In the ring of the rise

This time of year is when I tend to do a bit more reading.  Vincent Marinaro   "In the ring of the rise" is my current interest  its a title I have meant to read for a considerable period.  I apologise in advance to those of you that have already absorbed the book and are aware of its contents.

What fish actually see is of supreme importance to the fly angler,  the book explores brilliantly what the fish see and the effect it has on their feeding behaviour and how the evidence of such behaviour can be seen in the resultant rise form the fish leaves.  It also explores how fish see and react to the fly in, on or below the surface film.

When you consider how important the understanding of what fish see is its surprising that so little is written in the angling books, magazines and these days online.  I guess the easier approach is to concentrate on fly dressings , patterns and presentation.   I am not suggesting that people have not discussed the issue. Over the years many a diagram has been drawn .  Skues and Halford both discussed rise forms and spoke on the subject in loose terms.  Mottram in Fly Fishing some new arts and mysteries explores the problem draws diagrams and endeavours to reach some conclusions.  But I cant recall the last time I read a magazine article discussing the ideas the book contains.  

During my reading of In the ring of the rise,  one light switched on my brain which to me which partially explains the startling effectiveness of the klinkhammer to bring up Grayling from depth.  Again many of you may have already made this link and although I guess it should be obvious its still worth stating .  Fish are limited to a very small advance vision window as the surface film acts as a mirror from below until the fly is quite near, the emerger style of fly surely will be visible for a much longer period as it approaches a fish.  To those of us that have fished a klink style fly it is astonishing the way a grayling can intercept a fly.  

Also I listened to a talk recently by a fly fishing guide who stated that he liked to cut a V in the underside of a dry fly hackle , he beleives that the balanced footprint of the fly in the surface film gives the trout better advance warning of a fly approaching its feeding window.  The indentations of the trimmed hackle acting as a triggor point,  Same principle ? yes and something I will be trying in the forthcoming season.  If you havent read the book then get hold of a copy It may just open your eyes a little, it has mine.