It's both. The "sport" is called fishing or angling if you prefer. The "hobby" refers to the personal activity. Like many hobbies it can become an obsession.
If I remember correctly, it used to always be called a 'pastime' - Don't know when the word 'sport' crept in. I personally do not like the word as it implies that we are 'playing' toying with a live animal - which we are off course!
Have you tried river fly fishing competitions?
At the end of the day, it's what we make it. Fishing alone, with others, open comps for individuals or team comps. So...... past time/hobby, sport and way of life if guiding or ghillying. It can be relaxing, active, thought provoking/technical and dammed frustrating. hno:
Fly fishing competitions, whether river or lake, entail a fair amount of effort and physical exertion. Try an 8 hour loch style comp for size and see how you feel when you come off the water. In that 8 hours you may well have cast 6-, 7- or even 800 times depending on the style you adopt, and don't try saying there is no physical exertion in casting, especially from a sitting position. Then there is the time pressure and the constant thought processes that go into endeavouring to catch the fish. There is a lot more to it than your average day on the bank when you can sit, take a break for lunch or have a coffee when you feel like it.
In river comps there are four sessions and you have to catch fish in each session to be in with a chance. Four 1.5 hour sessions, and each one a little competition in its own right and the fish getting harder and harder to find and catch as the day wears on. Add to that the walking and wading and you can't wander along and take your time about it, because time is your enemy.
I've done both disciplines and there wasn't a day I didn't leave the water feeling pretty well wrung out.
I'm now a fly fishing guide on the chalkstreams and that brings its own set of pleasures and stresses. I'm being paid and the clients look upon me and my colleagues as "experts". We know the water and the methods. We have the ability to spot feeding fish and identify how to catch them. We feel under an obligation to do all in our power to get the clients to catch a few fish. Sometimes even a modest grayling can be the difference between an ordinary day and a good one.
I looked after an American client on the Avon at the end of October. He's never caught grayling before and at close of play he'd caught 25 and drove off out of the car park singing. I wondered to myself how many he would have caught if I hadn't been there, and having seen his fly box I am pretty confident that the answer would have been none. Size 16 shrimps and hare's ears sent him back to London happy. I went home knackered.
they have nothing else to do but accumalate some more knowledge,
maybe thats why they joined the forum in the first place,
THE PROBLEM WITH KNOWLEDGE IS THE MORE YOU HAVE THE HARDER IT GETS
Like all things fly fishing it is many different things to many different people.
But as fly fishers we like to question things and put a label on it.
is a klinkhammer really a dry fly ? Is bung fishing really ....? Are traditional wets just lures ? Is Czech nymphing fly fishing ? Is fly fishing Hobby or sort ?
For some it will be one or the other maybe both. I believe it can be argued as either depending on the persons perspective.
For me personally it way surpassed hobby a long time ago so I suppose I'm with Jim it is most definitely a way of life has been for a long time now.
It takes both body and mind to quiet, beautiful places and away from the stresses of daily life.
Personally, I don't want to bring any sort of competition to my angling, each to their own.
Fly fishing Freestone rivers can be enduring at the best of times , covering a mile and half of river over 6 to 7 hours is more tiring than working on site , miss coating a couple of 4 bedroom new builds .
Fishing in competitions is a sport otherwise, as Jim says, it's an integral part of our lives, in which I've indulged ever since the age of 5 (and that's a hell of a long time).
Its at least 3 things I would say, sport insofar as competitions go. Most people fish for leisure or pleasure so it is a hobby in that respect, and some people make a living out of it so it is a job as well.
I keep being told to shut up in the pub, talking about fishing to the uninitiated, so where else better to have a brew or 6, talking about fishing than a fishing forum?
I try and pop for a pint for a few hours one day a week, I always take a fishing magazine with me and pop it on the bar or table next to me, in the hope it attracts conversation about fly fishing..... I think that about proves my obsession. And it works too, 9 times out of 10.
Whatever you wish to call fly fishing, be it sport, hobby or pastime, once you've been involved with it for a good few decades, you should certainly be able to look back and regard your time spent as a parallel education in your life. Apart from fishing matters, you'll have been further educated in subjects such as wildlife, weather, environment, hunting, bush craft etc. And all for free. :thumbs:
The word 'sport' originated from the older word 'disport', Chaucer being the original user, in terms of enjoying ones self with a hint of not taking it too seriously, I might be wrong but I believe he used it to describe the activity of painting women 'disporting' of themselves beside a lake, as in frolic.
Describes my view of fly fishing perfectly, I am often found to be disporting myself at the waters edge
The word 'sport' originated from the older word 'disport', Chaucer being the original user, in terms of enjoying ones self with a hint of not taking it too seriously, I might be wrong but I believe he used it to describe the activity of painting women 'disporting' of themselves beside a lake, as in frolic.
Geoffrey Chaucer was one of the first writers to amuse the reading public with the verb "disport." Chaucer and his contemporaries carried the word into English from Anglo-French, adapting it from desporter, meaning "to carry away, comfort, or entertain." or take pleasure( It includes more specific mental states such as happiness, entertainment, enjoyment, ecstasy, and euphoria.). so it probrally is a sport.
and reference" hobby," ,
hobby is a" leisure activity, leisure pursuit, leisure interest or amateur interest"
so it can be both depending on the idividual . so how serious do people get then about fishing?thats the answer i think
I consider fishing just a hobby, but it can be both a sport and a hobby. For me, fishing is an excellent reason to spend more time with my loved ones and talk to my sons. But sport for me means going to the gym. I train four times a week and try to keep fit. Lately, I started to find out about steroid use. There is more debate on this topic at https://www.theihcc.com/best-place-to-buy-sarms/ than about whether fishing is a sport or a hobby. What do you think is worth consuming?
This thread reminds me of a story about an upper class youngster from an exclusive private school going for an interview at a university.
He was asked if he liked sport, to which he replied something along the lines of "Oh yes, I shoot pheasant, partridge and grouse, fish for salmon twice a year in Scotland and still occasionally ride to hounds". The interviewer replied "I was referring to rugby, football, tennis, etc.".
To which the young chap replied "Oh, you mean games!".
Fly fishing for trout and salmon is traditionally classed as sport. It's actually the word sport that has been misappropriated over the last century or so.
Sounds like an apocryphal version of the last line of post #7. ?
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