9. How to prefect your roll cast for small streams (9 of 15)

- [Man] Roll cast will become your best friend on small streams because it has no backcast, and slower rods or overlined rods roll cast better than stiffer ones. To learn how to perfect your roll cast, let's visit my friend Pete Kutzer for some instruction on fine-tuning this cast. ♪
[music] ♪ - [Pete] Hi, I'm Pete Kutzer with the Orvis Fly-Fishing Schools. Today I want to talk to you a little bit about the roll cast, and how we can make it a little bit more efficient and a little easier. A lot of people like to fish small streams, and some of us may be a little intimidated by these small streams because there isn't a lot of backcast room.
Well, that's where the roll cast is going to come into play. When you have limited backcast room, this roll cast is a great tool to have in your arsenal. To make this roll cast, we're going to bring our hand up by our ear. A lot of people have a tendency to keep that hand low, right here, and they want to imagine that, that line is rolling over on top of the water. Just like our forward cast, we want to make a nice smooth acceleration to a stop around eye level.
That's going to get that fly to unroll above the water and straighten out, getting out to those fish. We can make a roll cast in a lot of different situations. There's a high-angle roll cast up here, you can make a sidearm roll cast, you can also roll cast over your opposite shoulder. And this is a very, very effective technique. When you're in these small streams, try this roll cast. So my hand is up across from my ear.
I'm going to toss the fly in the water. I make a nice flick stopping at eye level. And that fly jumps right out nice and straight with a delicate presentation. You can do this roll cast, like I said, across your shoulder, and get it out there. You can do this roll cast down low, and pop it out there. When we make this roll cast, make sure when you get that hand up into that backcast position right here that you stop.
You wait and you freeze for a second. We have to make sure that there's some line in contact with the water before we flick it forward. It's not a continuous move, we're not rolling the line around. We're going to come back, wait for a second, then we can flick it forward. That wait allows the line to stick to the water. Then we can flick it forward, and get that line to jump right out.
Give this roll cast a try next time you're on a small stream. I'm sure you'll find a lot more places where you can catch a fish. ♪ [music] ♪