Fly Fishing for Bass: Why Bass Are the Perfect Fly-Rod Fish

A Spotted Bass caught “on the fly” from a Coosa River tributary.

I didn’t start fly fishing for bass because it was trendy or spiritual. I started because I needed something to do with my hands while my brain tried to keep from unraveling. It was three years ago, and my wife was pregnant with our daughter—a high-risk pregnancy that pulled us away from our quiet house on the Tensaw River and back into town, into my parents’ house, where we could be within ten minutes of a hospital. I’d been laid off, working part-time at the same sporting goods store I’d worked at as a teenager. I was nearly thirty, living with my parents again, broke, anxious, and scared. I needed something that would help me make the noise in my head go quiet.

A little creek ran through that neighborhood, one I’d fished as a kid and forgotten about. One afternoon I dug out an old spinning rod and wandered down there just to see if the fish were still around. They were. And once I knew that, something inside me started to click again. I told myself I’d make it more interesting by learning to fly fish. A friend from an online forum mailed me a cheap vise, some marabou, and some chenille from his crappie jig-tying days. That was enough to get me started. I began with tenkara because real fly casting seemed intimidating at first. Standing in that little creek, within sprinting distance of my pregnant wife, I tied ugly little flies and caught bluegill and bass. 

I still remember the first bass I caught on a fly. It was a two-pounder, big for that creek, that came out of the weeds and sipped a homemade mayfly imitation. I can still picture that fish coming out of the weeds and easing up behind my fly with its fins barely moving. I could hear cars passing and kids riding bikes up on the street, but for a second, none of that mattered. When that bass finally opened its mouth and sipped the fly, it just about knocked me back. I remember thinking, this is it — this is what I’ve been looking for. I didn’t have to travel or spend money or chase trophies to feel that spark. I could find it in a neighborhood creek.

Since then I’ve gone on a bit of a tear. I’ve fished for every native bass species in Alabama—from Coosa and Cahaba bass in the hill country to spotted and largemouth down on the coast—and a few from neighboring states. My tenkara rod has been retired to a corner of the garage, replaced by a six-weight and a floating line. I fish out of a kayak or just wade, and even though I live ten minutes from redfish, speckled trout, and flounder, I find myself drawn back to small creeks and farm ponds. Maybe it’s regression.A frustrated and anxious man longing for boyhood safety and simplicity. But in a complicated world full of things like cancer, genocide, and the erosion of the middle class, there’s something deeply satisfying about going back to simple things. Velveeta mac and cheese…Borden chocolate milk…squirrel hunting…creek bass.

These days, when I make that first cast, I feel a mix of anticipation and peace. Anything can happen. I might get skunked. I might catch the biggest fish of my life. But unlike most uncertainties in the world, this one feels good. It’s hope, not dread. And when the bass takes—when the quiet water explodes and the fly line goes tight—I feel completely alive.

Bass are everywhere. They’re in the retention ponds behind the grocery store, the little creeks that wind through subdivisions, and the big rivers that cut through wilderness. They’re in downtown Birmingham and Mobile, in the backwaters of the Black Warrior and the waterfalls of the Talladega National Forest. They’re the American everyman’s fish—tough, adaptable, and unpretentious. You can catch them with a $100 rod or a handmade bamboo one. You can reach them by car, kayak, or a pair of worn-out tennis shoes; no boat payment required.

And that matters. Because the truth is, more and more people are being priced out of the outdoors. Boats cost as much as houses now. The median-income family isn’t chasing elk, tarpon, or sailfish. They’re not booking lodges in Patagonia or flats boats in Belize. Most of us can barely think about retirement savings and college funds for our kids, because we’re preoccupied with keeping our kids in shoes that will fit. Meanwhile, the cost of hunting leases, nonresident tags, offshore fuel, and even the most basic gear keeps climbing while wages stay flat. The outdoor industry likes to talk about R3 (recruitment, retention, replacement) but it’s hard to recruit anyone into something they can’t afford.

Public land and water are shrinking too. Waterfronts get bought up and fenced off. Creeks that used to be open suddenly have “no trespassing” signs where they didn’t before. A lot of the old, quiet places are getting swallowed up by subdivisions and marinas. Every year, the window for ordinary people to simply go outside and participate in the natural world gets a little smaller.

That’s why fly fishing for bass feels like a quiet rebellion. You don’t need a lease, a membership, or a gas card. You don’t need permission from anyone. One rod, a handful of flies, and a stretch of public water are all you need to have a world-class experience that belongs entirely to you. It’s proof that joy in the outdoors doesn’t have to come with a price tag. It’s still possible to have a rich, meaningful day outside without burning a tank of gas or buying into the arms race of gear and gadgets. 

Fly fishing is tactile, physical, and alive in a way that no other fishing is. You’re not just chunking and winding. The rod bends, the line loads, the fly unrolls through the air, and when it lands just right, you feel pretty good about yourself for a moment. There’s a strange, Zen koan hidden in each cast: “The back cast is the forward cast, young student.” I think about that a lot. It hasn’t improved my cast, and I haven’t attained satori, but I think about it a lot, you know?

Topwater bass on the fly is as fun as fishing gets. It’s visual and explosive. You see the fly, you see the swirl, you hear the smack, and then suddenly that dead line in your hand comes alive and the rest of the universe fades away. The deadlines, the notifications, the politics, the noise—they don’t exist anymore. You’re just there, fully in the present, holding a vibrating piece of the natural world in your hands.

I tie my own flies now, not because they’re better, but because it makes the experience complete. The first fly I ever caught a fish on was an ugly gray kebari tied on a size six hook. These days I tie foam bugs, woolly buggers, zonkers, and squirrel-hair nymphs. I’m still working on my deer-hair poppers (they look…ok, but I can never get the hair stacked tight enough) but when I catch a fish on one…like I said, I feel pretty good about myself. I hunt the squirrels whose fur I use. I pluck the feathers from wood ducks. I tie them at my desk, where I also write for a living. It feels good to make something real and physical with my keyboard hands, something that can hold beauty and function at once.

What I love most about bass fly fishing is that it pulls you into small, intimate waters—places that feel more like they did before we dammed and paved and straightened everything. When you’re wading a creek, you see things you don’t see from a boat: crawfish, herons, snakes, deer. You feel the sun, the current, the cold seep of water in your shoes. It’s humble and real. And it reminds me of a time when fishing wasn’t about glitter boats and sponsorships, but about being part of the landscape.

That’s what I mean when I say fly fishing still feels human. In the broader fishing world, competition and consumerism have taken over. Everything’s about winning tournaments, buying gear, and climbing ladders. It’s the same rat race, just with rods. Fly fishing feels like an antidote to that. The people I meet through it—guides, artists, conservationists—care about clean water, access, and beauty. They talk about art and poetry and preservation, not just about catching more fish. That’s not to say that the rest of the sporting world doesn’t care about those things, but fly anglers seem more likely, for some reason, to devote more bandwidth to them. Call me a hippie, but I dig those vibes, man.

Bass are the perfect fly-rod fish because they bridge worlds. They’re wild yet accessible, powerful yet forgiving, ordinary yet endlessly diverse. You can find them everywhere, but they still surprise you. They don’t require money, just attention. And they remind you that wonder isn’t something you have to travel across the world to find. It’s waiting right there in your neighborhood creek, just under the weeds, watching the water with ancient and hungry eyes.