Just curious as I am self taught, newish to fly fishing, and have nobody to compare against where I fish (mainly coarse fish at moment).

I know there more important things but I'm really interested to see how my casting compares or is coming along - I cant haul. Thats why I say without hauling - lol.
Thanks

99% of my fishing is with a 2-hander so no expert with a single hander rod. But from personal experience about 40 feet (give or take).

Fred

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Roughly 20 yards without a breeze to affect it. That's, um, 60 feet.

If you can teach yourself to cast, you can teach yourself to haul.

I have taken the same route as you, self taught and muddling through. The haul to load the rod for the lift/backcast is quite easy as if you hold & tug the line, the backcast/lift sort of self hauls. The haul to load the rod while ending backcast ( at exactly the right point ) for the forward cast is a different annimal I have found.

From what little I know about casting dynamics, the point at which you turn the back to the forward cast will make a massive diference to presentaion and distance depending on how the rod is loaded.

I really should get some lessons to firm up or rebuff what I think I have grasped.....

what weight rods and lines are you on?

I'm using a 5 weight rod and a 5 weight wf line and to be totally honest I have done about 5 times, if not more, more casting practice than fishing over the last couple of months that I have given fly fishing another go (give it a go last year for a month or so).

I know its really sad but I measured my casts lol and I can get 70 odd feet off (thats not including the leader) without hauling. Its really annoying cause there's just a few of turns of line left on my reel and Im determined to get them off and I'm sure I would be able to if I could double haul. But Ive tried and tried and tried and managed it once - and then I was standing on the line lol.

I do have tailing loops a lot mind!!

if you lift the head of line and shoot, 60' should be fairly straight forward, casting further, presentation would be more controlled with a haul, could try just a single haul on the final cast to smooth the tailing loop out.

Ohanzee, are you really suggesting that someone who has in his own words "a lot of tailing loops" will fix them by learning to haul or even by adding a haul to a cast that has a fault in it already?

Tencher27, I don't think adding a haul in will help, it will, imho add further to your tailing loop problems. There are several thing that a caster can do that will cause a tailing loop, but as we are talking about distance the usual suspect is misapplication of power. This in itself could be one of two things, starting to fast then slowing down slightly before the stop, or pushing the rod that little bit to hard just before the stop.
However that said theses are just suggestions based on my experience and the content of this conversion. If you are any where near Hereford on Sunday, pop in to the Hereford show and find me at the Wye and Usk stand where I would be happy to have a look at your casting and see if we can get rid of the tailing loops.


Frank

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The above post highlights just how helpful a casting instructor can be! After over 30 years of fishing as a self taught caster (using the instructions on the back of my first rod which came from Argos ) I decided to learn the 'double haul'. Booked a lesson with a casting instructor and was able to do it within a few minutes (not brilliantly, but reasonably), the rest of the lesson was spent practicing it and learning different techniques for dealing with wind.

When I wanted to salmon fish I went to Michael Evans for casting instruction on the spey casts, snake roll etc. So I can't believe it has taken me so long to think to learn to haul when trout fishing! Not only does it help with distance it is a huge benefit when dealing with windy conditions.

I am fortunate to have a little land, so now tend to practice casting almost every day, it's relaxing and fun, and there are so many different casts you can use for different fishing situations there is always something to learn (it's also the next best thing to fishing IMHO). I can now cast an entire line (including WF5 and usually without tailing loops) when line and rod match well.

Bottom line, I can thoroughly recommend having a lesson; it has added greatly to my enjoyment of the sport and indeed fishing ability; definitely the best money I have spent in ages and is really not expensive. Just my thoughts...

Andrew

Certainly envy you the land Andrew. It's got to beat my local playing fields and all the usual unoriginal comments from people who think they're being original. Not to mention the dogs of course. I even had one care in the community type who tried to pick a fight with me, saying he could have tripped over my line as it lay flat on the grass. I wouldn't mind but he definitley made a bee line for it. Takes all sorts I suppose.

Mind you that's probably what they say about us.

Relax Frank, i was suggesting he learned to haul to give more control past the distance he is at, easy start by just adding a single haul to his forward cast, nothing complicated, and nothing to fear, the misconception that learning things does some sort of harm is not useful to anyone,

a casting lesson is always a good idea but not everyone wants it, trencher appears to be getting there on his own,

you think a haul on the forward cast will make the tailing loop worse? i beg to differ.

just found this on another thread, good timing, http://www.sexyloops.com/flycasting/tailingloops.shtml