In keeping up with our tips and tricks theme of late, here are a couple tips that can help you work the rust out of your casting technique early in the season.

And the best way to knock off that rust is to start practicing in your own backyard. That's what your nonfishing days are for anyway, right? Try to remember these five keys next time you're out working on those casts.

Photo by Brian Milne

Mother's Day, Graduation Day and Father's Day are right around the corner (not to mention my birthday on June 13th), so now's a good time to start thinking about gifts for that fly fisher in your life.

So for those who aren’t exactly fly-fishing aficionados, I offer a the gift buyer’s guide for those who know very little about fly fishing.

Now that you've tied all those flies, it's time to brush up on your knot tying. Luckily for you, we've got step-by-step guides on tying knots such as the arbor knot and the Albright knot on our knots page.

Keep checking back for our how-tos on fly fishing’s most popular knots as the spring season warms up.

Photo by Brian Milne.

OK, so spring is here, trout plants are underway, and it's time to stock up on flies for your next fly-fishing adventure.

So, the only question that remains is where are you going to buy your flies?

If you don't have a local shop located around the corner, or don't know of a shop near your fly-fishing destination, we've got a couple answers for you here. Good luck on the water this spring.

After a very long, cold, wet winter season, the general trout season is thankfully underway in most states.

In California, the season kicked off on Saturday – the Golden State’s general trout season typically kicks off on the last Saturday in April.

Head on over to our Regulations & Records page for links to your state fish and game sites, where you can find the current rules and regs and even stocking information related to trout fishing in your back yard.

The 2008 trout season opened with a bang Saturday, and I finally caught that healthy rainbow I’ve been searching for all year.

Here in California, the trout season officially opens on the last Saturday in April, so I went up to the Nacimiento River out of Camp Roberts near Bradley and caught a couple trout in the 12- to 16-inch range.

You could read more about fishing on the army base at Camp Roberts here, an interesting fishery considering all of the armed guards and tanks on hand.

Here’s another update on an earlier poll on what species fly fishers are looking forward to catching most this season. As of this post, 263 anglers have voted and the results aren’t all that unexpected with rainbow trout getting 25% of the vote. Here’s a closer look at the numbers:

About Poll

What species are you looking forward to fly fishing for most this spring?

Rainbow trout 25%, brown trout 16%, largemouth bass 12%, steelhead 9%, other trout 8%, smallmouth bass 9%, saltwater species 3%, salmon 4% and other species 9%.

If you haven't already, please vote in the poll, which also helps me figure out what species to target when it comes to writing about fly fishing.

When a friend of mine first asked if I wanted to go fly fishing for halibut many summers ago, I couldn’t help but laugh.

Fly fishing? For a bottom dweller that spends most of its life at depths of 75 to many hundreds of feet?

Good luck with that.

But once you get a handle on when and where nearshore halibut can be found, I quickly found out these flat fish are blast to catch.

Photo by Brian Milne

Browsing the weekend’s fly fishing headlines, I came across a quote in a News Leader (Va.) piece that was worth repeating.

The story was previewing Waynesboro’s upcoming Virginia Fly Fishing Festival and had a good line from Beau Beasley. The festival director pointed out two misconceptions about fly fishing: that it’s difficult and expensive.

"Neither is true," Beasley said. "People who come to the festival can see that it's not a hard sport to learn, and that you can buy a $100 fly fishing rod as opposed to a $600 fly rod."

As a penniless writer, I couldn’t agree more. In fact, I’ve written about fishing for a bargain on a handful of occasions. Speaking of which, if you’re looking for a deal this spring in preparation for that next trout fishing trip, here’s my list of the top bargain sites for fishing gear.

If you're a regular reader of blogs like this one, you've probably heard of a widget.

Also known as gadgets or blidgets (blogging widgets), widgets are pint-sized, standalone applications that bring outside content to your desktop or Web site.

Well, here's my addition to the widgetsphere: "Caught On The Fly," an RSS feed utility that takes the top 10 stories from the About.com Fly Fishing Guide Site and puts them in a lightweight widget that can be embedded on your blog, social network or Web site. You can add "Caught On The Fly" by clicking the "Get Widget" link below or by following the step-by-step instructions here.