Trout And Currents (2 of 12)

We all have those days when a river seems to be devoid of fish, and unless conditions are just right, it's almost impossible to spot trout below the surface when they're not feeding. Let's face it. On most days you venture forth on a trout stream, you probably won't see fish rising. At least, not all the time, unless you're incredibly lucky.

That's when you call on your best stream reading skills to take a stab at where trout might be feeding. These are skills you can use no matter what kind of fishing you do, whether you fish with a fly, cast a spinning lure, or fish a small stream with a worm. It helps to understand just what a trout needs in order to survive. Yes. They do need shelter and protection from predators, and often they live right next to cover. But even more important to us as anglers is that they need to feed without wasting more energy than they obtain in getting a meal. The current brings food to trout, but it also exhausts them if they have to fight it all the time.

So to put it in a nutshell, a trout likes to live in slow to moderate current with faster water close by. This faster water can either be to one side of them or above them. They hold their position in moderate current without wasting energy, and make brief forays into faster water to grab a meal. We call this boundary between fast and slow water a seam, and it's often visible on the surface. This slower water can be behind, in front of, or along the sides of an object, or it can be close to the bottom. Anytime moving water encounters a solid object, it slows down and creates a boundary layer of slower water. It's in this boundary layer that you'll find trout. Deep, slow pools with logjams might hold trout, but those trout may not be feeding.