What is fly fishing? Why do we fish? A very short introduction

For as long as humans have lived near rivers and oceans, we’ve fished. I think fly fishing is the closest to how our ancestors did it.

Here's a nickel tour around the breadth of the pursuit, including all the rabbit holes fly fishing can offer the curious.

This article is part of the Mindset pillar of Current Flow State's Learn to Fly Fish library. To support this work, and access exclusive perks, consider becoming a member.

Pillar 1: Mindset

Start here. Why do we fish? How do we venture boldly into the outdoors?

Current Flow StateNick Parish

Inside this entry

1. Fly fishing, defined
2. What fly anglers do differently
3. The many facets of fly fishing

Fly fishing defined

A formal definition of fly fishing might go like:

A style of fishing wherein the weight of the line propels an imitation of an insect as a lure.

And that wouldn’t be wrong. It wouldn’t account for everything. But it’s a good start.

Comparing angling styles: gear and fly

Here’s another unscientific comparison:

Let’s add another dimension:

What fly anglers do differently

We make fake bugs, from fur and feathers and thread and hooks. Some fake bugs—we call them flies—are so tiny you could fit three of them on a dime without touching each other.

We then tie those flies to lengths of line—that start as small as the thickness of a human hair and work their way thicker and thicker—together until they get to a plastic fly line.

Then we us our long, flexible rods to lift the bugs off the water and set them down in a place where we’ve seen fish feeding, or we think they’ll be likely to eat. And we try to keep hold of them when the hook sets in their mouth.

But here’s the thing: in the many years humans have fished, fly fishing is the norm, not the anomaly.

Humans have been documented fishing this way for a very, very long time—thousands of years. Other than how the equipment is made, there’s very little that’s different now than depictions of angling in the Roman empire.