Fishing Partners

They come in all sizes, shapes, forms, and ages. There are those from whom you learn, those who you teach and those whose ability is relatively equal to your own. There are those you fish with by choice and those with whom you are met through fate. Some become lifelong “fishing buddies”; others are strangers you meet on a fishing charter and never see again. Some you’ll wish you could fish with more often, others that you had never fished with at all.

It is difficult to choose which genre of fishing partner is best. There are plusses and minuses to each. Fishing with someone who is a better fisherman than you gives one the opportunity to learn more about the craft; to improve one’s own skills; become a better fisherman. It can also be a humbling experience. Not casting as well, not catching as many fish, becoming snagged more often, can be exasperating. When it becomes so, one must remember that the other guy is fishing with a lesser skilled fisherman and that too can have its ups and downs.

Fishing with those whose skills are not equal to your own can be very rewarding. Passing on your knowledge, the “tricks” that you’ve mastered and watching someone put them to use is most satisfying. It can be frustrating as well. Spending time getting unsnagged, dodging errant flies or lures, or removing them from oneself for lack of having dodged them can try the patience of any angler. Often the only solace can be found in the realization that you too have been on the other side of the equation. It should be noted here that teaching an absolute neophyte to fish may be the most enjoyable part of the sport. Watching someone get excited over a little fish that a more inured fisherman would disregard as a nuisance is an experience that is hard to rival.

Fishing with someone of relatively equal skill is perhaps the easiest way to pass the day. Catching similar size fish in similar numbers and having similar problems usually prevents either party from becoming upset with the other , or with himself. The only downside is that the element of “luck” sometimes throws a wrench into the works and one party fares much better than the other. It is, somehow, far more frustrating to be “out-fished” by someone whose skills you consider to be equal to your own than by “a master of the craft”.

The last category of fishing partners is made up of all of the previous categories, though mostly of those whose skills are regarded as well beyond those of the average fisherman. I’m talking about the fishermen of yore; the pioneers of a particular style or method; those whose words helped teach you how to read water, how to approach a stream stealthily; fishing partners who are with you even on those mornings of solitude that we all enjoy. Walton, Trueblood, Gordon, Lucas, Tappley, Williams the names are far too numerous to list and there are many others in each of our lives that other readers wouldn’t recognize, but who deserve equal billing. One may be miles from the nearest human, but one is never alone with a rod in his hand.