How to Fish Nymphs Under an Indicator on Still Waters

The author with a gorgeous brown trout from a backcountry lake on the western plateau in Tasmania.

Excerpted from Devin Olsen’s excellent book Stillwater Fly Fishing

Indicator fishing . . . becomes a more important method for me when bank fishing. Pulling flies will generate an “eat or be spooked” response from trout as your flies streak by them. This is great when you can constantly cover new water and new fish, since you will generally get at least a portion of the trout to take. When bank fishing, constantly covering new water by drifting in a boat is not possible. As such, suspending flies in the most likely-looking locations will allow trout to come to the flies. If they decide not to take them, they generally will not spook as easily as they would if the flies were being retrieved. In addition, indicator rigs keep flies where they will avoid hooking rocks and other obstructions along the shoreline. This becomes especially useful in alpine lakes, which are often rimmed by a distinct rocky shelf indicative of their glacial origin. Therefore, one of the best ways to present flies on the deep side of a shelf, without losing them, is parking them beyond the shelf with an indicator rig.

Stillwater Mending

Indicator fishing is a relatively simple method at its core. However, to fish your flies truly static, you must be able to mend your line. Currents created by wind form tension, causing bellies in floating fly lines that tow your suspending flies along under the indicator. Sometimes the trout do not mind this movement, but other times it kills the effectiveness of the method. If you spend much time watching anglers fish rivers, you will see that there are a lot of anglers who struggle to mend their line to get a good drift. I have not seen that the average mending skill level is any better on still waters than it is on rivers. In fact, I have watched plenty of indicator anglers who do not try to mend at all.

Using the photos above for reference, follow these steps. 1. turn your wrist so that the reel is horizontal and facing the direction of your mend. Slowly bring the rod tip to the downwind side of the line and indicator. do this by extending your arm, and the butt of the rod, toward the tip of your fly line to provide extra slack to work with, and then bending the forearm and wrist to move the rod tip. this step is the same in principle as bringing the rod back behind you for a roll cast, but the movement is done horizontally. the farther your rod tip is to the downwind side of the indicator, the longer the mending stroke you can make and the more line slack you can move. 2. In a swift movement, use your forearm and wrist to rapidly move the rod tip in the direction of your mend. to add extra line speed to your “roll cast” mend, you can haul with your line end to load the rod just as you would with a single haul on the forward stroke of an overhead cast. 3. Stop the movement as swiftly and firmly as you started it. 4. you should see a wave roll down your line that lifts it and stacks line slack upwind of your indicator. With practice, you should be able to do this quickly without lifting the indicator from the water.

Let me step you through how I mend my line. My goal is to stack as much slack on the upwind side of the indicator as possible while minimizing the amount of indicator movement resulting from the mend. To accomplish this, my mending looks a bit more like a partial roll cast than the more typical “lift and lay” approach to mending.

Let ‘Em Soak

Beyond mending, the greatest skill you can have when indicator fishing is patience. The longer your flies soak, the greater the chance you have of showing them to a hungry cruising fish. Because your rig is not covering water, you must rely on trout that are covering water themselves to see your flies. If you are constantly recasting, you risk missing trout seeing your flies. Additionally, most indicators make a pronounced splat on the water. The more casts you make, the more you risk spooking your quarry, as well. To stay vigilant, I try to make casts that are close to drop-offs, boulders, distinct color changes, or any other bit of structure that catches my eye. If I believe that my flies are near a place where fish are more likely to see them, then I am more willing to let them soak in place. If you do find that you are not getting takes when your flies are completely static, try twitching the indicator a couple of inches every 30 to 60 seconds. Oftentimes your indicator will disappear just after a slight movement to your flies, particularly if there is no wind and no wave action to provide your flies with movement.

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Stillwater Fly Fishing

The last trick to successful indicator fishing is getting your depth right. Assuming you’re allowed to fish two or three flies where you are fishing, you can cover quite a bit of the column if you tie your flies about 3 feet apart on your leader. Much of the time you can probably guess the approximate depth of the water in front of you.