I was fishing a narrow stretch of the Wandle today when I spotted 2-3 good sized trout, packed together. It looked like they were feeding on invertebrates on the river bed as ever so often, one of them would show me a gold flank. I could not breathe properly! 2-3 wild trout in London!

But having started from stillwaters, I had absolutely no clue how to present my shrimps to them to them without catching my backcast, snagging overhanging branches or lining the fish. They would disappear everytime I cast and reappear 5 minutes later in the same place. I didn't catch anything in the end but went home thrilled to see trouty life in the Wandle.

So my question is - when fishing small tree-lined streams, how do you guys normally present your nymphs / wet flies (they weren't rising)? Do you fish downstream, go down a line weight (I was using a 8 foot 5 weight), roll cast only etc?

Cheers,

Alan

Hi' Alan.
On a small stream, fishing in cramped quarters, I would advise the use of a short rod, 6ft, shorter if possible. You will be fishing at short range most of the time, so you could step up line size from a 3wt to a 4wt, or a 4wt to a 5wt in order to load the rod with a shorter length of line, which would be best used, in the conditions you describe, to roll-cast. Hope you find a solution. Cheers. TC

You could just lob your nymph in where they are feeding and leave it on the bottom until they come back..then give it a twitch but that wouldn't be sporting, would it

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Roy

Hi Toady
Got to ask this.....where were you on the Wandle?
Gaunty

One of the nicer bits! And not a shopping trolley in it...

Thanks TC - I have a 7 footer being built by Timmy that will be ready in June. The thought of those fish is almost enough to make me go out and buy one for the interim!

OOOOO! Roy.......who taught you that one.......and to think that you know the proper answer.

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Two things to have in life - A good bed and a good pair of boots -and if you aren't in one you should be in t'other

Get in the water and fish upstream, under the canopy, if possible

Norm

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0rWxCCHSCM

Good advice.There is a lot of twaddle about how complex fishing small streams can be.Technique is all and don't get hung up too much on tackle.Always fish upstream . I use a fastish 7-6 or 8 rod with DT 4.Keep on the move, roll cast ,side cast and every other type of cast.Use as long a leader as you can and concentrate on location more than pattern- 3 or 4 will get you lots of fish.Mine would be GRHE with small goldhead, silver leaded shrimp, klinkhamer and griffiths gnat.(but obviously I carry about a million other patterns as we all do...)

thanks for this info, very helpful

You could also use as long a rod as possible (only limited by the tree canopy overhead when raising the rod vertically to land fish) and do this:


Double click the video if it doesn't play in the forum window.