Greg DeMars grew up in Texas, and as he says, learned how to fish “pretty much as every little kid in Texas learns how to fish, with a red and white bobber and a worm.” Since his brother-in-law introduced him to fly fishing over 30 years ago, DeMars’ fly fishing adventures have taken him all over the world. His newest venture, however, is a little closer to home. DeMars’ new book Urban Fly Fishing Dallas-Fort Worth offers readers an in-depth guide to the best fly fishing spots hidden all over the metroplex. It will be available to purchase on March 4. We sat down with DeMars to hear more about how his book came to be.

What is it about fly fishing that appeals to you so much?

I’ve always enjoyed doing things with my hands. I’m a guitar player, so I just love that kind of tactile, manual thing. I’m an engineer as well, so there’s a little driving force of getting the technical knowledge of fly fishing.

What made you want to write a book about it?

I was actually traveling to central Texas to fly fish with a good friend of mine Aaron Reed, who happened to have written the first book in this series called Fly Fishing Austin & Central Texas. It was a seven hour round trip for me, so I thought ‘Gosh, I need to find a place closer to home to fly fish.’ At the time, I was living in Victory Park, and it’s a short walk to the Katy Trail and Turtle Creek. I thought, ‘Well, maybe there’s fish in Turtle Creek.’ I started fishing up Turtle Creek and other creeks around Dallas, and it’s like, ‘Wow, man, there’s all kinds of fish in these small urban creeks that no one thinks to fish.’ At that point, my buddy Aaron was like, ‘Well, you need to write the Dallas book.’ I had no interest in writing a book, but he worked on me for a few months and helped me put together a proposal for his publisher. This was about when COVID was starting to happen, and it was just kind of a perfect thing for me to be able to get out and get away. So I started fishing like crazy and taking all my notes and everything, and it ended up turning into this book.

What did the writing process for this book look like?

It’s a guidebook, so it’s fairly repetitive from a writing standpoint. But, my book is the third in its series, and the previous two authors had interjected some interesting little things in their books. I decided to use Texas Blues as kind of a musical theme for my book, because I’ve been playing blues guitar for close to 50 years, and I just really love that style of music. Dallas and Fort Worth are just hot beds, and have been for a very long time, of blues music. Everything from Blind Lemon Jefferson in the early part of the last century all the way up through new artists that are breaking in today. So that was a fun little thing to add some spice to the book, and I really enjoyed doing that.

Of all the spots you wrote about in your book, what is the one you think everyone should check out?

Well, it depends, because there’s so many different species of fish you can catch. White bass live in lakes, but every year about March or April, they start coming up into the creeks to spawn. It’s just insane activity, so if you can experience that, that’s amazing. There’s also the Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area, below the dam on Lewisville Lake. It’s just the Trinity River, but it fishes like something in the mountains. That’s a really great fishery to kind of try your luck in, but all these little creeks are so much fun. I just love getting in the water and having the water flow around my legs and feeling connected to the earth.

What advice do you have for people who are new to fly fishing?

The number one thing I would say is don’t be intimidated. I think a lot of people look at fly fishing and go, ‘Oh man, how do you do that? That looks crazy hard.’ I think there’s kind of an intimidation factor, but as long as you can get the fly in the water, you can fly fish. So I would say the number one tip would be just give it a shot.

What do you want people to know about the book?

It gives everyone in the city, everyone in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, a resource that can show them places to fish 5-10 minutes away from their house. There’s this idea, I think, among a lot of people that you have to go to the mountains or some remote wilderness to do your fly fishing, and a lot of people think you can only fly fish for trout. This perception is one of the things I really hope to change. You can fly fish anywhere, and you can fly fish for any kind of fish. You can fish in warm water, you can fish for bass and anything else you want to catch, and it’s right around the corner from your house.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.