Staff Articles

"Mending Your Ways" by Brant Oswald

Mending is one of the most important line control skills in fly fishing. In fact, this skill is so basic that most anglers, once they progress beyond neophyte status, take it for granted that there is nothing more to learn. However, my experience as a guide (and an informal poll of other local guides) tells me that many anglers don't even understand the concept of mending, and very few are really adept at applying it properly in fishing situations. What follows is an attempt to explain mending and suggest a variety of ways to use it more effectively.

Uses for mending
Mending is the process of repositioning the line on the water—this allows the angler to control the amount of force exerted on the line by the current, which in turn allows control over the effects of drag on the fly. The most common use of mending is to minimize drag on a cross stream or up-and-across cast, when the angler is attempting to get a dead drift presentation of a dry fly or nymph. Because the line is usually lying across currents moving at different speeds, the fastest line of current will push a downstream belly into the line, causing the fly to be dragged across the current in an unnatural manner.

Since the most typical fishing scenarios involve casting the fly into slower currents (along bank cover, near the edges of logs and midstream boulders, the slower side of a current seam, etc.) and having to deal with line on faster currents between the angler and the target, the most common mend is an upstream mend. An upstream mend counters the effect of the faster currents by creating a "mirror image" upstream belly in the line, allowing the fly to drift naturally in the slower water while the current pushes against this newly created slack. It is sometimes possible to make several successive upstream mends to extend the length of a drag-free float.

Unfortunately, this basic upstream mend is often the only technique that an angler learns. I see lots of experienced anglers on the stream who try to apply their personal variation of this mend in every possible fishing situation. As you might suspect, this mend is very helpful in some combinations of currents and casting angles, but it will completely ruin the presentation in others. It is important to remember the goal of mending is to produce a good drift; if mending doesn't produce the intended behavior in the fly, it is pointless exercise.

One of the difficulties in mending for most anglers is that their technique eliminates slack in the line and leader, rather than creating slack or moving it to a new position. If the angler starts with no slack, and starts yanking on the line at the rod tip, the fly will move. At worst, the mend will negate casting accuracy by pulling the fly out of the fish's feeding lane or cause enough drag to spook the target fish.

There are several useful rules that follow from the difficulty in mending without moving the fly. The first rule: don't mend if it isn't necessary. In some situations, a quartering upstream cast will provide a reasonably drag-free float without any additional manipulation of the line. This is especially true when there are not big variations in current speed between the angler and the target, and in faster water, where a small amount of drag is not as noticeable to the fish. In some difficult situations, a fish may be tucked into such a hard-to-reach lie that a mend is physically impossible. Low overhanging tree branches, for example, may leave no room for a mend. In other situations, the mend may be possible, but pointless. I often see anglers throwing big mends in a short upstream cast in fast water. These mends accomplish very little (except wear out the caster's arm), and a big pile of slack in fast water can make it very difficult to strike the fish if it does take the fly. A common spring creek scenario is to cast across surface weeds into an open channel. The angler can mend as much as he wants in this situation, but the weedbed is not going to move.

A second rule is to start with a slack line presentation before making the mend. If you wait until drag sets in, and then try to mend, the result is a longer—but really awful—drift. In my own mind, I think of mending as mending slack, rather than mending line. Especially when trying to make several mends in the same drift, it is critical to get ahead (and stay ahead) of drag. This often means the mending process is nearly continuous throughout the drift—any hesitation will allow the current to catch up and allow drag to ruin the float.

A final rule: don't make the same mend on every cast. Creating a drag-free presentation of a fly is challenging—and intriguing—because it requires the angler to consider so many variables: the position of the fish, possible angles of approach, wind direction, direction and speed of the current, etc. The angler must be a problem solver, adapting casting and line control techniques to each fishing situation.

One important application of this rule is to recognize the utility of downstream mends. When a fish is holding in faster current, and the cast must be made across slower water, a downstream mend is needed to keep line, leader, and fly moving at the same speed. In many cases, the best way to deal with slow water at your feet is to make a closer approach. That is, don't try to cast across a piece of slow water into faster water, but get close and reach across the slow water with the rod tip. However, it is reasonably common in spring creek and tailwater fishing to encounter a fish sitting on the edge of current, and the only possible approach is across a shallow flat with little current. A closer approach here will only spook the fish, and a command of downstream mending will be the only chance for success.

Mending Techniques
Creating the desired curve in the line is accomplished by lifting the line off the water with the rod tip and (at least for short mends) rolling the wrist in the direction of the intended mend. One of the keys to a proper mend is to lift the line with the rod tip before moving it laterally. A sideways move that does not lift line off the water will eliminate all slack, produce immediate drag, and draw the fly out of the fish's feeding lane. (In fact, this is a useful striking technique when the angler has a lot of line on the water.) This lifting motion should preserve slack in the cast, so that the slack can be repositioned, rather than eliminated. It also allows the line to break the surface tension of the water, making it easier to move.

This common semicircular wrist motion will produce a wide, sweeping motion in the rod tip, and the following line will create a wide belly when the mend is made. It may be helpful to recognize mending as a modified form of casting, in which a loop of line is directed to a target. The common mending motion is much like the wide open stroke of a beginning caster, and the resulting shape in the line works fine at short range, where the length of the rod and the caster's arm is sufficient to flop the line into position. Remember, however, that if the mend is being made right under the rod tip, the angler may be better off to approach the fish a bit closer and get in a position to reach across the problem current with the rod tip, so that mending may be unnecessary. A longer rod can be a big help in this situation.

Longer Mends
If the mend needs to be positioned farther away from the caster, a different motion is needed. As Swisher and Richards point out in Fly Fishing Strategy, one option is to make a larger mend by forming a larger arc with the rod tip. This can be accomplished by raising the casting arm before rolling the wrist and hand over to form the mend. This exaggerated arc tends to create a larger—but very wide—belly in the line when the mend is made.

A better approach for longer mends is to form a true casting loop in the line. After the initial lift is made, and the line is climbing away from the water's surface, the rod tip should be driven parallel to the water in a line toward the mending target. As with roll casting and overhead casting, the smaller leading edge of the resulting elliptically-shaped loop is more efficient in achieving long distances and in fighting the effects of wind. With practice, the caster can "kick" the mend to varying distances, allowing the mend to be placed on specific lines of current, even those a long distance from the caster. This is especially useful when deep water or strong currents precludes a close approach to the fish, a common situation on large Western tailwaters.

Stack mending

Stack mending is the technique of introducing additional slack to a presentation, "stacking" this extra slack on a single line of current. The common applications of this mending technique are on downstream angles. A downstream stack mend is sometimes called feeding or "shaking" line, as slack line is shaken through the guides onto the current line with a flip of the rod tip. When the cast is angled straight downstream (or nearly so), the tip is flipped vertically, so that the additional slack is deposited on the current directly beneath the rod tip.

This technique reaches its ultimate expression on California's Fall River. On this large spring creek, wading is limited because of restricted access and deep undercut banks, so the standard technique is to fish from small prams, anchoring above pods of feeding fish, and presenting the fly almost straight downstream. This allows for very long drifts, but the angler should recognize that a point of diminishing returns is reached when the fly gets too far downstream. You may be able to shake the whole fly line through the guides, but once the fly gets too far away, seeing the rise and reacting quickly enough to strike the fish can be difficult.

If the angle of presentation is not straight downstream, the tip is driven horizontally, so that the line can be moved onto a current line to the side of the caster. As with mending a fixed amount of line, stack mends can be made with a simple roll of the wrist and hand, or by loading the rod and "kicking" a horizontal loop to longer distances. It takes practice to develop the feel to create enough tension to move the line yet introduce slack at the end of the move, but this advanced mending technique will produce good drifts in very difficult situations.

The keys to stack mending are to have all of the needed line stripped off the reel before starting to shake the line through the guides (rather than trying strip it off the reel as the stack mends are made) and to shake out a foot or two of slack line at a time. Trying to feed line at a continuous rate, rather than flipping it out a chunk at a time, almost always creates enough tension in the line/leader/fly system to produce drag. As discussed above, it is critical to make a slack line presentation and then start the mending process before drag starts to set in.

Problems in Mending
To this point, I have explored both the rationale for mending line and the range of techniques used to produce such mends. For a final perspective on mending, I polled a number of the best guides I know and compared notes about the typical mistakes we see anglers make when mending line. I have noted the methods these guides use to help their clients deal with mending problems, and I will outline some practice routines that will improve mending technique and produce better line control.

Although most anglers get in the habit of making a cast and then throwing one mend into the line, one of the mistakes I see most often is the unwillingness of anglers to continue mending after a good drift is set up. Making several successive mends will often allow very long drifts of the fly—the key to these long drifts is to make each mend before the line comes tight, so that a bit of controlled slack is preserved throughout the presentation. Mend often enough to maintain controlled slack throughout the drift (or introduce additional slack with "stack" mends). Transforming your presentation from a few inches to several feet of natural drift can make a huge difference in the number of strikes elicited from the fish.

On the other hand, multiple mends work only if the angler starts with slack and maintains it through the drift. Nearly every guide I talked to pointed to the opposite problem—if the angler starts with a tight line, continual mends will only insure that the fly is dragging constantly throughout the drift. Guide Rod Zullo calls this "overmending", if the mending move drags or sinks the fly. He says he uses the phrase "mend lightly" to get his clients to think about repositioning the line without moving the fly out of position or drowning it completely.

Todd Wester told me he thinks (since their tight line mending produces continuous drag) many of his clients would actually be better off mending less or not at all. This approach involves making a straight line cast up and across or throwing a single mend and accepting short drifts with minimal drag. Several feet of good drift may be better than a few inches, but a few inches is better than no drift at all.

Retired guide Rusty Vorous approaches the same problem from a different angle. He says the biggest mistake his clients make in mending is to push the rod tip sideways without lifting the line or introducing additional slack into the presentation, a technique that moves the fly and creates drag. However, rather than get his clients to minimize mending, he deals with this problem by getting them to make every mend a stack mend, teaching them to throw more slack into the presentation as a matter of course.

While most of the problems the guides pointed out are the result of mends that appear to be too energetic (since they cause drag or move the fly out of position), I often see my own clients make mends that aren't energetic enough—they mend the fly line a few feet away from the rod tip but leave a downstream belly in the tip of the line or the leader (or in its most insidious form, just in the last few inches of the tippet). Even though they have gone through the motions of mending, this downstream belly will still cause drag. This is especially true of reach mends—an upstream reach used to position line, leader, and fly on a single line of current—when the wind is blowing upstream. The wind will tend to kick the fly upstream on light tippet, leaving a downstream belly in the leader or tippet. I would rather see a more aggressive mend that moves the mend all the way to the fly—a key skill for the advanced angler is the ability to do this without moving the fly off the target current line. Admittedly, this takes considerable time and practice to develop a feel for how much force is required at various distances.

If the mend does move the fly, try to make the mend early, when the fly is still several feet above the fish, not just as it comes to the fish's lie. A slight amount of drag and a refusal is better than spooking the fish completely by yanking the fly away with a poorly timed mend.

Mending Practice
The only way to learn how to mend is to practice on moving water. As with casting, the angler would benefit a great deal from practicing technique without actually trying to catch fish at the same time, as worrying about the fish moves concentration away from technique. I realize few readers will take this advice, since fishing time is so precious, but it is still good advice. At the very least, work on technique during a slow part of a fishing day to allow more concentration on the technique to be learned.

Use a buoyant, highly visible (but not oversized) fly for practice. You want the practice fly to float reasonably well, so you are not spending all your time redressing it, but it should drown (as a real fly would) if your mends produce too much drag. A Wulff or parachute style fly will allow you to see the fly easily and detect drag when it sets in. Finally, don't make the practice fly so large that surface tension keeps it anchored in place while you jerk the line and leader around with poorly executed mends. (If you don't want a fish to interrupt your practice, break the hook off at the bend.)

Practice mending both upstream and downstream, and try both types of mends from opposite sides of the stream, so that you practice mending to both sides of your body. If you are comfortable holding the rod (and casting) with your "off" hand, try mending with each hand, as this will give you extra control in some fishing situations.

For your practice sessions, try to find a stream with a variety of currents to work on. Even if you spend most of your time on spring creeks and tailwaters, a freestone stream with more variation in current speeds may be a better arena for mending practice. A small stream is an excellent place to start—drag itself is easier to see at close range, and short mends are easier to execute. Eventually, bigger water will be needed to practice pushing mends out to longer distances.

Practice with a nymph and indicator (or a dry fly/nymph combination) as well as a single dry fly, especially if this terminal tackle is a major part of your usual fishing technique. The sunken fly and surface tension helps anchor the indicator and allows the back end of the leader and fly line to be repositioned more easily, but mending will feel different with these rigs, and practice is important for using them successfully.

Mending is one of the central skills in fly fishing, and I have tried to explain at least some of the reasons and methods for this technique, as well as some of the problems encountered when anglers apply it on the stream. Remember that the real key to mending effectively, is not in the arm or rod or line, but in the brain. The ability to analyze each new fishing situation—the fish's position, current speed, water depth, casting angle, etc.—and to figure out how to control line, leader, and fly to produce a natural drift is what mending (and fly fishing) are all about.