Now then thrillseekers.... it's been a couple of weeks since I joined this forum. I've chipped in here and there but not had any tales of any substance to report....until now. I'd just like to say,personally,I've enjoyed reading your stories and seeing your pictures - although, strangely, there's one or two self satisfied arbiters of taste who seem to take great pleasure at sniping and finding fault with this kind of thing (they know who they are). However, it saves me forking out for Trout and Salmon! ....so keep yer tales and pics coming guys.
It dawned on me Monday last that I wasn't working in the morning...Mmmmm, where to fish? Then I remebered waxing lyrical to a visitor from the states last week about this particular fishery. "Best wild brownie fishing in England" I said to him. "I'll have that then" he replied, and off he went with 3 other chums. "6 fish between the 2 boats, all between 2 and 4 lb" was the tally when I called him afterwards. "My hands were shaking when I was tackling up just looking at the place mate"..."that is one breathtaking fishery". And this from a guy who has seen and done almost everything, trust me. So, with his words still echoing in my head, and not having fished the place myself in about 4 yrs I decided to give it a shot. It was obviously fishing well..... 1 fish a day is good on this place, never mind 3 per boat boat!.
Conditions were perfect on arrival -overcast, warm(ish) for about 6 million feet up! and a not too cold easterly of around 3-5 mph. I'm pretty sure this place is an S.S.S.I, pretty much pristine and jam packed with fly life. 2 or 3 species of medium to large olive type thingies were coming off,also huge buzzers in stripey football tops,beetles on the water,hawthorns with their silly gangly legs and god knows what kind of nymphy creepy crawly things were swimming around in the depths! I say depths,but this place has an average depth of around 6 ft with a deep hole just off the middle of around 18ft. The water is gin clear and most of the time you're drifting over 4 - 10ft and can see the bottom no problem which varies between lush weed beds,white marly stuff and rocks and small boulders. There's something very comforting for a confirmed floating line merchant about fishing this type of shallow lake.
I tackled up two rods to save time as and when conditions changed. It doesn't happen to me often these days,but,as with my american pal, my hands were all over the place. Just the sight of this water seems to reduce me, and apparently others to a dithering wreck! So,floater on both rods,first rod 11' 3" with a basic 3 fly loch style rig - Bibio - Dabbler - Greenwells variant. Second rod 10' with and intermediate poly leader on a floater and a long 3 fly flourocarbon rig with 3 of my own pupae-buzzer-nymphy type critters. Conditions were almost perfect for a nice loch style drift and I was frothing at the mouth at the prospect of lazily flicking out a short line...lift,stroke and dabble. But sure enough, as soon as I'd hit the water the conditions changed. The wind dropped almost completely and there was a patchy calm all over the lake with confident if not abundant rising fish. So my time saving plan backfired immediately! Off came the loch style rig and on went two dries...no interest...quick change...nothing...flat like a mirror and down to one fly...nowt! I kinda knew after about half an hour that for some reason I wasn't going to get one on the dry. It was one of those days when they just laughed at whatever was presented...but I'm like a dog with bone when it comes to dry fly. Sure, I love dirifting loch style,love twiching little nymphy things under the surface,but the dries do it for me,even to the extent of probably missing 50% of what would otherwise be productive fishing time when I know damn well that the dries aren't gonna cut the mustard!The first fish came to the net after about two hours of trying to tempt them on every kind of dry under the sun and eventually abandoning the dries in favour of the 10 footer with the flourocarbon rig with the lttle critters.The plan was to cast to rising fish and slowly fig 8 them past it's nose....3rd or 4th cast everything went solid, and after a brief scrap and few charming pirouettes, a perfect little beauty of about 1.25 lb was in the net. I'll apologise now for the ***** pics chaps. I seriously need to upgrade my digi - only 2 mp, plus I was on my own and needed to hurry and get the fish back in the water... No time for an Ansell Adams job!
...Nice one for starters. 1.25 lb Fell for one of my own buzzers on a 14, twitched a couple of inches under the surface.
The day continued to present subtle changes in conditions, light,dark,flat,ripple,warm then mild then warm and so on. Each change though was enough to warrant a change in tactics,flies,leaders etc. Wonderful,wonderful fishing weather - keeping you thinking and working for your fish. Some days you make a total hash of it and somehow,even with perfect conditions manage to make a sows ear out of a slik purse - god knows, I do it often enough....especially in competitions...come to think of it,usually in competitions! But today was no comp,the stress factor was off and it was just me,the weather and the fish,and luck was on my side. All the tactical changes reaped rewards at least in terms of offers,pulls,plucks and rises if not hooked fish. Got a bit more interest to the critters on the flourocarbon in the next couple of hours but didn't connect with owt untill 2pm. It had been quite dull for a while but gradually brightened up and the sun was threatening a complete break out. Decided to have half a dozen more chucks with the critters before a rethink, when out of the blue,twitch twitch twitch... WALLOP......something nearly snatched the rod from my hand and then took off like a train! A few obligotary heart stopping pirouettes gave me good look at the monster (I was thinking 4 or 5 lb) then after some deep dives and a couple of last minute dashes to avoid the net he was safely in. 6.5 lb of wild perfection. My best wild Brown ever (previous best a 4.5 river fish). I just sat there and shook like a shitting dog and gawped at him, I wanted to snog him...or at least stare at him all day if he rejected my advances, but I soon snapped out of it and realised this majestic fish had to go back. I hurriedly took a snap of him in the boat and a snap whilst getting some oxygen over his gills in the water. 30 seconds later he thrashed his shovel of a tail and was gone.
6.5 lb ...very pleasing on a size 14 olive pupa
away you go son.... see you again soon I hope.
The afternoon continued to present subtle changes and a couple of offers but no more fish until about 4pm.All of a sudden it went quite dark and the breeze got up to it's strongest all day...about 6 or 7mph! A nice little loch style wave developed and a few splashy rises were spotted. That was enough for me to reach for the 11'3" wand with Bibio - Black and pearl hopper - Greenwells variant. Half a dozen short line flicks later and a good fish slashed at the Bibio...missed it. Cast again..slash - missed it! Cast again! Bingo.
Silly Billy! 4.5 lb ....Had 3 goes at my flies and eventually connected with the Pearly Bibio.
As soon as the wind had got up and built a little wave,it dissappeared,and at 5pm they switched off. Strange how sometimes you know when you ain't gonna get another fish and sure enough,even though conditions were ok, you wouldn't have known there was any fish in there. Convinced myself for another hour that they'd soon be back on but deep down I knew that play was over for the day.... but I didn't want it to end. What was I continuing for anyway? I'd had a dream day. I was happy...very very happy. I'd made some good choices and decisions for a change,the fish I hooked had all stayed on,the weather had behaved impeccably and I'd also been very,very lucky.
Apologies for the ***** fly pics too guys! First attempts!
I wanted to snog him.....
you ever wrote a book.
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