I live within 10 yards of and fish on the river Wear, over the last 6 weeks I've noticed a lack of fly life on and around the river, there's hardly any flies on the water and from what I've seen, very little in it, there are no trout taking off the surface of the water and the younger members of the club who are on the river bank more than me are telling me that they're catching very little, I've watched the water a great deal and have not seen the clouds of flies over or near the river and very little hatching, is anyone else who fishes the Wear or any other river/stream noticing the same?
Its very worrying.

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Some things that can be done:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=OaegTCr7qsE

Contact your local EA office and join up for the Riverfly Initiative. You will receive training in recognising four groups of river insects and in taking the kick samples so that you can catch them. You then monitor your bit of river on a regular basis - weekly is best - and report your results. This gives a much more detailed dataset than the EA are able to achieve with their much wider remit. It is very useful and has resulted in action being taken to stop a pollution that the Agency's monitoring round missed.

A couple of useful links:


Riverfly - Monitoring

http://www.ourrivers.org.uk/

Hi BobP

Whilst I like your suggestion I wouldn't recommend anyone taking weekly samples from a single site as this will cause a depletion of species and numbers over a period of time. Some species are living under water for up to 4 years before hatching others will have many generations in this time period. Taking samples does have a certain mortality rate as its impossible to return 100% unharmed.

One point for Kernel G to note is that inverts are cyclical in life cycle and it may just be cycle that see's low volumes at this time of year. (not pollution)
For example I've sampled 3 rivers this week (in 1 catchment)...sample 1 showed mostly immature Baetidae....upheld by the slowing to a halt hatch of LDO for example. Sample 2 had only 2 Heptegenidae recorded...all the rest will be eggs and not visible to eye yet. Sample 3 showed lots of Heptegenidae but they were all very small.....this river is ahead of river 2 by about 2 weeks.

Of course its always worth checking to see if its a pollution

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I started this game about 30 years ago and can remember massive hatches on rivers and lakes when I started out. Sadly, few places I fish come close to those early days in terms of hatches.

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Yes, I fish near Durham and have blanked on my last two outings on the Wear. Not even had a "twitch" on the fly. Tried various flies and leader setup but it made no difference. The river did seem very "quiet", thought it was just my bad timing.

Back in the day when I was fishing more (a, lot more, every other day, sometimes every day), regularly I could catch 3 small trout/salmon parr on the same 3 fly cast, this could/would occur on most days, I cannot remember when last it was that I caught even 2 fish on the same 3 fly set-up, I always had a three fly cast on, using 16/14s, occasionally 12s or a mixture. I've checked my diaries between 1987 to 1992 and have noticed from my notes that I was catching up 60 fish on some days, in 1987 I caught 27 trout over 12" or 1 pound in weight, 1988 was better, I had 34 fish of 12" or 1 pound or more.
I started fishing again in 1987 after an enforced lay off due to a motorbike accident and kept meticulous diaries of fish caught, where, conditions and on which flies etc, I should really get back to being a little more fastidious and keep better notes, but are the fish not there because of the lack of fly life or is there another reason, like pollution?
Once upon a time there would be samples taken of the water by Northumbrian Water or the EA, and no doubt because of costs, the samples will no longer be taken, therefore any "additives" entering the water table will not be checked.
The large hatches of March Browns, Olives, Greenwells, Blue Duns, Grannoms and the more prolific flies are not happening anymore and its a worrying trend.

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If it wasn't for pickpockets I wouldn't have a sex life.

Stopped past the Carron(falkirk) tonight on way home some fly life but not a lot never saw one rise usually lots at this time of year,had polaroids on never spotted one fish or even a minnow weather seems a month late up here.

Pete

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When I last fished the Wear (about ten years ago) the big worry was polluted water coming up from the various closed coalmines dotted around and getting into the river. I assume that this was partly the reason the EA were carrying out water sampling.

Looking at the good runs of migratory fish it would seem that part of the river is still able to support a good head of parr and smolts, but the mine pollution may well have affected the middle and lower reaches - in fact I'd be suprised if this were not the case. It's a sad state of affairs.

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