A 

"One thing becomes clearer as one gets older and one's fishing experience increases, and that is the paramount importance of one's fishing companions"
-John Ashley-Cooper

 

"In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous."
-Aristotle

"That's about as big as a fish that big gets"
-Anonymous

"You do not cease to fish because you get old, You get old because you cease to fish!"
-Anonymous

B

 

"What are more delightful than one's emotions when approaching a trout stream for the initial cast?"
-T. Nash Buckingham

"The charm of fishing is that it is the pursuit of what is elusive but attainable, a perpetual series of occasions for hope."
-John Buchan

"My biggest worry is that my wife (when I'm dead) will sell my fishing gear for what I said I paid for it."
-Koos Brandt

"By the time I had turned thirty, I'd realized two important things. One, I had to fish. Two, I had to work for a living."
-Mallory Burton

"In every species of fish I've angled for, it is the ones that have got away that thrill me the most, the ones that keep fresh in my memory. So I say it is good to lose fish. If we didn't, much of the thrill of angling would be gone."
-Ray Bergman

"You can observe a lot just by watching."
-Yogi Berra

"Most anglers, especially tyros, false cast too often. Three false casts should be sufficient for any throw and two is better. One is perfect."
-Joe Brooks

"All the romance of trout fishing exists in the mind of the angler and is in no way shared by the fish."
-Harold F. Blaisdell

"Hatchery fish have the same colours, but they always seem muted like bad reproductions of great art."
-Bill Barich -This Sporting Lifec

C

"Some men would rather be photographed with their fish than with their wives."
-Gwen Cooper and Evelyn Haas

"In these sad and ominous days of mad fortune chasing, every patriotic, thoughtful citizen, whether he fishes or not, should lament that we have not among our countrymen more fishermen."
-Grover Cleveland

"Only when the last tree has been felled, the last river poisoned and the last fish caught, man will know, that he cannot eat money."
-Cree Indian saying

D

"The water you touch in a river is the last of that which has passed, and the first of that which is coming; thus it is with time."
-Leonardo DaVinci

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication"
-Leonardo da Vinci

"Water is the driving force in nature"
-Leonardo da Vinci

E

"All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again."
-Ecclesiastes 1:7

F

"The angler forgets most of the fish he catches, but he does not forget the streams and lakes in which they are caught."
-Charles K. Fox

G

"The great charm of fly-fishing is that we are always learning."
-Theodore Gordon

"The trout do not rise in the cemetery, so you better do your fishing while you are still able."
-Sparse Grey Hackle

"You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take."
-Wayne Gretzk

“Fish are, of course, indispensable to the angler. They give him an excuse for fishing and justify the fly rod without which he would be a mere vagrant."
-Sparse Grey Hackle

"There is only one theory about angling in which I have perfect confidence, and this is that the two words, least appropriate to any statement, about it, are the words "always" and "never."
-Lord Edward Grey

"I frankly don't make much of a living, but I make a hell of a life"
-Jack Gartside

"If people don't occasionally walk away from you shaking their heads, you're doing something wrong."
-John Gierach

"The best fisherman I know try not to make the same mistakes over and over again; instead they strive to make new and interesting mistakes and to remember what they learned from them."
-John Gierach "Fly Fishing the High Country"

"A trout is a moment of beauty known only to those who seek it."
-Arnold Gingrich

"The solution to any problem -- work, love, money, whatever -- is to go fishing, and the worse the problem, the longer the trip should be."
-John Gierach

"If I fished only to capture fish, my fishing trips would have ended long ago."
-Zane Grey

"It is impossible to grow weary of a sport that is never the same on any two days of the year."
-Theodore Gordon

"I used to like fishing because I thought it had some larger significance. Now I like fishing because it's the one thing I can think of that probably doesn't."
-John Gierach

"Something to think about: If you fish the wrong fly long and hard enough, it will sooner or later become the right fly."
-John Gierach

"Whether I caught fish or not, just the thrill of rolling out that line and watching my fly turn over has been good enough for me. That and the hundreds of treasured memories I have of this wonderful sport."
-Curt Gowdy

"I think I fish, in part, because it's an anti-social, bohemian business that, when gone about properly, puts you forever outside the mainstream culture without actually landing you in an institution."
-John Gierach

"Fly tackle has improved considerably since 1676, when Charles Cotton advised anglers to 'fish fine and far off,' but no one has ever improved on that statement."
-John Gierach

"Creeps and idiots cannot conceal themselves for long on a fishing trip."
-John Gierach

"They say you forget your troubles on a trout stream, but that's not quite it. What happens is that you begin to see where your troubles fit into the grand scheme of things, and suddenly they're just not such a big deal anymore."
-John Gierach

 "If fishing is interfering with your business, give up your business."
-Sparse Grey Hackle

"The angling fever is a very real disease and can only be cured by the application of cold water and fresh, untainted air. "
-Theodore Gordon

H

"There will be days when the fishing is better than one's most optimistic forecast, others when it is far worse. Either is a gain over just staying home."
-Roderick Haig-Brown

"There will be days when the fishing is better than one's most optimistic forecast, others when it is far worse. Either is a gain over just staying home."
-Roderick Haig-Brown

"Soon after I embraced the sport of angling I became convinced that I should never be able to enjoy it if I had to rely on the cooperation of the fish."
-Sparse Grey Hackle

"Lots of people committed crimes during the year who would not have done so if they had been fishing. The increase of crime is among those deprived of the regenerations that impregnate the mind and character of the fisherman."
-Herbert Hoover

"I have fished through fishless days that I remember happily without regret."
-Roderick Haig-Brown

"No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man."
-Heraclitus

"Be patient and calm - for no one can catch fish in anger."
-Herbert Hoover

"The fish and I were both stunned and disbelieving to find ourselves connected by a line."
-William Humphrey in "The Armchair Angler"

I

"There is certainly something in angling that tends to produce a gentleness of spirit and a pure sincerity of mind."
-Washington Irving

J

"I'm going out to fish," Simon Peter told them, and they said, "We'll go with you." So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
-John 21:3

K

"Often I have been exhausted on trout streams, uncomfortable, wet, cold, briar scarred, sunburned, mosquito bitten, but never, with a fly rod in my hand have I been less than in a place that was less than beautiful."
-Charles Kuralt

"There's more B.S. in fly fishing than there is in a Kansas feedlot."
-Lefty Kreh

 "Most fishermen use the double haul to throw their casting mistakes further."
-Lefty Kreh

L

"When you are on the river, ocean or in the woods, you are the closest to the truth you'll ever get"
-Jack Leonard

"The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant: "What good is it?"

-Aldo Leopold

"If people concentrated on the really important things in life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles."
-Doug Larson

"The season is ended. There was not enough of it; there never is."
-Nick Lyons

"If I'm not going to catch anything, then I 'd rather not catch anything on flies"
-Bob Lawless

"We got no troubles, Life is the bubbles, Under the sea..."
-The Little Mermaid

 

"I firmly believe that any man’s finest hour, the greatest fulfillment of all he holds dear, is the moment when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on the field of battle – victorious.”
-Vince Lombardi

"In the best stories about fly fishing ... big fish are caught or lost; people say wild and spontaneous words; event becomes memory and sometimes, in the hands of a master, bleeds into art."
-Nick Lyons

"I fish better with a lit cigar; some people fish better with talent."
-Nick Lyons

M

"I am firmly convinced that the ideal combination leading to a happy life is to have the time to both fish and read."
-Brian Murphy

"It is not how abundant nor how considerable our catch be, but rather to the sport, and manner in which our quarry, the noble trout is angled."

-J.B. Martin

"I look into... my fly box, and think about all the elements I should consider in choosing the perfect fly: water temperature, what stage of development the bugs are in, what the fish are eating right now. Then I remember what a guide told me: 'Ninety percent of what a trout eats is brown and fuzzy and about five-eighths of an inch long."
-Allison Moir

"The Essentials of a Good Fly-Hook: The temper of an angel and penetration of a prophet; fine enough to be invisible and strong enough to kill a bull in a ten-acre field."
-G.S. Marryat

"I salute the gallantry and uncompromising standards of wild trout, and their tastes in landscapes"
-John Madson

"I go fishing not to find myself but to lose myself "
-Joseph Monniger

"Poets talk about "spots of time", but it is really the fishermen who experience eternity compressed into a moment. No one can tell what a spot of time is until suddenly the whole world is a fish and the fish is gone."
-Norman Mclean

"Angling is extremely time consuming. That's sort of the whole point."
-Thomas McGuane

"Scholars have long known that fishing eventually turns men into philosophers. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to buy decent tackle on a philosopher's salary"
-Patrick McManus

“Never leave fish to find fish"
-Moses, 1200BC

"Put backing on your line; even if you never use it. It helps you dream."
-Jimmy D Moore

"Fishing is not an escape from life, but often a deeper immersion into it..."
-Harry Middleton

"He told us about Christ's disciples being fisherman, and we were left to assume...that all great fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were fly fisherman and that John, the favorite, was a dry-fly fisherman."
-Norman Maclean - A River Runs Through It

"Opportunities are everywhere and so you must always let your hook be hanging. When you least expect it, a great fish will swim by."

-Og Mandino

"To him, all good things—trout as well as eternal salvation—come by grace and grace comes by art and art does not come easy."
-Norman Maclean - A River Runs Through It

"Smoked carp tastes just as good as smoked salmon when you ain't got no smoked salmon."
-Patrick F. McManus

"If our father had his say, nobody who did not know how to catch a fish would be allowed to disgrace a fish by catching him."
-Norman Maclean

"Many of us probably would be better fishermen if we did not spend so much time watching and waiting for the world to become perfect."
-Norman Maclean

"Eventually, all things merge into one, and a river runs through it. The river was cut by the world's great flood and runs over rocks from the basement of time. On some of the rocks are timeless raindrops. Under the rocks are the words, and some of the words are theirs. I am haunted by waters."
-Norman Maclean

O

"More than half the intense enjoyment of fly-fishing is derived from the beautiful surroundings, the satisfaction felt from being in the open air, the new lease of life secured thereby, and the many, many pleasant recollections of all one has seen, heard and done."
-Charles F. Orvis

"There he stands, draped in more equipment than a telephone lineman, trying to outwit an organism with a brain no bigger than a breadcrumb, and getting licked in the process."
-Paul O'Neil

P

"There is only one reason in the world to go fishing: to enjoy yourself. Anything that detracts from enjoying yourself is to be avoided."
-Leigh Perkins

"Never throw a long line when a short one will serve your purpose."
-Richard Penn

"Fishing books should ooze from a riverbank, not rocket out of publisher's offices in big cities."
-Neil Patterson

"Fear No Fish, Never Grow up."
-Flip Pallot

"It is only the inexperienced and thoughtless who find pleasure in killing fish for the mere sake of killing them. No sportsman does this."
-W.C. Prime, 1888

R

"Government cannot close its eyes to the pollution of waters, to the erosion of soil, to the slashing of forests any more than it can close its eyes to the need for slum clearance and schools."
-Franklin Delano Roosevelt

"If all politicians fished instead of spoke publicly, we would be at peace with the world."

-Will Rogers

"The angel cried with a loud voice, saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees."
-Revelation 7:3

S

"One fish. Two fish. Red fish. Blue fish. Black fish. Blue fish. Old fish. New fish. This one has a little star. This one has a little car. Say! What a lot of fish there are."
-Dr. Seuss

"The only reason I ever played golf in the first place was so that I could afford to hunt and fish."
-Sam Snead

"Beginners may ask why one fishes if he is to release his catch. They fail to see that the live trout, sucking in the fly and fighting the rod is the entire point to our sport. Dead trout are just so much lifeless meat."
-Ernest G. Schwiebert, Jr

T

"I've gone fishing thousands of times in my life, and I have never once felt unlucky or poorly paid for those hours on the water."
-William Tapply "A Fly-Fishing Life"

"One evening I was awakened from a deep sleep by a weird noise coming from my husband, only to find out he was dreaming and he was a Dry Fly. I suspected then, and now realize, his dreams are not made up of wild crazy women, only episodes of his days of being in the stream."

-Jan Thousan

"...buying a fly rod in the average city store, that is, joining it up and safely waggling it a bit, is much like seeing a woman's arm protruding from a car window: all one can readily be sure of is that the window is open."
-Anatomy of a Fisherman by Robert Traver

"Just as in cooking there's no such thing as a little garlic, in fishing there's no such thing as a little drag."
-H.G. Tapply The Sportsman's Notebook

V

"If one really loves nature, one can find beauty everywhere."
-Vincent Van Gogh

"Most fishermen swiftly learn that it's a pretty good rule never to show a favorite spot to any fisherman you wouldn't trust with your wife"
-John Voelker 

W

"The finest gift you can give to any fisherman is to put a good fish back, and who knows if the fish that you caught isn't someone else's gift to you?"
-Lee Wulff

"There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot."
-Steven Wright

"Angling may be said to be so like the mathematics that it can never be fully learned."
-Izaak Walton

"No life is so happy and so pleasant as the life of the well-govern'd angler."
-Izaak Walton

 

"Teamwork is the fuel that allows common people to produce uncommon results "
-John Wooden

"Most of the world is covered by water. A fisherman's job is simple: Pick out the best parts."
-Charles Waterman

"Why does a salmon rise? Why does a small boy cross the street just to kick a tin can?"
-Lee Wulff, The Atlantic Salmon

"I object to fishing tournaments less for what they do to fish than what they do to fishermen."
-Ted Williams

"Game fish are too valuable to only be caught once."
-Lee Wulff

Y

"The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever."
-Jacques Yves Cousteau