well . . not quite first time: my brother has taken me to a few reservoirs to teach me to cast and I used to chuck wet flies from a spinning rod as a kid but today I took my new equipment up to the river and fished.

I just wanted to say a big THANK-YOU to everyone here who has helped with my newbie questions and pestering.

Based on advice here I bought: a Shakespeare Trion XT 7ft #3 (I was all set to buy the Odyssey but somehow Peter talked me into the more expensive rod - hmmm); some John Norris Pro 2 Stealth Floating Line in DT4 (yes, I've deliberately over-lined the rod) and the smallest of the Greys G Series reels (the G1; the good people at John Norris put backing on and spooled the line onto the reel as a free service). I also bought some x4 and x5 tapered leaders and a selection of wets and nymphs from The Essential Fly.

So . . . my membership of the club started today; the river was low (no rain for weeks) and the wind was high but hey ho I was off. Lost one fly on the river bed and another in a tree (when I got cocky and had too much line out!) but had a great time. I fished for about 90 mins and didn't even have a bite. Now this is a well-stocked river and I know I could probably have caught a trout or two on worms but that's not the point. Catching trout with worms is easy (might as well use hand-grenades); I was looking to make the whole thing harder and more skilful and that's what I got. A very enjoyable experience and one I shall be repeating as soon as possible.

Once again, many thanks to everyone on here who has either answered my queries directly or else posted other stuff that I've been able to look up and refer to in my quest for information.

Any more top tips before I head back out onto the water?

Most rivers are low, Revo over here in Belgium too and fish are easily scared in the clear water. Now is a good time to work on your stealth tactics. Keep low and look long before you decide where to present your fly. Try to do it with as little false casts (and not on the direction of the fish) as possible. Look what is flying around and emerging from the water. Try to match your flies to what you find. Keep at it, the fish will come.

Tight lines,
Johan

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Johan Janssens

Dont be in to much of a rush to get a fly on the water once you are ready to go just sit and watch you will learn a lot by doing so,if you see fish taking off the top try and see what is flying about if that aint happening try a nymph,keep at it once you catch your first that will be it.

Hey Revo

Really pleased you enjoyed yourself, you have absolutely got the right attitude to fishing going on... most new fly fishermen go through the phases...

Got to catch a fish
Got to catch a load of fish
Got to catch the biggest fish
Got to catch a wild fish

Eventually most seem to arrive at it is nice to be out

enjoy...

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Hope you enjoyed it, try sitting by the water for 10 min until the fish are feeding all around and look and see if you can identify what they are feeding on.

If this is a fly only river, expect the fish to be selective about what they eat, any wrong presentation, unnatural movement of the fly, drag, lines etc will scare them.

In this weather (bright sunshine), don't go fishing between 1000 and 1800. Enjoy the sunshine!

If they are rising, Put on a similar DRY fly if you have one.

Nymph fishing in a river results in very quick takes and rejections that are difficult to spot and hook.

Use a 6x or 7X tippet and keep the tippet at least 3ft long at the end of your tapered leader.

If you get a take, the slower the water flow, the longer you take to raise the rod to set the hook. Fat rapids, need to be asap, slow flow through a pool, the "God Save the Queen", setting on the queen.

Just have fun!

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Just My Tuppenceworth!!

Thanks for the advice lads (and lasses?) - much appreciated.

I fished the same river last week but a mile or two downstream from the club waters and caught a 2 lb brown on worm (using my lovely Wychwood Truespin). The farmer charges £2 per day to fish, and I saw a lie under a log where I suspected a trout had his territory. Bang! Rod bent double and supper was in the bag after playing him out for a couple of minutes.

So because I know I can catch trout easily on a worm I'm fine with not getting any fish on the fly . . . yet! So far, just getting the cast right and learning to handle the leader is enough. I hope to be able to get a fish soon though - I'm patient but only up to a point.

One thing I'm not yet sure about is "fishing" the nymph: do I reel it in? If so, fast-pause-fast to give a rising and falling action in the water? Do I just leave it out there to wander in the current, "mending" (is that the word?) the line by letting more out? My brother gathers the line in a figure-eight but then if there's a strike I've got a lot of slack sitting there before I can reel in any tension. I think I've worked out to reel in with some tension (i.e. holding the line between my fingers so it goes onto the spool a little tighter) and I've noticed the groove on one side of reel - seeing some pictures here gave me the clue that it was to put the leader in before hooking up onto an eye or keeper (ah, clever: this allows it to be longer than the rod-length.)

Once again many thanks and any nymphing tactics would be appreciated.

It would be a lot easier to show you than write it down but i will give it a go.Is the flow of the river fast or slow?There is a few ways of fishing the nymph, upstream and accross and down,upstream is quite difficult to master if you have not done it so we will start with accross and down it is what it says accross from you are and then let it drift with the current until it is fully downstream of were you are standing leave it there for a few second as the nymph will rise up in the water and this is normally the time you will get a take.{move your rod at the same pace as the flow}For the last couple of seasons i have been useing what they call the duo,this is were you suspend a small nymph under a dry fly,now the distance you put the nymph from the dry is really determined by the depth of water you are fishing,i normally start with about 3ft but if i am catching the bottom i will shorten it.Another name for this is short lining this means you will only have about a foot or so of actual fly line out of the top ring of the rod and you flick the flies upstream bringing your rod downstream at the same pace as the river watching the dry fly all the time and the slightest unusual movement in the dry fly you strike not to hard mind.Like i say it would be easier to show someone how to do it rather than write it down i hope i have not confused you too much.

Got one!

On Tuesday I had my day off and caught a nice large rainbow at a well-stocked local lake (I'm guessing 3 or 4 lb - a very decent size), took a big green buzzer a couple of feet down.

But the real "buzz" was tonight - a couple of wild brown trout. Fishing at dusk on a warm Spring evening in a small river miles from anywhere, nothing but the sound of a distant owl and the flittering of bats. Peaceful and perfect. I used a gold bead-headed nymph (is that the name?), retrieved nice and fast-ish across a weir pool. Both fish returned alive at approx 1 and 0.5 lbs each.

Well, I'll be doing *that* again, God willing.

A thousand thanks for all the advice here - wouldn't have know where to start without your helpful posts and replies.