Tinkering with fish
KIRK DEETER BEGAN FLY FISHING FOR LOVE. Initially it was for the love of a woman, not a fish.
"I met Sarah, who would eventually be my wife, at the University of Michigan," Kirk began. "Her family was from Michigan, and her father/grandfather/greatgrandfather had all fly fished. It was quite a family tradition. They had a cabin on the Pere Marquette River in the western part of the state, and I first took up the sport to curry favor with my in-laws. The first time I got in the river with a fly rod, I disappeared for many hours-I was so smitten with it. My in-laws thought I'd gotten lost; they sent my wife out to find me!
"If you're a thoughtful person, fly fishing has a natural appeal. The wheels have to be turning upstairs for things to work. I like fixing things, tinkering with things. Some people do it with cars and engines. I like to do it with fish. Fly fishing is a great puzzle; it's about problem solving. Every day you wake up and the puzzle pieces are splayed out differently. No matter what tips and tricks you've figured out, there's always something new waiting around the next bend."
As an editor-at-large for Field & Stream, Kirk has the chance to cover a variety of fly-fishing experiences. He sees a tremendous dichotomy between fly fishing in salt water and in sweet. "Both activities utilize a fly rod, but to me, the similarities stop there," Kirk continued. "They're two different sports. On the flats, it's the cast that's most important; on a trout stream, your cast is often only twenty or thirty feet, but the presentation has more nuance. I love high-country trout fishing-there's a reason I live in the Colorado Rockies. But my world thundered and turned when I hooked my first tarpon on a fly. I like to say that I daydream of trout, but at night I dream of tarpon! There's something to be appreciated about both species-all species, for that matter. It's amazing to catch a tarpon, to come in contact with a creature that might be as old as you or older (tarpon can live to eighty years), a fish that's been dodging bull sharks and red tides to survive. Likewise, it's very satisfying to fool a trout. They're such beautiful creatures, with their elaborate scales. When you're trout fishing, you're not matching wits against one fish; you're up against tens of thousands of years of instinct that's constantly evolving."
Over the years Kirk has become a champion of fly fishing for what has historically been considered a somewhat less romantic species-carp. In some ways his feelings about carp encapsulate what he loves about fly fishing in general, and where he sees the future of the sport. "I've had the chance to go all over the world and catch many different species, but it's turned out that one of the most interesting fly-rod targets is swimming right in my backyard," Kirk said. "I guess it's a case where familiarity has bred contempt…or used to! I think carp are maligned here because they're not considered classic table fare-though they were brought to North America in the 1800s specifically for that purpose. Carp have many qualities to commend them. They are one of the most resilient fish in the world. They can live in almost any conditions-warm or cold, clean or dirty water-and are readily accessible just about wherever you live. Go to a local lake or a golf course pond, and carp are the fish you're likely to see. Not everyone has the time or money to travel to the Bahamas or Key West to find tailing bonefish or cruising tarpon. If you want to sight cast to a tailing fish that might be ten pounds or more, carp are it. Carp are able to communicate with each other; if you spook one, you'll probably need to find another spot, as the spooked fish will send out a warning to others nearby, and they'll be off the bite.
"For me, carp create a complex problem-solving matrix in your head. With tarpon, the matrix is simple: You see the tarpon, you make the cast. If you put the fly three feet in front of the fish and make a good strip, the fly will probably get eaten. With carp, you're thinking about many things: How are they swimming? Are they 'cruisers,' swimming along the bottom? Are they 'feeders,' tipped nose down (obviously rooting for food)? Or are they suspended higher in the water column? Each type of carp demands its own type of cast, fly, and presentation.
"Carp really get your wheels spinning. I like to equate carp fishing with soccer. Around the world, carp is the number-one sport fish. A staggering amount of money is spent on carp angling. There are carp in ponds in England and France that are mourned when they die; hundreds of people might pay tens of thousands of dollars for a chance to come fish for it. But here in America, it's just starting to catch on."
Many of fly fishing's skills can be taught-casting, entomology, fly tying, to name a few. But there's one quality-some might call it "fishyness" and others might call it instinct-that's harder to impart. It's safe to say that Kirk Deeter has it. He has reason to believe that his son Paul may have it, too. "There's a little creek right across from our house that has small brook trout," Kirk explained. "From time to time in the summer I'll take my son Paul over there with a tenkara rod. [Tenkara is the traditional Japanese method of fly fishing using just a long rod and fly line, which is attached directly to the tip of the rod; it's ideal for making delicate presentations on small mountain streams.] I put that long rod in his hands, and stood back as he went creeping along the creek bank like a lion cub, very wary so as not to spook fish. You can't learn that sort of instinct; like a bird dog, you either have it or you don't. Watching him crawl along the bank was one of my proudest and happiest moments. It looked like I was going to have a future fishing partner."
ABOUT THE ANGLER
KIRK DEETER is an editor-at-large for Field & Stream magazine and editor of Trout, the publication of Trout Unlimited. He is also the editor-in-chief of Angling Trade and senior editor of The Flyfish Journal. His stories have appeared in Garden & Gun, The Drake, 5280, Fly Rod & Reel, Fly Fisherman, Big Sky Journal, SaltWater Sportsman, and Trout, among other places. Kirk is also the coauthor of three books: The Little Red Book of Fly Fishing (with Charlie Meyers); Castworks: Reflections of Fly Fishing Guides and the American West (Game & Fish Mastery Library) (with Andrew W. Steketee and Liz Steketee); and Tideline: Captains, Fly-Fishing and the American Coast (with Andrew W. Steketee and Marco Lorenzetti).