Of advancing years, I only recently took up fly-fishing after a lifetime of coarse and sea-angling.

Casting a fly-line was counter-intuitive until I got the hang of it, and started to feel the rod loading and the timing of the stops.

It then felt strangely familiar and pleasurable.

It just clicked in my mind.

Hours spent in my bedroom during the yo-yo craze in the '50s when nobodies became overnight celebretaries and yo-yo competitions featured on the front pages of local newspapers.

Timing the roll-out and flicking at the bottom of the string at the right moment and the right force, to have the yo-yo spinning back up the string, walking the dog, the cat's cradle.

Useless skills that took hours and hours of practice, now paying dividends in false casting skills?

Very good,but just remember that you should be trying to limit your false casts to as few as is possible.There's no point in getting good at false casting.You should be getting good at the final cast.I see many anglers(experienced as well as newbies) swishing away merrily as if that's what their meant to be doing. No No No.The point of the excercise is Fly fishing, not casting.and if you can do it with 1 false cast to load the rod .all the better.Flies in the water catch fish.flies in the air catch nothing .

Jim

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The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

Except Trees my grandad used to add to that statement

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Allan
Only dead fish go with the flow.

yo yo power application and flick, nice.

I agree.It's a good lesson.

Jim

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The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

You're so right, Jim.

I taught myself to cast around 50 years ago on small rivers. I liked to fish a dry fly and spent a lot of time false casting to dry the fly. (remember liquid mucilin?)
Now I keep reverting to false casting when it's not necessary. Far too much time spent in the air, more "wind" knots than needed , more disturbance over the fish and it does nothing for my deteriorating shoulder.

It's hard to break the habits of a lifetime.

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"Take not out your 'ounds on a werry windy day" Surtees.