FOR CERTIFIED HARVEY LEADERS
Harvey Leader Training Manual
The leader-facing how-to-teach manual. Ten sections of philosophy, technique, and teaching strategy - everything you need to deliver The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School with authenticity and excellence.
HOW TO USE THIS MANUAL
Ten Sections, One Method
Work through the philosophy first - it is the difference between running a fishing clinic and delivering Stream School. Then keep the technique, conservation, age-group, and safety sections close at hand while you teach. Use the contents below to jump to any section.
ORIENTATION
Welcome to the Program
The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School is grounded in the philosophy and teaching methods of Joe Humphreys, one of America’s most influential fly fishing educators. For nearly two decades at Penn State University, Joe shaped not just skilled anglers, but thoughtful stewards of coldwater resources. His influence extends far beyond the classroom - he has taught presidents, Olympic coaches, and thousands of students who continue to fish the waters he taught them to read.
This guide equips you - whether you are a volunteer Harvey Leader, physical education teacher, youth leader, or professional guide - with the philosophy, techniques, and teaching strategies necessary to deliver this program with authenticity and excellence.
REQUIRED BEFORE YOUR FIRST SESSION
Watch the documentary film Live the Stream (2016) in full before teaching any session. This is not optional. The film follows Joe Humphreys at age 97 across the streams and memories of his life. It will give you the stories, context, and emotional foundation that written curriculum cannot provide.
The film documents: Joe’s origin story (first fish at age 6, Thompson Run as his classroom); the saving of Spring Creek (his greatest conservation achievement); night fishing and the state record brown trout; working with veterans through Project Healing Waters; teaching city children their first fish; the quest for a 20-pound brown; and the Look Up moments that define his relationship with nature.
WHAT MAKES THIS PROGRAM DIFFERENT
✓ Observation before action - students watch the stream before they cast
✓ Control before distance - accuracy is the goal, not a pretty loop
✓ Conservation woven through every session, not bolted on
✓ The Look Up moment - teaching the whole environment, not just the fish
FOUNDATIONS
The Humphreys Philosophy - Deep Dive
Before you teach a single cast, you must deeply understand Joe Humphreys’ approach to fly fishing and to teaching. This section trains you in the foundational ideas that differentiate The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School from every other youth fishing program.
2.1 Joe Humphreys: The Full Story
Born January 19, 1929, in Curwensville, Pennsylvania, during the Great Depression. Moved to State College in 1935 when his father took a job at Penn State University. “Little did my father realize he also gave me my livelihood,” Joe said. State College sat in the heart of Pennsylvania’s limestone country - one of the finest wild trout regions in the eastern United States.
Joe caught his first fish at age 6 on Spring Creek - an eight-inch native brown that flew over his head and landed in the weeds. “I was just in awe of the beauty of that fish. This is where it all started.” From that moment he was self-taught, pedaling his bicycle to Thompson Run - a small tributary - and spending hours watching trout, turning over rocks, and teaching himself the stream.
That first morning, Joe’s father had never fly fished. He came simply to be with his son. He had a clumsy piece of equipment - Joe could never remember what it was. But he hooked a foot-long fish. He threw the rod down and pulled the fish in hand over hand. “He had no experience whatsoever - he just wanted to be with his son.” That is the origin of everything this program does.
As Joe grew older, he crawled to the stream. Every morning, on his belly through the dew-soaked grass. He had learned that walking upright spooked every fish. “When I walked up to the stream, the fish went everywhere. So I finally learned to stay low.” He watched a single trout for days from behind a stone, watching its mouth open and close, watching where it fed, watching what it ate. This is where Observation Before Action came from - wet grass, a stone, and patience.
At nine, Joe caught his first fly-caught trout by accident. A Trico hatch was going off on Spring Creek. He had only his father’s size 10 wet flies - all wrong for a Trico hatch. He put one on and it floated. A nine-inch trout grabbed it. “The trout committed suicide.” That accident taught him that presentation and timing often matter more than having the exact right fly.
“I was on my bicycle with the fly rod across the handlebars, three peanut butter sandwiches in my pocket. Thompson Run was my classroom. What we caught and what we shot is what we ate. That is just the way it was.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
At around age 10, observing trout feeding on tiny orange freshwater shrimp at Thompson Run, he tied an imitation from his mother’s sewing thread and caught a 14-inch trout. “Now I knew they took the fly underneath as well as on top. This is called nymphing.” He pedaled home and had his mother photograph the fish. He had independently discovered subsurface fly fishing.
“Fishing was the catalyst that moved me from the depths of despair into a whole new life.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
2.2 Observation Before Action: The Thompson Run Lesson
The central story of The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School is not the orange shrimp catching a fish. It is the observation that preceded it. Joe found the shrimp because he stopped, waded in, grabbed vegetation, and looked at what was in the water. He did not assume. He observed.
Teach your students the same discipline. Before picking up the rod on any day of the program, students sit at the stream and watch for at least 15 minutes. They write in their journals. They identify insects, water features, feeding fish. Only after they can articulate what the stream is telling them do they cast.
CALIBRATE YOURSELF - HARVEY LEADER EXERCISE
Before your first session, spend 15 minutes alone at your stream. Sit with a notebook. Identify five things: insects, water features, fish positions, feeding activity, light patterns. When students arrive, you will recognize what they are seeing because you have trained your own eye first.
2.3 The Athletic Mindset: Casting Is Delivery
Joe’s wrestling and boxing background shapes how he teaches casting. In both sports, form follows function. The goal is not a beautiful technique - it is a decisive result. The same applies to the cast: the goal is not a pretty loop. The goal is the fly in the right place. When teaching students, use athletic language.
“Wrestling and fly fishing? They’re both physical sports. Secondly, the technique is so important. There’s technique and smarts involved. You have to have great fly control so that the fly will float perfectly, drag-free.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
2.4 Casting to Catch - Not to Impress
Every technique Joe teaches exists for one purpose: to put the fly in the right place with minimal drag. Not because it looks better. Not because it is easier. Because it catches fish.
COACH’S CUE
When teaching, always explain the why before the how. A student who understands that the tuck cast exists to sink the fly will learn it faster than one who is just copying a motion.
2.5 Getting to the Bottom: The Depth Imperative
If observation is the foundation, depth is the currency of nymph fishing. Get the fly to the bottom. Keep it there. This is where trout feed.
The self-test: can you consistently get a fly to bounce the bottom in a three-foot run? Can you feel the tick of the nymph on rocks? If not, practice until you can do it with your eyes closed. That is what tight-line nymphing requires. Your sense of touch becomes your eyes.
INSTRUCTOR PREP
Before teaching nymphing depth to students, fish 30 minutes on your teaching stream and consciously practice bottom contact. Note which weight and leader length gets you there. That is what you will set up for your students.
2.6 The Look Up Moment: Teaching the Whole Environment
One of the most important teaching habits in The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School is the Look Up moment. Joe practices it on every day on the water: at some natural pause, he stops, turns to his companions, and says: “Look up. You’ve been staring at the water from the moment we made the first cast. I’d like to stop and live the moment.”
He points to a red-wing blackbird. Clouds moving over a ridge. Sunlight on a wet log. The sound of a distant riffle. “Those are cherished moments. The good Lord has given us such a beautiful place to fish. When you don’t take time to recognize and appreciate it - you’re missing part of the game.”
“Look up. You’ve been staring at the water from the moment we made the first cast. I’d like to stop and live the moment.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
As a Harvey Leader, you are responsible for creating this moment every day of any multi-day program. The student who can stop mid-session and genuinely notice the world around the stream - that student is learning something that no casting clinic can teach.
TECHNIQUE
Teaching Each Cast
Five casts, taught in order of difficulty and matched to the age tiers. Each exists to solve a real problem on the water - teach the why before the how.
“All my casting strokes are very short. So many people lock the wrist - but the 10-to-2 cast is for tournament casting. All my casting is wrist.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
3.1
The Short Stroke Cast
All my casting strokes are very short. Joe’s signature delivery - a wrist-driven, compact stroke that keeps the loop tight and the fly accurate at the close range where most teaching happens. Start every student here.
3.2
The Tuck Cast
George Harvey’s cast and the heart of nymphing - it drives the fly down so it reaches the bottom before the line catches up. Teach it once a student can place the short stroke on target.
3.3
The Bow-and-Arrow Cast
A tight-quarters cast for brushy water where there is no room to backcast. Load the rod with the leader in hand and release. Engaging for the 11-13 tier.
3.4
The Downer-Upper Cast
An advanced presentation cast for the oldest students - delivering a drag-free drift to fish lying downstream. Introduce only at the 14-17 tier.
3.5
The Roll Cast
No backcast required - the first cast you give the youngest students and the safest in tight or crowded conditions. Foundational for the 6-10 tier.
SUBSURFACE
Teaching Nymphing
4.1 The Depth Principle
80 percent of trout feeding happens subsurface. Most beginning anglers fish too shallow. Before any nymphing session, state clearly: “The goal today is not to cast. The goal today is to get the fly to the bottom.”
4.2 Rigging the Nymphing Setup
Build the leader and add weight so the fly reaches feeding depth in the run you are fishing. Match weight and leader length to the depth and speed of the water - this is the setup you calibrated for yourself in Section 2.5 before bringing students to it.
4.3 Strike Detection
The take underwater is often a subtle tick or hesitation, not a visible grab. Teach students to manage slack and watch the leader and sighter - we care about slack because we care about tension. The instant the drift hesitates, set.
“We care about slack because we care about tension. Our flies, leaders, and fly lines are impacted by current from the instant they hit the water until we remove them for the next cast.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“These fish don’t want the flies swinging down over them. They want a perfect natural drift.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
COACH’S CUE
Open every nymphing session with the same line: “The goal today is not to cast. The goal today is to get the fly to the bottom.” It resets the student’s instinct to throw line and refocuses them on depth.
STEWARDSHIP
Conservation Teaching
5.1 The Spring Creek Story - Required Teaching
Every multi-day program must include the Spring Creek conservation story. It is the most powerful example in The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School of what one person - and a small group - can accomplish for a piece of water.
The story: contamination from highway construction entered Spring Creek through the Duck Pond. Water temperatures climbed to the 80s and 90s. Wild trout disappeared. Joe founded Spring Creek Trout Unlimited, engineered the diversion of Thompson Spring around the Duck Pond, and brought the stream back to health.
Key quote: “What can I do myself? What can one man do?” And then: “It starts right here. It starts at home.”
“This was my treasure. This was my life. And I saw it going. I don’t know how I can do this - but I’m going to change this somehow.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS, ON SPRING CREEK
The lesson is not about Joe’s accomplishment. It is about proximity and ownership. The students in your program live near a stream. That stream needs them.
5.4 The Look Up Moment as Conservation
The Look Up moment is not separate from conservation education - it IS conservation education. The angler who notices the red-wing blackbird, who feels the cold spring water, who listens to the riffle around the bend - that angler becomes a steward. You cannot protect what you do not love. And you cannot love what you do not notice.
“We need to be stewards of the stream. You don’t have to pick the fish up out of the water and wave it around. Keep it in the water. We have to work on water quality.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
5.2 BROOK TROUT AS BIO-INDICATORS
Brook trout are the most direct, living measure of stream health students can observe. Their presence means clean water. Their absence means the stream has been degraded.
“Brook trout serve as fabulous bio-indicators for our mountain streams. In many of the same streams where brook trout live, we get our drinking water. They are an early detector of poor water quality.”
Teaching application: if brook trout are present, have students observe and handle them carefully before release, and connect their beauty to the clean water that sustains them. If absent, ask why - and what would need to change for them to return.
5.3 THE GREEN DRAKE HATCH
The green drake mayfly - one of the largest in North America - emerges once a year from the finest limestone streams. Joe calls it the “Memorial Day Classic.” Like brook trout, green drakes require very clean water.
Teach students that the green drake hatch is a gift from the stream. It only happens where someone has been taking care of the water.
AGE TIERS
Teaching Different Age Groups
The method holds across every age - what changes is pacing, the casts you introduce, and how you celebrate. Three tiers, each with its own identity.
AGES 6-10
The Minnow Tier
Energy, celebration, instant success
This group needs energy, celebration, and instant success. Keep sessions short - 20-30 minute active segments. Celebrate every small win loudly.
Teach: the short stroke and roll cast only. Keep knot tying to the Davy Knot on large paracord.
AGES 11-13
The Brook Trout Tier
Attention span for technical work
This group has the attention span and coordination for more technical work. Fly tying becomes genuinely engaging at this age.
Teach: the tuck cast, the full nymphing leader setup, and the bow-and-arrow cast.
AGES 14-17
The Brown Trout Tier
Tactical thinking and depth
This group can handle all techniques and begin thinking tactically. Fly tying at this level should produce fishable flies.
Teach: the Downer-Upper cast, the night game concept, and conservation in depth.
STUDENTS FROM URBAN & UNDERREPRESENTED COMMUNITIES
For many students, this will be their first experience standing in a cold-water stream, watching wild fish, or being in a natural environment with focused purpose. Do not assume familiarity with any aspect of the outdoors. Do not make students feel behind. Move more slowly through the observation phase and give more time to simply experiencing the stream before teaching technique.
In Live the Stream, Joe watches a girl catch her first trout and hears her say: “My first trout! Oh my gosh - this is just amazing. I’m in a whole another space.” His response: “I understand these kids. I understand where they’re coming from.” Because he was that kid, pedaling his bicycle to the stream when school wasn’t working.
These students often become the most passionate conservationists. They come to the stream without preconception. Everything is new. Use that.
PRESENCE
Therapeutic Value of Fly Fishing
Joe Humphreys has volunteered for years with Project Healing Waters, a national program using fly fishing to rehabilitate injured and psychologically wounded veterans. A veteran participant describes it: “Fly fishing is the greatest therapy in the world. I can get out of a bad state of mind and reel myself back in.”
This applies beyond veterans. Any young person carrying difficulty - family stress, academic frustration, personal loss - will find in the stream a place that demands only presence. The fly fishing cast requires full attention: hands, eyes, timing, current reading, fly selection. There is no room left for rumination.
As a Harvey Leader, you do not need to be a therapist. You need to be someone who holds the space safely and lets the stream do its work. Trust the water.
INSTRUCTOR AWARENESS
Joe was a struggling student who found direction through fishing. Some of the students in your program are in the same place he was. The Joe Humphreys’ Fly Fishing Stream School may be the thing that turns their life around - the way Just Fishing turned his. Take that seriously.
ADVANCED · AGES 14-17 ONLY
The Night Game
Night fishing is introduced in the Week-Long Summer Camp as an aspirational concept - not a beginners’ activity. Harvey Leaders should be fully briefed on what it involves before discussing it with students.
“In a world few fly fishers see or experience, yet one that is most dynamic, is from twilight to dawn... The Night Game!! Its beauty is unsurpassed.” - JOE HUMPHREYS
TWO INSIGHTS TO KNOW BEFORE YOU TEACH THIS
Sculpins - “the strawberry shortcake of the trout world”
Joe says this every time he talks about big browns at night. Sculpins are nocturnal. Large brown trout know exactly when and where they move. A sculpin pattern swung slowly through a pool tail-out after dark is one of the most reliable big-fish methods Joe uses.
The sulfur hatch trap
If the green drake hatch is on but sulfurs have been hatching for three or four weeks prior, the larger fish may still be conditioned to sulfurs. Joe nymphs with sulfur patterns after dark while others fish green drakes. “Other guys are not catching and they’re saying - what is he doing? That is the reason. Those fish are conditioned to the sulfurs.” Watch the conditioning, not just the current hatch.
Why big trout feed at night
Large brown trout are largely nocturnal. Reduced predation pressure at night, combined with darkness that provides cover and comfort, causes them to move into shallow water and feed aggressively on large food sources: big stonefly patterns, large streamers, significant wet flies.
JOE’S STATE RECORD BROWN TROUT
Tell this to advanced students as a lesson in persistence. Joe stalked a single large trout for three years - night after night to the same pool. His wife sang at him for it. Finally, at one in the morning, the fish took. He fought it for twenty minutes with no net. The warden measured it: 16 pounds, 34 inches. Pennsylvania’s fly-caught record.
Joe first heard the fish two years before he caught it - a tremendous explosion on a long pool on Fishing Creek. He thought it sounded like a deer jumping off the bank. Then stone quiet. No deer runs back out of the water. He knew it was a fish.
He worked that pool for two full seasons in the dark of the moon. Nothing. George Harvey suggested the riffle above the pool - crayfish, sculpins, and stonefly activity all peak at night. “Why don’t you try the riff?” George said.
The night before, Lefty Kreh asked Joe for a night fishing story; on Spruce Creek Joe took a six-pound brown. The very next night, on Fishing Creek, after an 18-inch fish, his buddy asked if it was time to go home. Joe said: “Let me just go to the top one more time.”
“It sounded like somebody rolled a washtub over. I put the hammer to that fish. I had no net - and that wouldn’t have landed that fish anyhow. I’ve never seen a fish this big. I said: I think I’ve got a record. The warden measured it: sixteen pounds, thirty-four inches.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
NIGHT SAFETY - NON-NEGOTIABLE FOR ANY SUPERVISED NIGHT FISHING SESSION
1) Only on streams fully known in daylight.
2) Buddy system - no student alone.
3) Wading staff mandatory.
4) Harvey Leader-to-student ratio 1:3 maximum.
5) Phone with light available - use only in emergency.
6) Headlamp allowed only during transition, not during active fishing.
HARVEY LEADER CHECKLIST
Before Every Session
A four-phase routine that keeps every session safe, prepared, and on-method. Run it every time - you never improvise.
BEFORE CAMP / PROGRAM BEGINS
✓ Watch Live the Stream in full - required
✓ Calibrate your own eye: 15 minutes of observation at your stream
✓ Fish 30 minutes practicing bottom contact; note weight & leader length
✓ Confirm the teaching water is fully known and safe
✓ Prepare age-tier lesson plans and the casts each tier will learn
MORNING OF EACH SESSION
✓ Check weather, water level, and stream conditions
✓ Lay out eye protection, rods, leaders, and the day’s flies
✓ Confirm the buddy system and instructor-to-student ratio
✓ Set up the observation spot before students arrive
✓ Review the day’s why-before-how teaching points
DURING EACH SESSION
✓ Open with 15 minutes of observation and journaling
✓ Teach the why before the how on every technique
✓ Celebrate small wins loudly - especially the youngest tier
✓ Create at least one Look Up moment
✓ Hold the space safely; let the stream do its work
AT SESSION’S END
✓ Keep fish in the water; handle and release carefully
✓ Connect what they caught to clean-water stewardship
✓ Have students record the day in their journals
✓ Celebrate progress and set up the next session
✓ Pack out everything; leave the stream better than you found it
INSPIRATION
Joe’s Words - For When You Need Them
These quotes can be used throughout the program whenever a student needs encouragement, explanation, or inspiration. Keep them close.
“I will continue to teach until I finally reach the bottom of that mountain.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“The secret to life is having something to look forward to. Fly fishing gives you that.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“Look up. You’ve been staring at the water from the moment we made the first cast. I’d like to stop and live the moment.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“What happens to people if they don’t have proper instruction? Frustrations build. But when nothing succeeds like success - and you catch a fish - you’re off and running. You never forget.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“Fishing was the catalyst that moved me from the depths of despair into a whole new life.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“Without clean water in which these fish live, we’re in bad shape. You’ve got to take care of those streams. It starts right here. It starts at home.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“To catch a brook trout in all its regal beauty - it’s gold to me.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“Every day on the stream is an adventure. And as a teacher, if I’ve passed some good things on - not just the how-to, but an appreciation of nature itself - that’s what it’s all about.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“Sculpins - I call them the strawberry shortcake of the trout world.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“I just got outfished by a busload of fifth graders. Nobody will ever have all the answers. It is always humbling.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“I learned to crawl because when I walked up to the stream, the fish went everywhere. So I finally learned to stay low.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“If I have helped somebody and given them something exciting to look forward to when they go on a trout stream - what greater rewards could you have?”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
“We never stop learning. The good Lord made it that way.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
Joe sees fly fishing instruction as an investment not just in a sport, but in the long-term health of the waters and the people who love them. Young people are the future of fly fishing - and of the conservation work that keeps the streams worth fishing.
“Every day on the stream is an adventure. And as a teacher, if I’ve passed some good things on - not just the how-to, but an appreciation of nature itself - that’s what it’s all about.”
- JOE HUMPHREYS
You’ve Read the Method. Now Carry It.
Apply to become a certified Harvey Leader, or explore the age-tier schools and week-by-week lessons your students will follow.