I'm new to the sport so keen to try and home my skills over the winter in preparation for the spring. As such I'm planning to fish for Grayling on the fly over the winter. I am a bit ignorant of the law/ etiquette on this. I assume that it is inevitable that you will catch some trout in error. I C&R everything I catch so not a massive problem but I would prefer to avoid the trout of possible. I'm going to stick to nymphs but would appreciate any advise on how best to fish for Grayling during this period without disturbing the trout who I assume are spawning at this time of year.

Hi Rob
You will catch trout when your fishing for Grayling, if you find your catching trout in numbers just move on and find some Grayling. Also when the Trout do actually start to spawn, they go off the feed, so you generally wouldn't catch them anyhow. In terms of flies, I find that generally Trout & Grayling will take the same patterns, however to target the Grayling at this time of year the addition of pink or orange will usually attract more Grayling than Trout.
Hope this helps,
Gary.

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some good advice there Gary


Cheers
Spencer

As with what Gary said. You can reasonably allow yourself scattered "single" accidental captures of trout. Hooking two in a spot should be the cue to move upstream or downstream a bit.

The only time that wild trout congregate together in high densities in a small area is just ahead of spawning (they don't much like to eyeball each other the rest of the time). Just be sensible if you find yourself standing on top of a shoal of pre-amorous trout and move on a short distance. Nobody can complain at that.

Also as we get deeper into winter - look out for spawning redds or areas where redds are likely to occur (do a search on wading and redds for a post I put up last winter for pictures etc.)

PG

(Wild Trout Trust)

Thanks for the advise and tips guys.