Working With Your Fly-Fishing Guide

The best way to make the most of a fly-fishing trip with a guide is to work closely with them. In many fly-fishing situations, you often have only one shot at a feeding fish, so it’s important to make it count.



What To Expect On A Guided Fly-Fishing Trip

You should expect to have fun, have at least a few good opportunities at fish, and to learn a lot about the local water and fishing in general. 

While many guided fly-fishing trips result in fishing experiences of a lifetime with big numbers of fish caught and sometimes personal-best trophies, the size and number of fish caught on any guided trip is far from guaranteed. 

Depending on the length of the guided trip and the operation, your outing may also include lunch and beverages, and many guides offer the use of their high-quality fly rods and terminal tackle as well. Since fly selection is a big part of strategy, guides should also provide the flies, but it doesn’t hurt to bring your own.

Your fly-fishing guide has spent countless days this season, and possibly decades, fishing these waters. They’ve seen it all, but their goal is to show you a good time, and not necessarily get you to fish the way they do. That doesn’t mean you should ignore their advice in favor of your preferences. Instead, tune into their guidance and learn not just the “what” but also the “why” behind each of their directions.



Before your trip even begins, the best guides will ask you what your goals for the trip are.

Do you want to catch a lot of fish? Do you want to catch big fish? Is the scenery as important as the fishing? Do you want to fish somewhere you won’t encounter other anglers? Do you want to improve your casting?

These questions help them create an experience you’ll enjoy. Answer them truthfully and in detail.



Working With Your Fly-Fishing Guide

A guide who knows your goals has a big leg up on the one who’s guessing at what you want, but how well you listen to the expert advice of the guide rests solely on your shoulders.



How much direction a guide offers depends on the people and the situation. The ‘people’ are the guide and you. The guide may not be the most talkative or may be intuitive enough to understand that you learn more by doing than by hearing. But the end goal in their directions is to get you to hook and land fish with only their words. How they do that will likely differ between wade fishing and float fishing.

Wade Fishing With A Guide

When you’re wade fishing with a guide, they’ll have more time to explain what they want you to do. You’re stationary, and even when sight fishing a rising fish, you should have a few moments to think about your first cast to it. 

If you’re a beginner, working with a guide while wade fishing is a great opportunity for you to improve your casts and learn to read water, as it gives you more time and more repetitions with the guide there to help you each step of the way.



They’ll have you wade into the ideal position to make the perfect cast to either a fish they saw or the most likely holding areas. Their guidance will include distance and location. Listen to their guidance on your casts and listen for them to say (or shout) “set.” Even the most experienced anglers can miss an eat, and having the second set of experienced guide-eyes on your fly or indicator, telling you when to set the hook, will help you catch more fish.

Guided Float Fishing On Rivers

Some of your time fly-fishing from a boat on a river may be spent anchored up, where your guide can spend some time explaining how to make the perfect first presentation, and how to make adjustments to your last cast. As long as you don’t put a feeding fish down, you may get multiple shots at them. 

Listen to your guide and ask questions if their instructions are unclear.



They’re trying to get you to put the fly exactly where they’ve had success putting that fly hundreds of times before. You both need to be good communicators to make it happen repeatedly throughout the day (you can get lucky once or twice).

Much of your fishing when floating a river will be done while moving. When the boat’s moving you’ll need to be even more tuned into your guide, as you’ll get only one cast at each holding spot. The guide likely sees way more spots that’ll likely hold a fish than you will, so use your ears to listen as much as you use your eyes to look for spots you want to cast to.

Your guide will use direction (e.g., nine o’clock, or 10 o’clock) along with distance (e.g., 30 feet or one rod length) to guide your cast. They’ll also point out physical features like rocks on the bank, rocks in the water, seams between currents, grass, undercut banks, logs, riffles, buckets, leaves floating, or anything else that can guide you to the zone they see as the best place to cast. 

They’ll also instruct you on your casting technique. If you want to make the most of a guided fishing trip, you should practice your cast ahead of time. But there’s always room for improvement, so listen to your guide for advice on adjusting your casts, what they mean by specific directions, and when to set the hook.

Communication Is A Two-Way Street

If there’s a single takeaway, it’s to listen to your guide and communicate.



As a client, you may insist on fishing only dry flies when the dry-fly bite isn’t happening. Your guide may think you’re crazy and should explain that you’re unlikely to catch fish on dries. If you decide you’d still rather cast only dry flies even if it means not catching any fish, then that’s a decision they should support and one you’ll have to live by. Most guides will bring along a nymphing and/or streamer rod, suspecting you aren’t as committed to dry-or-die as you said. 

The opposite should be true too: If you’ve been nymphing all day and casting a dry fly for a few minutes would make you happy, let the guide know. The more effectively you communicate with your guide, the better your trip will be.



At the end of your trip, you should feel like your guided fly-fishing experience is worth it because, if you keep an open mind and have open communication, you’ll have learned a lot.