Fly fishing is my specialty. I am a flyfishermen first. Not someone who will take you fishing and let you use fly tackle. When I go fishing for myselfes a flyrod is the first thing I pick up. Quite often, all I bring is flyrods. Look at the promotional material and websites of captains who purport to be flyfishing guides. Notice how many photos show spinning and casting rods rather than flyrods. See how many flyfishing reports submitted to flyfishing websites by so-called "flyfishing guides" talk about fish caught on jigs or even bait. Come with me if you want to flyfish, go with someone else if it's not as important to you to use a flyrod but just to catch a fish in any way possible. Either way is cool. I release all redfish that come into the boat. That is what I do. I don't do baitfishing or trolling charters and no chumming. If you want to charter a captain who fishes with bait or trolls and you want to fill a cooler, I know a couple of guys who are really good at those things and I will put you in touch with one of them. I do flyfishing sight casting and shallow water fishing for redfish and have been doing it since 1999, before anybody else even knew redfish existed in the grass flats or had figured out the tailing tides around here. I pretty much pioneered flyfishing to tailing reds in the grass in the Morehead City area. I did this with hard work, getting muddy and researching what guys in South Carolina were doing at the time. Not by trying to follow other boats, asking other people behind somebody's back or having somebody else take me to their favorite spot (that they probably found out about from somebody else anyway).
Imagine seeing a fish tail or back out of the water and trying to get that fish to eat a fly, it's not easy. If your skills are not up to it (or even if they are) you may not catch a fish, even if they are all around you. I am happy only having caught one or two fish as long as I saw a bunch as long as I was flyfishing. When a nice fish comes into my boat, it means that much more because a problem was confronted and overcome. If you like the sound of how I do things, go ahead and drop me a line. We have fun and see cool stuff and when we catch fish, we have earned it. Of course we fish with tackle other than flyrods. We are proficient with every type of tackle except for those crazy center pin reels that midwest steelhead anglers use (and gillnets and any other nets). The flyrod is always the first option. I never leave the dock without flyrods...may forget to bring an extra spinning rod, but never a flyrod.
