"Dapping the undercuts"

wgmiller

wgmiller

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Does anyone else "dap" the undercuts of streams and get the sh** scared out of them when a fish bumrushes the fly? While not purist fly fishing, there is something very alluring about dropping a weighted fly alongside the undercuts of a stream and waiting for the strike!
 
I'm not sure I can visualize what you're talking about.

Are you talking about standing a bit back on the cut bank and just plopping a nymph/etc into the water below?
 
Dapping may be the purest of it all. And yes, that is awesome when it happens.
 
greenlander wrote:
I'm not sure I can visualize what you're talking about.
He means not putting any line on the water, adding a little weight, and just kind of dunking. Usually used in tight quarters.
 
To me, the purest form is tying on a dry fly, laying out a beautiful, delicate cast, and having a fish nail the fly. IMO, "dapping" is a bit more like baitfishing in a way, but damn, can it be a rush!
 
I guess my comment should have been that it may be the first form of ff.
 
I stepped on an edge of a grass plot along our local retention pond and a four foot gator shot out.I stepped on a rock in the rip rap along the gallatin river and a 3 foot rattler crawled out.
Match you on the scare "the s--t factor".lol
But,yeah,did a lot of dapping with terrestrials.Love it.
 
csoult wrote:
He means not putting any line on the water, adding a little weight, and just kind of dunking. Usually used in tight quarters.

Ok, that's what I was thinking.
 
I dap a lot on brookie streams...with dry flies for which the term is derived. I think the best term for fishing back undercuts and root / wood jams would be called flipping or just dropping. I became an excellent flipper from my days in front of a jet or glass bass boat. I've applied the tactic using my fly rods on all the streams I've every fished using very heavy streamers. It's a fantastic tactic on spring creeks. And a lot of times you don't see the hit, you FEEL the hit! Sometimes right at your feet. I've been rewarded in the Cumberland Valley Spring creeks with amazing catches on Big Spring, Falling Spring, and the LEEEEEEEE Tort using flipping. One thing I've learned is that having less line in the water is better. And less line allows me to have more control of where the fly goes. Also, I tend to pull the fly which lets me feel bumps. When I feel a bump (under a cut bank per say), I set the hook. Most times it's grass or a stick, but sometimes it's a fish and a heart attack in the process. Look at Sal's Le Tort monster! Man, I would have died streamside!!!!
 
Happened to me this past Friday. Spotted about a 10" wild brownie and dropped a bead head pheasant tail ahead of him. Watched him ignore it when a brownie about 16" shot out from under the bank and absolutely slammed it. Surprised me so much that my hookset sucked and he shook off after a few tugs.
 
nimrod wrote:
Happened to me this past Friday. Spotted about a 10" wild brownie and dropped a bead head pheasant tail ahead of him. Watched him ignore it when a brownie about 16" shot out from under the bank and absolutely slammed it. Surprised me so much that my hookset sucked and he shook off after a few tugs.
Been there too.
 
You have to get the job done some way or another. My methods would make a purist frown, that's for sure. It ain't always about the pretty cast. My favorite way to sling a nymph is to just use the leader or at most a few feet of flyline with it.
 
I call it that Bill Dance hook set! Lmao! Been there too!
 
Wg and I fished the lower letort on Sunday and the method he is describing is basically all I did. I almost completely ignored most the stream and just worried about the undercut streambanks. It makes it a lot easier because stealth is a non issue.

Talking about the bad hook set because it scares the bejesus out of you....I lost a 17 inch or so brown because of that. It happens but what a rush!
 
midgeman wrote:
I dap a lot on brookie streams...with dry flies for which the term is derived.
Adding weight even with dries 8", 10", or 16" back from the dry allows you to control the line better. Just don't allow the weight to go in the water or then you dunk your dry.
 
When there aren't any hatches, or it isn't hopper time, that's pretty much my go-to method on Letort, etc. The clear water makes it especially fun. Seeing a monster slide out from a weed bed and wallop your fly - doesn't get much better than that! It seems like they reward you just enough to keep it interesting. I showed this method to a guy on the Letort once who didn't think there were any fish there because he didn't see anything. A 17" brown that materialized out of a the weeds changed his mind.
 
midgeman wrote:
It's a fantastic tactic on spring creeks. And a lot of times you don't see the hit, you FEEL the hit! Sometimes right at your feet. I've been rewarded in the Cumberland Valley Spring creeks with amazing catches on Big Spring, Falling Spring, and the LEEEEEEEE Tort using flipping.

These streams are where I do a lot of my fishing and these undercuts seem to be pretty prevalent. Although the tactic certainly could be used any place a fish is hiding, it is particularly fun when walking along the stream bank.
 
I've done it with dries and streamers, where there was no way to cast into the lie. I use extreme caution when doing it because it's pretty easy to spook fish by being heavy footed. And I usually hide behind a tree when dapping.
 
I've found that dapping is an incredibly effective technique in small streams. And for some reason, I'm able to get much closer to the fish than I'd expect that I am able to. Some examples from my day with Swattie on Saturday are here. The first photo he posted of a fish is one that came on a dap; the second photo shows me fishing the head of a pool, but the biggest fish that I saw on that day came from a bugger dropped two feet in front of me under the large rock. The photo attached here is the hole the first brookie came from, with some of my ugly markup.

First, if my memory serves me correctly, Swattie got hung up on a rock near the red spot to the left. He pulled his line out of the way so I could fish the hole. I thought for sure we would move a fish by casting to the head of the pool and dragging the bugger past the exposed root ball (along the orange lines) but that yielded nothing. Next, I thought for sure that we would move a fish under the big rock in the middle of the stream, which had the right side nicely undercut; the blue lines run parallel to it so thats where my next casts were. But that also yielded nothing. Swattie retrieved his fly and moved up to the next hole; I moved up to the green dot on the rock and dapped at the red X (X marks the spot right?). Second dap, a brookie charged out and inhaled the fly. Now you'd think with all that activity, the brookie would be spooked, but apparently not enough to put him down when that peacock herl flashed in his lair :)

Even small fish like that still spook me, although its almost like calling your shot when playing pool or basketball. There are times that I KNOW that if I drop a bugger right beside a certain rock, there will be a fish under that rock, and its rewarding to at times be right. Other times, I think I'm still right, but have gotten too close and spooked the 'lil fellows..
 

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dapping is just another technique that needs to be in your arsenal. it is often the only way to get a fly into a certain spot. I've done it over numerous log jams where there was no hope of getting any kind of cast in there. and when the fish strikes, ya just gotta yank it right out of the water!
 
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