on my clauser with rio redfish 8wt, i can hold about 70ft on a calm day and around 50 windy. my sage xi3 is a completely different story. with a light weight fly #1 wooly bugger i was making 90-100 foot casts with a sharkskin line. with something bigger like an peanut butter 80 foot. havent gotten to play with it in much wind just about 10-12.

In my experince casting is like tents. If a tent is rated for 4 people, under real world camping it sleeps 2. If a guy tells me he can cast 70 ft in his back yard, I'm figuring on 35 in a windy rocking boat with fish blowing up all around. Myself included.

In that situation, I always consider it a successful cast whenever the fly does not end up in the middle of my back...

Word.

Scott, you just defined the difference betwen fly casting and fly fishing!!! ...

Which, as we all should know, are two totally different things, ha. What's the difference between the fly caster that busts a laser shot into the wind to a boiling fish brawl and the guy that looks at that same maelstrom of fish and goes from a practice pond power-caster to a real world choke-meister?

Experience and practice, says I. Practice enough to be confident in your abilities. 45-50' is a great solid distance, and arguably most fish are caught on casts made to this distance or less. Once you're confident that you can lay a cast out nice and straight to this distance consistently, then go back to challenging yourself. Make it a game.

How many times in a row can you land your practice fly in your hat at 25', 35', 50? How about in a CD? How about in the hole in the middle of the CD? You see where I'm going here. Strengthen your foundation, and then build on it.

And practice on water. Grass ain't the same. Plus it ruins a good fly line.

Listen to this ^ guy. He knows what's up.

CnD, I don't know if I'd go that far.

Heck, you probably get as much fishing in a week as I do in a month. Hopefully more, for your sake. Maybe when the kids are completely grown or at least that's what I keep telling myself. Definitely need to get some SW fishing in soon but I'm workin' on that...

Good advise!
No water - practice on the grass!!
Rig up a practice line on an old reel and practice - practice - practice!

When I'm on the water, I fish. When I want to practice casting, I usually walk down the street to the nearest big patch of grass with shade.

I'm not the best caster in the world but so far it's working out ok for me.

what is this grass you speak of ?
























we need rain

You a registered trademark now mr fancy pants?!

yeah, its mostly dirt now

Can I get an AMEN???