Faerie Winds

Funny sometimes how our thoughts run during this tortuous time we call the off season. Just yesterday I was thinking about easing down the river, stalking bank feeders, that and the effects of those little faerie winds that drive anglers crazy.

Wind is of course always a major consideration when it comes down to presenting a fly. Here in the Catskills, it controls everything about fishing when it blows fairly hard: where we can fish, how we can fish, and at it’s worst, whether we are likely to catch any fish on a dry fly. Winds are major players in this game, whether blowing like a gale or whispering like soft breaths of a babe.

The prevailing winds for the day must be considered when we chose our location, along with river flow and the general wadability of the water where we hope to find rising fish. If the depth and current speed allows freedom of positioning, we can usually plan our approach so that the wind doesn’t defeat our casting. On our relatively large Catskill rivers though, we don’t often have that freedom during the prime insect weeks of spring. Even when the conditions do allow a reasonable casting angle to deal with the prevailing winds, it is often necessary to make casts from a distance. The Red Gods impose a rule in these situations, to the effect that the limit of wading shall remain at or just beyond our maximum casting range under the conditions.

As fly fishermen, we are firmly bound by this rule, whether we recognize it as a rule or not. Wet vests, waterlogged fly boxes and seepage over the top of waders are the warning signs allotted by the Red Gods, warnings often followed by a dunking, or worse if ignored. There is another insidious ingredient involved though. When we find that extra foot or two of casting range, steady ourselves in more current than we prefer, relax and make that perfect cast, the faerie winds are brought to bear. Gentle, capricious yet irresistible, they can be the most trying test of our angling temperament.

We know we must control the leader and the fly so that it drops gently with controlled slack. Anything less and our fly will drag and erase the possibility of taking what might be the trout of the season. An experienced caster and dry fly fishermen knows when everything feels right. Yet time after time, our fly falls short, seems to drift off track, or even curl back toward us with insufficient slack to make the drift. Faerie winds have wafted our fly away from it’s target!

Now the scientists among our ranks will blubber about back drafts, the prevailing breeze being unsettled and pushed away from the shoreline by the intrusion of riverbanks and vegetation disrupting the flow of air over open water, vectors and thermal inconsistencies… bullshit. The truth is that the faerie winds are the extra ace in the vest pockets of the Red Gods that plague us!

Faerie winds are invoked when the gods are not satisfied that we have labored half an hour against buffeting winds, slippery rocks, and current deeper and faster than our best wading technique can normally surmount, to somehow arrive in a position where the distance to the subtle ring against the bank is less than or equal to our best cast. We have not yet earned that trout in their estimation; thus, they invoke the final test.

Passing their final test is beyond difficult. Each cast softly wafted back toward us, half a foot from the line of drift that trout is lying in results in the tensing of the muscles in our necks, backs and casting arms. Five casts, ten with the identical result, and by then our technique has begun to noticeably deteriorate. We curse, apply more power to our casts, and our fly drops farther from the target. Fuming, more cursing, and then an attempt to slide one precariously anchored foot closer to that bank. We feel the gravel slipping out from under that foot, recoil, and nearly lose it. Okay… calm…

Stretch the neck, wriggle the shoulders, adjust the tippet by one size, or it’s length by six inches. Make another cast.

I am persistent in this ritual, some of you perhaps less so, some more. If we keep at it long enough, if we somehow manage to quell the frustration building between our ears, on some days we may actually pass the test. Either that, or the trout will stop rising.

Many of us live for those rarest of days, those when we finally conquer all of our foibles, physical and mental limitations, and make that perfect cast. The faerie winds are stilled, the leader uncoils perfectly and drops the fly in the exact position and line of drift, resulting in a perfect float. In a mix of amazement, celebration and gratitude we watch that float all the way into it’s envelopment by a brand new ring upon the surface, raise the rod with perfect timing, and feel the energy of a seven-inch chub!