Opening day was strange, most people on no.3 were struggling although the mouse fishers were catching fairly regularly. The odd person seemed to be picking up fish on deep nymphs or boobies. There were a couple of dead sheep floating by the outlet, so bring your own water for the Kelly!

No.2 is now full and stocked and the natural bank was absolutely rammed with anglers (apparently the fishing was excellent there). My two companions and I all had one fish each from the inlet on No. 1 but had to work very hard for them. A fella next to us caught a few, again on a static mouse.

Nice to be out but hard work.

Must make an effort to fish the barrows this season, especially now that number 2 is stocked (this was always my favourite out of the 3 barrow reserviors, it was always enjoyable fishing the more natural bank furthest from the road), i know what you mean about hard work at the barrows, manys the time i have fished Fry imitations there in a harsh wind late season when the fly life has been non existant

Hopefully see you up there later in the season Morty.

Jon

Yep i will indeed make it to the barrows this season, hopefully see you there too, for the last two seasons the only fishing i have done at bristol waters reserviors has been on the boats at chew and blagdon and i reckon that along with the north shore at blagdon the barrows always offered excellent bank sport, do you still see the prolific sedge hatches along the natural banks in summer through to early autumn which i always associated with a good day at the barrows the trout rises were spectacular and they would gorge themselves with the hatching sedge, when i last fished there i had a flybox specifically for sedge patterns alone

all the best

Morty

Yes the sedges are still there, along with big black buzzers. The down side of the sedges last season were the swifts that took my flies by mistake. I'm going to stick with one barbless dry this year and hope that the three I took in one evening were just down to freakish bad luck...

agree about the barrow tanks they are great for nymphing.some spectacular hatches at times too.great in the wamer weather early morning and duskfish scrap like hell for there size aswell . dont like the barrow mouse method though .cheers. steve

Understand where you are coming from re the Barrow mouse which many anglers just fish static and wait for a take, its not my type of fishing but each to his own and many good bags have been taken with this fly, i think it was originally named a Hedgehog and invented/developed by a guy called Andy who used to work for Bristol Water, i really enjoyed fishing trad wet at the Barrows too, i always caught well amongst the emerging sedges with a wingless wickhams fancy just below the surface when the fish were taking emergers, along with my dry sedge patterns this fly was a real mainstay

yes morty agree what you said mate.each to there own partal to a bit of booby fishing if needs be but do like the more imative aproach.cheers.steve

Yes i prefer fishing dries or nymphs with a concession to fry imitations during the tail end of the season when there is little or no fly life about to imitate, sadly i have like many others noticed a sharp fall-off in the number of fish i catch from dries in the last few years which is a shame as it is, in my opinion easily the most exciting aspect of our sport to see a fish rise and take the fly

all the best and have a good easter (hopefully some of which will be on the water)

Morty

and your self morty .hope to see you at the tanks sometime tight lines.steve