featured Tier in the Symposium, and my session was very well attended. If you were in the group, thank you for participating. Thank you also to everyone who stopped by my table to watch and ask questions and talk fly fishing.

**Tying LaFontaine’s Diving Caddis. Thanks, Phil, for the wonderful photos.**

It’s hard to believe that I’d never met Bob Clouser before this weekend. Bob was FFT just before me, so that seemed like a natural time to say hello. Whether you’re a presenter like me, a vendor, or an attendee, Bob’s kind nature is typical of the overwhelmingly positive energy you’ll get from everyone at the show. You’re with your tribe. People want to talk to you. So…you’re coming next year. Right? Or to the Marlborough and Edison Fly Fishing Shows in January. Right?

Matching The Hatch with Wet Flies

Nov14

“Matching The Hatch With Wet Flies.” That’s the title of my Featured Tier demo this Sunday at 11:45am at the International Fly Tying Symposium in Somerset, NJ. As I prepare for the demo, I had a few thoughts I wanted to share.

When you’re fishing wet flies, matching the hatch doesn’t matter — until it does. And then, you’d best be prepared. What I mean is, there will be times when fish will eat a wet fly simply because it looks alive and like something good to eat. The bug that wet fly is supposed to represent may not be hatching at that moment. It may be entirely out of season. It may be the wrong color or size. But nonetheless, it gets stomped.

However, the more you fish with a team of three wet flies, the more you will encounter situations where the trout will only have what’s hatching, presented in the water column exactly where they are feeding on the naturals. They may pick out one fly on the three fly team to the ruthless exclusion of the other flies. That’s when matching the hatch pays dividends. You’ll be the person leaving the pool, trailed by other anglers who will want to know, “What fly were you using?”

So: know your hatch windows. Understand what food is most likely to be in the water. Understand how those bugs behave. Specific patterns aren’t as important as matching size, color, and profile. Give the trout a choice. They will always tell you when you get it right.

See you this weekend!

LaFontaine’s Diving Caddis is a good choice for a late afternoon-into evening pattern — because that’s when the trout are most likely to be seeing egg-laying female caddisflies. One memorable evening, I landed two dozen trout in two hours — sixteen on the Diving Caddis.

International Fly Tying Symposium next weekend, Nov 16-17, Somerset, NJ

Nov8

Time flies when you’re writing a book, and I can’t believe we’re only one weekend away from the 2024 International Fly Tying Symposium. That’s right, next weekend, November 16-17 in Somerset, NJ. They will be vendors galore with all kinds of hard-to-find-stuff, along with some of the best fly tyers in the world. There are classes, seminars (free with admission) and featured fly tyers (like yours truly!) Check out the seminar schedule:

And the featured tier list! (Note the slot on Sunday at 11:45, which of course will be of particular interest and importance.)

I’m looking forward to seeing you there. Please come say hello!

Currentseams Q&A: Wet fly or dry/dropper for emergers?

Oct25

I got this question when I spoke earlier this month the EJTU meeting. It’s a good one. I’d just shown the group a video of trout taking sulphur emergers. The rises were regularly timed and showy/splashy. You could also see the bugs in the air.

The question was: When you get to the river and you see a scene like that, do you automatically go to a a dry/dropper? A: No. I will start with a wet fly team of three, and two of them will likely be sulphur patterns. There’s a lot to unpack here in terms of that decision. In this particular video, it was late afternoon in June. The rise forms clearly said the fish were on emergers. The time of year, time of day, rise forms, and visible bugs (sulphurs, whose nymphs are in the drift a good long time before emergence) indicated that the trout were taking their food just below the surface. A dry/dropper might get you some takes, but why not feed the fish like they’re already eating? Which is, subsurface, just below the film. A wet fly team of three fits that bill perfectly.

A splashy, emerger rise form (upper left) still taken from the video. You can also confirm that the trout are taking the emerger by the lack of duns on the surface. This doesn’t mean you can’t catch fish on the surface. It just means the dry fly may not be the most efficient method.

Note that a dry-dropper may be a better method for presenting just under the surface with different hatches. A midge pupa in winter would be a good example of that.

Thank you EJTU, sign the ASGA striper letter, and I actually went fishing…twice!

Oct11

Forgive the brevity, but I’m up against it today. First: thank you EJTU for hosting me on Wednesday night. I presented Wet Flies 2.0, the turnout was excellent, and we had an engaging post-talk Q&A.

Gadzooks! Fishing twice in one week? It’s true. On Tuesday night I braved a snotty surf and 10mph wind with surfcaster extraordinaire Toby Lapinski. We fished a top secret rocky reef, and although the conditions seemed perfect for fall bassin’, we managed just one touch before we decided that it wasn’t happening. Yesterday, I headed to points far away to fish a thin blue line with #2 Son Cam. The water was painfully low, and leaves were a constant issue. The action was slow, but we had fun fooling wild brook trout on dry flies and deep jigs.

Finally, please take a minute out of your busy day to sign the ASGA letter to the ASMFC. Striped bass desperately need us to take action now. The following graphic on the Juvenile Abundance Index tells a dire story:

Here’s a link that will give you more information and a chance to sign the letter and make your voice heard.

Mark your calendar: International Fly Tying Symposium Nov. 16-17, 2024

Sep17

Once again, I’ll be appearing at the International Fly Tying Symposium this November 16-17, 2024, at the Hilton Doubletree in Somerset, NJ. This is great opportunity to mingle, mix, and see some of the best fly tiers on planet earth: Thomas Baltz. Jeff Blood. Bob Clouser. Tim Cammisa. Tim Flagler. And that’s just one partial alphabetical column. Oh! There’s also a well-stocked marketplace that always has common and hard-to-find items. There are classes, seminars, and featured tying demos. The last two are free with your admission, and I’ll be one of the featured tiers on Sunday at 11:45, which will get you home in time for football. The demo is “Matching the Hatch with Wet Flies.” I hope to see you there!

“Fly Fishing CT’s Small Streams” Thursday 9/12 7pm at Hammonasset Chapter TU

Sep11

I’m kicking off my 2024 fall/winter speaking season Thursday night, September 12, 7pm, at the HCTU meeting in Meriden. The topic will be Fly Fishing CT’s Small Streams, a subject that I’m really passionate about. We’ll talk when, where, how, tackle, flies, tactics, conservation, and more. The meeting is open to the public, so I hope to see you there!

**Fishing small streams returns you to the very soul of fly fishing.**

Farmington and Housy last week: Slow, Slower, Slowest

Sep2

This can be a tough time of year to fish. A lot of what is hatching is small. Usually flows are low (not the case in either river) and warmer (ditto). Over three days, I saw very little bug activity, and the feed bag was never on. Still, there were some bright spots in all the dreariness.

Monday, August 26: Housy (Slower). I fished with fly tier extraordinaire and fellow smallmouth bum Lou Di Gena from 3pm to 8pm. It was not good. I managed to hook four smallies in five hours of fishing. I should be hooking four smallies on consecutive casts. Bug activity was minimal (small caddis) and there were no fish in some incredibly sexy new water we fished. We ended up in a pool where I once landed 50 smallmouth in an evening. Painfully slow that night. Of course, it’s hard to be bitter when you land your biggest bass of the summer…even if it was in the first 10 minutes of fishing.

**This slob went 17″ and somewhere between 2 1/2-3 pounds. Taken under an indicator with Lou DiGena’s CE Crayfish, a small (2″) weighted pattern. A real forearm burner!** ***(Photo by Lou DiGena)***

Wednesday, August 28: Farmington (Slowest). This was a photo shoot day with fellow Farmington River guide Antoine Bissieux. He fished from 3pm-7pm with dry flies — I joined in for the last hour with wets — and it was disaster slow. We fished a mark below Riverton, and hatch activity was slim to none. I don’t think I counted even a half dozen rises in three hours. Antoine blanked (to give you an idea of how pathetic the action was, it was his first skunk of the year) and I managed only four bumps and one fish to net. The bumps were half-hearted, and the one I did land was arguably the worst hit I’ve had all year on a wet fly. (Insert heavy sigh here.)

**Take your time, Antoine. You’re not missing anything.**

Thursday, August 29: Farmington (Slow). I gave a wet fly lesson to Corey and his son Matt from 3pm-7pm. We started off in the bottom end of the PTMA, but that was not a happening place, so we headed north. Another mark, although quite fishy, was disappointing. Both Matt and Corey had some bumps, but no real hookups. Farther north was the call, and I’ve never seen the area below the dam so crowded. My best guess on the crowds is that anglers thought there might be pre-Labor Day stocking? (There wasn’t.) But we found a very nice section to call our own, and had at it. Ding-ding-ding! It was the winner bell and the dinner bell. Both Matt and Corey brought fish to net, and it was gratifying to see their hard work pay off. Well done, gentlemen!

**They’re not big, but wild brookies on the Farmington are always a treat.**

(Late) Farmington River Report: Trout (mostly) open for business!

Aug19

My apologies or not getting this out last week. I’ll try to be a little more timely. The good news is that the terrible weekend rains mostly missed the Farmington, and the river has been fishing very well. Last week I guided Dan for a late afternoon-into evening session. The focus was on dry flies, and we started off with a hopper/dropper system. (‘Tis the season! And I promise, no more parenthetical statements.) We discovered a pod of trout taking emergers in a shallow run in bright sunshine. When Dan dialed in his cast and drift, his hopper got crushed by a very respectable mid-teens brown. We found another run formed by the confluence of two sections of river, but we couldn’t buy a hit. Even when we switched to wets, it was no dice. My best guess is that they were feeding on something far smaller than what we were throwing.

We ended the session at a classic dry fly pool within the PTMA. Hatch activity (22-24 BWOs, 18-20 Summer Stenos, and later, 12-14 Light Cahills and an absurd number of midges…and I guess I fibbed about the parenthetical statements) was light until 8:30pm, but Dan managed to stick a nice fish on a 22 BWO dry. We used a 14-foot leader-tippet system terminating in 6x to get better drifts in the languid, glassy pool. At 7:30 I was able to join in the fun. As predicted, that wild brown feeding just off the rock in the frog water got stupid as it got dark, and I took him — with great delight — on a size 16 Catskills Light Cahill dry. Both Dan and I had good action until we could no longer see our flies.

The next day, I shot some drone photos for the book with filmmaker extraordinaire Matthew Vinick. I fished for about 45 minutes below and within the PTMA until he arrived.