Before trying to lift the fish he should have reeled down closer to it, until his rod was in the 9 or 10 o’clock range, and he could have easily swung the fish over the side of the boat without breaking his rod.Getting high-sticked isn’t something that only happens when you’re landing a fish – it can happen when you’re setting the hook too. When he tried to boat flip about a 2 ½-pound largemouth his rod got to be right at 12 o’clock and all of a sudden we heard, “ping” – and about 18-inches of the tip of his rod snapped off. It is used to avoid the effect of currents that make the drifting fly appear less natural. As the fly begins its drift, lift your rod tip high, and do not allow slack line to gather and drag in the surface film.
When high sticking…. You’ll get a stronger hookset and you will be in a better position to fight the fish than if you tried to set with your rod too high and ended up with your rod and reel above or behind your head.You will get a much better hookset if your hands are at belly level and you can use your forearms to snap the rod up when you feel a hit.
Try to keep the tip below 11 o’clock when you’re working a bait, setting the hook or landing a fish. In a case like that, it’s always best to turn of the reel handle while lowering your rod to the 9 or 10 o’clock position before setting the hook. "Native American Wintu women tied simple weighted flies for the trout because they got tired of … High sticking is a fly fishing technique designed to deliver a subsurface fly pattern on a dead drift to trout holding in moderate to fast pocket water and short, but deep pools.
I always get a kick out of seeing people who set the hook and their rod and reel ends up above their heads, or even behind their heads. There isn’t much fighting of the fish going on.If you watch closely, you’ll notice that the pros keep their rods at a low angle when they flip the fish so that they get the maximum leverage out of their rods and they avoid getting “high-sticked”. as soon as the fly sinks to the river or stream bottom, raise the rod tip high and follow the line downstream through the drift. Whatever leader system you choose, make sure it has those two characteristics. When rods are in this position they can break with very little force. Graphite rods can break with as little as 2 pounds of force when at 90 degrees. When they set the hook on a four-pound bass they’ll instantly pull it out of the cover, crank it up to the boat and then swing it on board. Of course there are times when, if the fish are biting short, you’ll miss a couple, but in the long run you’ll get more solid hookups and land more fish if your rod is in the right position when you feel the bite.The best piece of advice I can give you on this topic is to pay attention to the position of your fishing rod at all times. High Sticking is a technique fly fishermen use that minimizes the amount of fly line that is in contact with the water by keeping the fly rod raised. He got high-sticked. The basic high sticking technique is based on casting your fly roughly perpendicular (and slightly upstream) into a nearby run (at least 2 – 3 feet deep), while raising your rod throughout the drift to adjust for the slack.
You can control the drift nicely with your rod … Technical short line nymph fishing, or "High Sticking", is now a core technique with modern Trout fisherman. “tight line fishing”, you want your flies to sink very fast… The best way for this to occur, very thin line (cuts through the water fast) and heavy flies. We recommend a fly rod with a bit more length which allows the angler to access lies further out-stream. I don’t care if it’s a $500 rod or a $50 rod, rods are not meant to be bent straight around.
Trying to set the hook from above the 11 o’clock position is sort of like trying to pull up your anchor by starting with your arms at chest level and lifting from there; you don’t have a lot of power and it’s just not natural.