Empty Handed

Arrived at the fishery at around 10am and set up with the usual 2 fly rig, skinny olive buzzer on the point with a red holo Diawl Bach on the dropper, this time.

Long story short, hacked around with the usual suspects for several depressing hours - various buzzers, nymphs and the usually reliable shipman’s, with and without retrieving, with and without a bung, but without a fish. In fact, I didn’t even get a take, as far as I know.

Totally overstayed in an attempt to get something on, which just made it worse. I’d originally planned to leave around 1 at the latest, but ended up staying ’til after 2. Depressing.

Weather conditions were pretty bad, though. No rain, but a steady and strong wind chopped up the lake making presentation and bite detection difficult to impossible, made casting awkward to dangerous and dragged the temperature down with the chill factor. Saw a couple of fish come out to sunk line tactics (Cat’s Whisker in at least one case, according to the catch return of one guy who finished before I did).

The only thing I got out of the day was to try out not one but two new items of kit. Item one was not really a specific fishing item, but was the new Thermos flask I got for Xmas, so I had a cup of Bovril in the ‘Fisherman’s Shelter’ at around 12.30, and I carried the flask in the second item, my new Fishpond backpack/vest pack. This is the ‘Glacier’ vest pack, no longer listed on the Fishpond site. It seems pretty good, but I’m a bit disappointed with the size, really. I struggled to get my waterproofs and the flask in comfortably, and there would be little or no room for, say, a sandwich box or, indeed, any tackle in addition. I’d hoped that the backpack part would be pretty spacious as I was hoping to do a bit of hiking and fishing later this year, but I’d struggle to fit food, drink, clothing and sufficient tackle (reels being the main problem) for a full day in this bag, contrary to Fishpond marketing. Disappointing also is the rod tube system. This allows you to strap two rod tubes alongside the backpack, but the attachment to hold the base of the tube is like a cup holder, in effect, and sits level with the bottom of the pack. This means that this is where the bottom of the rod tube also sits, so a tube much longer than the height of the backpack would be quite awkward to carry. I trialled this with a rod tube containing my 9′6 4 piece rod, which is pretty short really, and this was manageable (I wouldn’t normally have bothered carrying this around with me, of course), but anything longer would be tricky. This means all of my other rods! I’ll have to try this, but I think they’d make the whole pack too top heavy, and would possibly flip themselves out as well. Maybe not, I’ll give it a trial sometime. This may be going back on eBay, though. The quality is excellent, I think I need something bigger, though. I shouldn’t think I would buy another such pack without seeing it first!

Anyway, in conclusion, winter fly fishing really sucks unless the weather is right, and I need a sinking line. I think I’m going to sack off the fishing unless the weather is kind, and spend the time with the family, or possibly on a little golf! I’d much rather do that than spend several freezing hours joylessly dragging a Cat’s Whisker back along the bottom of a lake with more white horses than Morecambe Bay…

From Chris McCully:

These roach rise at dawn and dusk, even in these depths of the year. What they’re rising to, here in December, is a bit of a mystery, though it must, surely, be tiny midge pupae. In any sort of calm weather you see the fish topping, dawn and dusk, hard by the tram-stop…fish up to a massive 8 or 9 inches long.

This afternoon, as a change from working and writing (manic laughter in distance; pig flies past…) I spent an hour over these little scraps as the day steepened into night. Artificial was a size 16 or 18 Witch (an old grayling pattern) fished just sub-surface. I watched the leader-end for takes - an edge of nylon cutting through the reflections of city neon.

Read the rest and see the cool photo of the flies he used at his web log. Fly fishing for Coarse fish is one of my interests, too. See my group on Flickr and all my own Coarse Fish on the Fly shots.

Managed to get out for what is hopefully becoming my “traditional” new years day fishing excursion today. As per last year, it was to Forrest Hills. I don’t frequent this place quite so much as I used to do, since the prices went up and the stocking went down, or, at least, not so often. These days it costs practically the same as fishing Bank House, and the stamp of fish isn’t as good. That said, however, I do seem to catch quite as many here as at Bank House, so I probably shouldn’t grumble… The main benefit is that it is open. The honesty box approach is great for fishing out of hours, so to speak.

The weather wasn’t quite as comfortable as last year, today. It was breezy to begin with (I arrived at a very leisurely 10am, and was the first to arrive for the day - no golfers had turned out yet, either), building to very breezy later. That pond was as choppy as Morecambe Bay. This helped to make it very chilly. Later, it tried a bit of rain, too. I started off with a PTN on the point and a black spider on the dropper (the spider being the star of the day this time last year) and fished buzzer style, swinging them round in the wind. Nothing. I switched banks to get the wind over my left shoulder and worked through buzzers, nymphs, bloodworm etc. Nothing. I tried a black and green lure, but unsurprisingly got nothing - I’m not well equipped for lure fishing and fishing this unweighted lure on a floater in that wave was probably a waste of time. Well, it definitely was a waste of time!

I’d seen a few swirls and splashes, and the occasional flattened wave which could have been a fish at the surface, so I tried a ginger shipmans, and, keeping a short line, plied the marginal weedbeds for a while. This felt right, and I was confident. Sure enough, a fish moved to my fly, but came short - I saw the wave flatten and a golden flank, it was surely a fish, but it didn’t take and several more casts didn’t bring it back.

By this time (12, 12.30?) I was cold and thinking about jacking, since I was due at the ‘in-laws’ for lunch by about 2, but thought I’d move down to the windward end of the lake for a while. I’d noticed some fish moving, and, besides, it was more sheltered and the water was calmer. I tried a buzzer under a bung for a bit, but NOTHING. Then, when I was really running out of time, I spotted a few more rises quite nearby, and whacked on a black shipmans, well greased because even here it was quite choppy. Leaving the bung on (to help keep tabs on the fly) I cast out to near where the fish were moving. Not so many casts later, a proper take, but I arranged for the fly to be removed from the fish’s mouth at high speed before it ever grabbed it… That was the bung’s fault (probably) so that came off. Really running low on time now, so a change of direction, casting back and into the wind this time… A take, within moments of the fly alighting. No mistake this time, giving it a few moments to turn and into the first fish of the year, a rainbow of about, ooh, 1 3/4 lbs, or so. Very welcome. I netted and released it and packed up the rod, headed for the car and, as I drove away, the rains came down. Perfect timing.