Managing Expectations

I watched a Youtube video by Pacific Northwest entitled Last Call: End of Season Fly Fishing for Surmmer Run Steelhead on the Lower Deschutes River. Our protagonists steals away from the pressures of life with Jen to enjoy some late season camping and Swinging for Steelhead on the Deschutes river.  The plan  was  to decompress, unwind, improve his spey casting and possibly swing up a Steelhead.  

In the end, not only did his casting not improve, he became very discouraged. He decided to take a step back, observe and appreciate his natural surroundings and reflect on the beauty of it all. You know, stuff like that.

My heart genuinely went out to him because unmet expectations can be so brutal and I hate to see somebody discouraged. 

Here are some things to consider when managing expectations as a steelheader and caster.

1.  Cast your easiest casting and funnest set up to cast. Make it easy on yourself. Cast small flies unless the water is super murky.  We give fish all kinds of credit for lateral lines and the ability to detect things hundreds of feet away, yet its easy to default into thinking we need an huge fly, dumbbell eyed, heavy weighted with a heavy sinktip to get it down.  This stuff can be difficult to cast and the water temperatures dont always require these heavy setups. 
2.  Remember, sink tips and sunk lines are for slowing the fly down as much as they are for those other reasons.  I’m not against big heavy flies, or using heavy sinktips, or lead,  or whatever the situation requires but not for people wanting to enjoy and improve on their cast.   Try a type 3 sink tip Or a 96 grain OPST Riffle sink tip,  or t8 and a traditional hairwing, salmon fly or a hobo Spey.  Try to get above the fish your targeting  and slow the fly down with mending and position as opposed to getting down super deep with heavy tackle for now.
3. Cast with just your rod tip.  The reason I preach stopping the rod very high, hitting the sweet spot, eg a light anchor is because once you feel the rod actually doing the work of the cast it will change how you think about casting.
4. Loosen up and relax. I see people trying very hard to use correct hand positions in relationship to the fulcrum and rod angles etc but there is still something missing from a lot of the casting I see on the rivers and in practice or lessons.  A lot of these issues look to me like casters are trying too hard to do the cast correctly.  There sometimes is too much emphasis on peeling hard as if thats going to put extra power into the cast.  So  much concentration in fact that the head is rigid, the eyes in a death stare at the opposite bank and the forward cast is punchy and strenuous as opposed to almost nonchalant and graceful.
5. Instead of concentrating on strick mechanics give yourself a little leeway to think about only the rod tip for a while.  Think about the path of the sweep on a waterborne cast. Is it steep?  We dont necessarily need to rip a big ol’ roostertail in the water to get a good cast. A nice mellow sweep at a steep angle and a rithmic drift into the firing position with a little flip of the rod tip can produce a satisfying cast that can and will fly far enough to put you into fish.
6. Dont hit it hard to cast far,  cast smoothly for a narrow tight loop.  Stop low for dumbbell eyeballs.  At the risk of sounding silly, it literally should be elegant.  A casual observer should witness effortless grace.   Just shoot a rod length of shooting line or one and a half.  
7. Try to hit the sweet spot. Enjoy the casting until the fish turn on. We cant catch fish that aren’t there.  In the two handed we are hunting to different types of unicorns.  The elusive Oncorhynchus Mykiss,  (kissMyhyny) and the perfect cast

However, Im not such a good sport. Plus I am older and have much more experience in unrealized expectations, in the arena of Swinging  for Steelhead.  

First of all I usually cant even get Jen to go with me. I did once on a day trip. She is in great shape, an avid hiker and outdoorsman in her own right and tough.  So I took her to see my special place on the river where I did my thing and felt somewhat at peace. She commented about the unsightly  barren hills and complained about the stickers.  Thus my fantasy was thwarted.

The casting does not much piss me off.  I used to become  irate during practice casting sessions when mother nature did not cooperate with my casting plans.  I cursed the sky hurled insults, wondering why the wind waited until I was laced up and in the water, to commence in blowing sideways. I would become furious. But I wouldn’t quit, and if I kept throwing the wind would eventually die down, maybe in spurts but things would generally get better and after some hours usually I would get in a solid practice session and see some gains in my casting.