Flylab Interview: Stu Tripney

Flylab Interview: Stu Tripney

Stu Tripney is an artist, writer, fly-fishing guide, casting instructor, fly designer and founder of Stu’s Superior Flies from the South Island of New Zealand. He lives in Athol on the banks of the Mataura River, has dedicated his life to chasing brown trout and “loves to make people smile and laugh and tries his damndest to put the FUN back into fishing.” His recent book Trout Love is a freewheeling ode to the South Island’s reclusive backcountry brown trout and the Trout Bums who pursue them.

Who is Stu Tripney and why did you start a fly shop?

Well, I moved to this little town, Athol, 17 years ago or so, and I had a fly shop: Stu’s World Famous Fly Shop. I bought a little shack and transformed it. The Stu’s Superior Flies brand came from my mom. She said, why don’t you call them “superior flies?” I was designing and tying my own flies, trying to guide and run a shop behind the scenes and running myself into the ground. You know what I mean? It was chaos–17-hour days, every day. It never stopped, or I was going to go under.

I borrowed all this money. I had nothing. If I had a safety net it would’ve been okay, but there was no safety net. It had to work. I was married and got a divorce. You lose half of everything. And I’m still in the shop and people are coming in, and I’m still not telling anybody what’s happening in my life. I’ve got to smile and be chirpy. You know what I mean?

Sometimes, I just had to shut the shop and go fishing.

Everybody would walk in and say, “How is this shop world famous?” I’d say, “Cuz I said so…” But it’s been shut down for 10 years. Now it’s a little art gallery. So, anyway, I had the little fly shop. I didn’t make enough money to employ anyone. That was one of the problems, people don’t get it. People just think cuz you got a shop that you’re rolling in it, and they go, why don’t you just employ some people? Because it doesn’t make enough money.

But it did get world famous–it was like walking into fly-fishing heaven. I had art from all over the world. I was teaching, I had a casting area and I was guiding. Every now and then a fly-fishing bum would come in and say, “What are they eating?” and that would help pay the bills. Once, Mike Lawson–he runs a shop in Idaho on the Henry’s Fork–walked in and said, “This is the best fly shop I’ve ever been in.” and I said, “Well, buy something. I need to survive.”

I kept it open as long as I could, but eventually, it had to close. And then I went online with my fly designs. Sitting there at 2 a.m., trying to tie flies, running the shop and guiding–it was a little nuts…

Where are you in New Zealand?

Down in the south, past a little ski town called Queenstown. I used to live there, but moved to Athol to be beside the river. I love the countryside and can work on my fly designs, because the river is right here. All the water is gin clear–you can see the fish. I can see their behavior and how they interact with my designs. You have to get so involved in something to make it work. Maybe there’s some burnout, but there’s no other way to understand what’s happening and what they’re doing.

Like guiding–it’s so overwhelming, physically, mentally and dealing with people all day long. I did love it, but I’m not doing it much anymore. I’d see other guides and realize it’s just a transaction, or they’re completely burned out, and I realized I don’t want to ever be like that.

I knew I had to get out.

I met a couple of old clients recently and they said, “Hey, we’ll pay you. We’ll give you all this money. We want you to guide us.” and I said, “No, I’m doing some landscaping.” I like making things–it’s creative. I love the design aspect. I’m getting to make sculptures. I realize I’m enjoying that side of it. And the writing too…

What was your favorite part of the guide experience?

It was always challenging for me, every day. Always learning. We all learn every day, and I love that aspect of it. There are so many variables. I have at least 40 rivers and waterways close to my house, which I can fish, and they can all vary.

This is the end of the season, it closes in two days, but we still have mayflies, because it’s been warmer. The river right beside me here, the Mataura River, is about 249 kilometers long. It holds one of the largest populations of brown trout on the South Island. There’s another river, the XXXXX, which is on the South Island, but in the north, which is similar. In the lower reaches, like most rivers here, there will be more fish–maybe 200 fish per kilometer, or just over. What’s the Madison River in Montana: 6 or 8,000 fish per mile?

The number of fish is a huge difference right away, and our fish could be a little bit bigger. The further down the systems, the fish are usually a little smaller–two to three-pound fish. Which still is a big fish I guess, when you compare them to Scotland, where I’m originally from. When you put a fly in an American river, it’s like the last slice of pizza at a drunken party–somebody’s got to make a move on it. Whereas over here, there’s less competition. So they’re like, “Nah, that that’s a fake.”

So, it goes from 200 fish in the lower reaches to 70 fish per kilometer in the top reach, where I am. Up here, it’s very rare to catch a small fish. When I go out, I try my damndest to catch the small fish, because they’re the trophies. The small fish can be spookier than the big fish. It’s all about the challenge. I did watch a thumper brown (~six pounds) go under my feet at the bridge yesterday.

This is all sight fishing. You can try to blind fish, but I don’t know–this is hunting and the ultimate in visuals. My latest non-fiction book, Trout Love, is a fishing book but it’s just as much about hunting. I actually have a hunting chapter in the book. One of the reasons I wanted that chapter included is because it’s part of the story–during my years of guiding I didn’t hunt with a rifle, but I was still hunting for fish. Sometimes with clients we’d meet a hunter in the backcountry and a lot of them would say, “I don’t know how anyone could shoot an animal…” and I’d always respond, “But what are we doing? We’re out here terrorizing trout. We’re hunting trout.” There’s no difference. I think all fishermen are really hunting. We’re addicted to sight fishing and the visuals.

Talk about the growth process of fishing: the struggle of hunting, trial and error, all the failures, then getting good at it…

I’m the type of person that immerses myself in difficult things and learns from them, like learning to fly fish when you don’t have a clue. It’s a giant set of hurdles. But now I’m confident when I’m fly fishing, when I see the fish–I can catch it. I’ve got a high catch percentage. I’ve also started hunting–it’s been a great escape, because my life is all fishing. My dog Trigger loves it as well. We’ve never eaten so much meat! Just like fishing, it’s an educational process.

We are hunting the fish here in New Zealand. Eighty percent of the time it’s visual fishing. You see the target, you have to be able to deliver a cast to the target. This is why I became so involved with fly casting and the teaching side of the sport–almost all of my clients required a casting lesson to be successful.

Most of the American guides come over and almost always, we need them to cast a bit better to catch these fish–accuracy is key. When I came to New Zealand, I thought I was pretty good, but I had to climb back down to the bottom rung of the ladder. At first, I was blaming the tippet. I was sleeping in my car, not hooking many fish. Even if I hooked them, I wasn’t landing many. I’d take the tippet back to the shop and say, “This tippet keeps breaking. It’s crap.” I’d change it out, but eventually realized it was me, not the tippet. These fish are so powerful and bigger than they look. That first run I was breaking them all off. I realized my casting had to be spot on for the best success–the perfect placement for that fish, you know what I mean? And you only get that one cast–you want to get it right.

It reminds me of the book Blink by Malcolm Gladwell–about the power of our intuition and subconscious thinking. I remember they put a knock-off vase in some New York museum and their expert said it was authentic, but as soon as they showed it to some real specialists (with photos), they knew in a split second it was fake. Good fishing guides are the same–they’re processing so much data and information about the fish in the blink of an eye.

You, the client, see the fish and I’m saying, “Right here, this is the fly.” Because my brain has already processed the exact fly for that fish: the water, depth, how he’s feeding. I may change the fly on every fish, because we can see how the fish is reacting to everything. Don’t get me wrong, we might use a big cicada during the summer all day long, but you have to treat each fish as an individual. I’m pretty sure this is the fly that fish is going to eat, but it all has to happen in the first cast. And every cast that happens after that, our chances diminish.

The cast is the presentation, and the first cast, with a good presentation, is the best chance. When I’m standing there with someone and they’re bombing casts out, I’m generally praying for that first cast to be right. Sometimes on the fourth cast the fish will spook. At six casts the client will say, “We’ve got the wrong fly on.” and I’ll say, “I think it’s the right fly.” But maybe we need to find a new fish…

The best chance = the best technique.

But this is also fishing–I’ve caught fish dragging a fly behind me walking up the river. I’ve done the worst cast in the world and still caught fish. It can be a disastrous presentation. I just caught that fish and yet every other fish that day spooked with a beautiful presentation–that’s fishing. That’s what keeps us going.

We’re usually coming up behind the fish, so they can’t see us. We’re trying to get the fly in front of the fish, so if it eats, it’s facing away for a better hook set. If they see you, it’s game over. When most of the clients see the fish, it’s usually too late, and you don’t even cast. With all these visuals, I can see the behavior of the fish, how twitchy they get even before the cast is made. You’re trying to get the best angle, so you don’t get spotted.

With cicadas we often land the fly behind the fish. The line shadow or anything going over the fish could spook it. We just want to land it close, because you know the fish is going to hear it. Land it behind the fish and let the fish turn. Now the fish is coming straight at you and that’s always a mini-nightmare. Do you wait until it takes the fly and goes down? Do you wait until the fish turns? Do you try to set the hook straight away?

Before I came to New Zealand I was taught in Scotland to say “God save the Queen” before setting the hook on a dry fly eat. But these fish suck a fly in and spit it out so quickly, you can’t even say the “G” in God, let alone God save the Queen. It might look like the fish fed once, but, actually, it inhaled/fed three times.

But that’s fishing. Let’s find another one. We’ll get there. You can only put so much pressure on someone when they see the fish. And big fish, you have to get the cast right. There’s a couple of places I know where there’s big fish. They’re so spooky. They’re so wary. They may have been caught before, but I know where they live. And they might live in one pool, I might go there 10 times in the season–if the fish isn’t out, we don’t get a chance. Then suddenly, I see that big fish, and I know it’s out and I know it’s in a position where I’ve got a chance–that’s when I know I’ve still got the passion, because I start fizzing. That’s what happens to the client as well. It can take years to control that energy. 

Talk about Big O, the giant brown trout, and how the book Trout Love became an idea…

Thomas and the French fishing bums would come and stay at my house, and I would get to hear where they’ve been fishing. Some of these guys come for three-to-five months at a time, and they don’t realize they’re actually doing more fishing than people who live here, because we’ve all got to work. I would learn so much from them. I just love that. You learn so much from everybody, all these different nationalities. 

They found this monster brown that keeps popping up over a number of years–they’ve come close to catching it, one of the guys nearly had it in the net twice, but it wouldn’t fit. When Covid hit I was looking for something to do, and the fishing bums were stuck at home. The bums can’t come over. The boss is going to catch the big trout. Show you how it’s done. You young punks. But they were all on board with it. “Oh, go boss.” So, that’s how it happened.

I went to find this big old trout, but I didn’t actually want to know the pool it was in and all the rest of it. I had to find that out. I’m on a mission to find a pool from the memory of a video clip. And I don’t know if the fish is still alive, because it’s been a few years. They don’t live forever, but they do live a long time in New Zealand. Some fish may live 17 years, which is quite unusual, but this was a very big fish. It’s in a pool and not near my house. I go on a mission–me and Trigger to capture this fish called Big O on the Je t’aime River. We called the river Je t’aime, because it means “I love you” in French.

Obviously, that’s not the name of the river, but everyone who’s read Trout Love is trying to piece it together. What’s been cool is that many people have written me back, saying they love the book and that it’s inspired them to go fishing. But they’re all asking in a sneaky way to figure out where the river is, the Je t’aime. I guess it started a treasure hunt. That’s what the book is about–me trying to catch one of the biggest trout on the South Island, and one of the smartest ones that I’ve known about. It’s also about these fascinating people, the fishing bums.

Talk about your journey into writing… 

Writing is the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. I was never the smartest kid at school. I’m dyslexic. I have a lot of challenges that could mean I shouldn’t be able to write. As such, I’ve just chipped away at it. It takes me three times as long as anybody else.

Like anything, you get better as you go. I have a lot of stories and enjoy telling them. I’m always thinking, what’s next? What’s my next challenge? I’m going to write ten books.

When I brought the first book out, I called it volume three, and people said, “Where’s volume one and two?” I said I’m forcing myself to complete all ten. Trout Love doesn’t have a volume, but I want to write them all before I’m 60. Writing has inspired me to travel and fish and have a different outlook. I can’t simply write these books after four days of fishing, because I want to immerse myself in the culture, the community, a foreign land and live there for three or four months and document it all. That’s what I’ve been doing.

I just sort of stumble into these situations and go, holy crap, you can walk in the jungle and look for tigers, without a gun and maybe there’s a river that runs to the sea, and it all comes together like that. That was Nepal and then India. I was in the Himalayas searching for trout.

Probably some of the best writing advice I ever heard was from the author Miles Nolte. He said to me once, “Think about each sentence like making a perfect cast. No slack in it.” That stuck in my head when I kept rewriting Trout Love. Let’s shorten some of these sentences, you know what I mean? I’ve found that I love the writing process, but it’s long and difficult. It’s actually the hardest work I’ve ever done. It might not be for everyone.

It would be quite amazing to have a good editor as well. You know what I mean? A real pro. Hopefully, I can find one for my next book–I’m on the third rewrite. I think it will be called Wandering Trout about my time in Tasmania. I went back and spent the summer in a car and tent and met some amazing characters–that’s the book I’m working on at the moment.

Hopefully, somebody might read it and go to Tasmania and realize you can go anywhere. It’s just an excuse, my fishing rod is an excuse to travel.

Do you self-publish, or are you using a publisher?

No, I self-publish and it’s definitely cost me a fortune. I’ve spent all my money and nobody really buys books anymore. It’s broken the bank big time. I’ve had a couple of different editors. I had a publisher read one of my books once–they said it had lots of great stories, but not enough fishing. It’s not about money or fame for me. I just want to do it.

I don’t know if they’re good enough to get a publisher, so I’m just plugging away.

Oh, they’re wonderful. Your books are better than most stuff that’s out there. Keep doing what you’re doing.

Thank you. You must have been drinking this morning.

Plus, self-publishing provides you a ton of freedom.

Yeah. I sit there and write some stuff and laugh and say, I can’t write that. I’ll write some stuff from my life and some editor will come and say, let’s rewrite this part. And I’ll say, but that’s what happened? You know what I mean?

As you know, you have to watch your P’s and Q’s. But with self-publishing, I can tell the story the way it happened.

I just love disappearing to places, you know? This winter I spent a lot of time in huts without phone signals or anything. I found a private hut at the bottom of the mountains, no one around, no internet, just firewood I’ve just been hauling up. Writing every day, working, surrounded by a pile of books, getting inspiration. When I’m writing, I’ll read a lot of books on nature and animals. I won’t actually read any fishing books.

I went to this remote hut, flew in by a helicopter and never thought I’d do that. I brought all my stuff and was trying to get some writing done without getting bitten by the bugs. I brought a big battery to charge my computer. I’m one of these people–I can’t have any distractions when I write. I have to hide from the world.

The helicopter pilot said at the drop, “We’ll pick you up in a few days.” I said, “Come back in a month and get me.” Later, I even extended the trip. I didn’t bring enough food, but I did take my rifle to shoot something and feed myself. Eventually, I got a goat and was able to radio the helicopter and say, I’m staying a bit longer. I can’t write without food!

Was it a mouse year?

It wasn’t a mouse year–that’s when the 8-pound trout can suddenly become 14, eating all these double cheeseburgers (protein rich mice and rats). They become fat and ugly and don’t fight as much. It’s like being connected to a sweet jar.

The mast cycle for beech trees (high seed production years are known as mast years) is about once every five years. In mast years, you know there’s going to be a mouse explosion, if the government hasn’t poisoned them all. Stopping the mouse and rat plagues helps to keep the native birds eggs and chicks alive.

But as soon as it’s a mouse year, the trout bums will start showing up. Thomas and the trout bums can tell you every year there was a mouse plague.

Trout love and mouse love.

How do we want to end this interview?

Well, maybe next year, someone will finally hunt down the Big O and put him in the net.

It’s hard to imagine that fish during a mouse year. 

You might need two nets.

But we all need big fish to dream about...

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Once you get to know Stu and his best buddy “Trigger” then you will understand that a fly design is never finished until it’s been rigorously tested and perfected.