I make it a rule never to weigh or measure a fish I've caught, but simply to estimate its dimensions as accurately as possible, and then, when telling about it, to improve these figures by roughly a fifth, or twenty percent. I do this mainly because most people believe all fishermen exaggerate by at least twenty percent, and so I allow for the discounting my audience is almost certain to apply.

I don't regard nature as a spectator sport.

I don't mind my hand shaking so much; it improves my S cast.

Most fishing rods work better if you grasp them at the thick end. If you grasp a fisherman at the thick end, you may get a thumb bit off.

...there are few things deader than a dead brown trout stream.

It is easy to tell tourists from tarpon. Tarpon have a narrow, bony plate inside the mouth of their lower jaw. Tourists have both upper and lower plates.

I get all the truth I need in the newspaper every morning, and every chance I get I go fishing, or swap stories with fishermen to get the taste of it out of my mouth.