Thought I may as well start a Ribble thread for the few of us who fish the area. Feel free to contribute in any way you can.

16-4-10
First visit of the season, restricted to a few hours after work - not the ideal time at this stage of the season, but hoped the grannom (egg laying females) might put in an appearance. They didn't!
Nymphed and duo'd the water thoroughly and had intermittent sport with 4 grayling, four trout and a load of parr.

Fish took either olive klink or this little jobbie:



Not much insect activity noted - just a few small stoneflies and plenty of midge, although there's every chance the earlier part of the day saw a LDO hatch.
River is very low and the bottom mile of our beat seems to have filled in in a few places following back end floods.

ATB,
Matt

__________________
The sun pushed dark spokes of melt and sparkle
Across the fields of hoar. And the river steamed -
Flint-olive.


http://northcountryangler.blogspot.com

Well done, Matt!
Judging by my experience that's a pretty good achievement on the Ribble at the moment. Didn't see a single fly on the water when I visited one of our beats as part of a working party on Wednesday. Still waiting for the grannom. Fished for 2 hours beforehand without sight of a fish other than parr. Whereabouts roughly were you fishing?
There was a spasmodic LDO hatch on the lower Hodder earlier in the day which had fish rising in places and had one on a klink which was nice.
Phil

__________________
We come from dust; we return to dust. I'm going to fish

I suppose if the tardiness of the spring is anything to go by then we might see the grannom around the last week of the month, maybe even into May. The going was tough alright and the river was a bit lower than I had expected.
I was on our water above Sawley.

I would imagine things will get into swing over the next fortnight or so.....hopefully!

M

__________________
The sun pushed dark spokes of melt and sparkle
Across the fields of hoar. And the river steamed -
Flint-olive.


http://northcountryangler.blogspot.com

Indeed so. I have chiff-chaff and blackcap singing in the garden - and no leaves on the trees!
P

__________________
We come from dust; we return to dust. I'm going to fish

Fished on Mitton beat today,started off with a heavy nymph in the steps at the top of beat and lost count of the small parr and grayling i had,just as i reached the bottom steady flow,a good hatch of grannom appeared and a lot of small fish rising,i fished a team of spiders down and across and caught alot more small grayling and parr and a good brownie just over the 1lb mark,
Worked my way further down the beat hoping to see a better rising fish but the wind was howling up and across the river so i didnt venture any further than Hodder foot,
A good dunn hatch appeared around 2.30ish so i decided to concentrate on the flats with a deer hair comparadun and managed to winkle out another 4 good brownies all over the 1lb to 1.5lb mark,
A very enjoyable day and nice to fish my first decent hatch of the year,

Paul

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Wanted spare spool for ionica 3/4/5

Also spool for BBS11 titanium prefered but would consider black

Hi, I'm just wondering which club you are all a member of? Is it RADAC, prince Albert, or none of the above? I've just started working in the Ribble valley and trough of bowland so am looking to join a club with waters in that area, to provide after work jaunts during the summer!

thanks, Andy

No fishing this weekend but I went out to do the first of my monthly kick samples on the river for the Riverfly Partnership's AMI. Despite a modest fish kill being reported on the upper middle reaches last week (suspected effluent from the Gisburn tannery upstream), the invertebrate population seemed fine with all groups barring ephemera represented and an overall score of 14 being recorded.

That said, I shan't be fishing the Ribble again until it's had a flush through; the river is heartbreakingly low and clotted up with silkweed. It's a wonder our game fish populations stand up at all......

M

__________________
The sun pushed dark spokes of melt and sparkle
Across the fields of hoar. And the river steamed -
Flint-olive.


http://northcountryangler.blogspot.com

I had a couple of hours on the EA beat at Mitton on Sunday. It's the first time I've fished it for over a year. I have never seen as much fly/fish activity. I walked down to Calder foot & started fishing about 100m from bottom of the beat,in 2 1/2 hours I only covered about 50 m of river. I caught 2 decent Brownies on a Black Gnat & lost another on a March Brown. For a fiver I dont think you can beat this stretch of water.

Fished the river a couple of nights ago. It's heartbreakingly low and weeded up. Midweek showers had actually lifted the level by about 6" - but still nowhere near 0 on the gauge.
Didn't see a thing until late on when a few female bwo spinners gathered to lay and an odd fish came up....and I mean an odd fish; I casted to the only two risers I found, good fish. I rose and hooked both but failed to land either.

So a big fat mid season blank for me. The keeper had nailed the tails of 15 mink on the gable of the club hut. I saw a cormorant in the trees on the edge of the wood.

M

__________________
The sun pushed dark spokes of melt and sparkle
Across the fields of hoar. And the river steamed -
Flint-olive.


http://northcountryangler.blogspot.com

Took the lad to Mitton beat today for a change to our regular Eden haunt as i thought the challenge would do him good as most of you will know its not the easiest of stretches to fish,but it turns out that the challenge was for me as he slapped me, 5 fish to my 3 including a lovely seatrout of around 1lb 5oz on a deer hair comparadun,
As M says the river is in poor condition and is desperate for some more rain,but an enjoyable session all the same,
All my lads fish were caught fishing the dry in the likely spots,i had 1 on the dry and a quick change to a light nymph took 2 nice brownies from a fast riffle that just looked like it held a fish or 2 but wouldnt rise to a dry,

Paul

__________________
Wanted spare spool for ionica 3/4/5

Also spool for BBS11 titanium prefered but would consider black