A Riseform Detail
When we see bold, splashy rises, our initial thought should be that the food item responsible is either large and/or mobile. Calm, quiet rises usually result from smaller, less mobile food items being taken. While there are never any guarantees in reading riseforms, these concepts are a good place to start in figuring out what a fish may be feeding on. But there’s an important caveat here, and it has to do with current speed and depth of water. If fish are rising in relatively fast water and coming from down deep to do so, splashy rises can result, even if the food item isn’t large and active. The splashiness is a consequence of the fish taking the food and turning down quickly to get back to the slower water near the bottom. In the photo above, a stretch of water both fast and deep, size #16 Pale Morning Dun mayflies are being taken—insects neither particularly large, nor especially mobile.
Attention to details like this can make a difference in your fishing, and it’s also rewarding simply understanding more of what’s taking place around us on the water. (Yes, that’s a third, quieter rise between the two splashy ones.)