Mike's Question:

Can you recommend a good fly fishing beginner's video i.e., rod and line selection, casting, fly selection etc...Thanks.

Mike Palumbo

Mark's Answer:

Maria & Mike,

Luckily, the market is loaded with instruction videos (and now, CD-ROMs too) but wading through to find the valuable ones is too difficult.

I like the idea of watching a video for a sport so mechanical and visual as fishing and fly fishing. Through video, an angler-to-be can practice within the confines of the home, where the only embarrassment might come from a nosey neighbor or your children (send them to bed with no pudding).

For many folks, the reinforcement of seeing how something works is invaluable. My wife Amy learns visually and unless she gets to use her hands when talking, the story is going nowhere fast. But if you plan to watch videos to learn about fishing or more specifically fly fishing, you need to practice what you are seeing on the spot.

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I think some of the In-Fisherman videos are worth looking into if you want to learn how to fish for bass, catfish, walleye or panfish. You can find them through Cabelas or through the magazine In-Fisherman.

Orvis offers quite a few selections of video and CD-ROMs aimed at the beginning fly angler. The titles include Flyfishing Made Easy , Beginnings Video and one I have seen and like, The Orvis Fly Fishing School CD-ROM (better than the video because it includes the Orvis Knot Book and interactive elements).

Rick Hafele's Anatomy of a Trout Stream video is the best on the market for learning about the habitat of the trout. A friend of mine tells me that the Doug Swisher video, Strategies for Selective Trout, was beneficial while another friend says the CD-ROM Tying Flies for Trout was a helpful CD-ROM. You couldn't go wrong with the Gary Borger line of how-to videos either.

You might just want to go to your local video store and rent what instructive fishing videos they carry. Or visit your local sporting goods store or fly shop and see what they have in inventory. And as a last result, you can ask a clerk at one of the stores to show you how to set up your rod, what kind of flies to use in your area and so on. That's their job, after all.

I think video works best in conjunction with the written word (which means you should check out Paul Marriner's List of the top fly fishing books you need in your library).

So read your GORP articles, your fly fishing books, watch the videos, practice and then do the best thing you can do to learn the sport — get out and fish.