The Fly Fishing Thread

[coppice]

An Indian Summer day high up on the North York Moors yesterday , on the lovely little river Seven (no 'r') . Nowt big , but feisty little wild brownies on upstream nymph and dry fly. Not easy - accurate casting needed and a lot of stealth .

She looks a picture , no ?

[dickymint]

coppice said:

An Indian Summer day high up on the North York Moors yesterday , on the lovely little river Seven (no 'r') . Nowt big , but feisty little wild brownies on upstream nymph and dry fly. Not easy - accurate casting needed and a lot of stealth .

She looks a picture , no ?

Upstream nymphing now that is an art

Edit: especially sideways like that

[nigelpugh7]

So just enjoyed the last episode in this series of Gone Fishing .

Another great programme, I’m blown away with the quality of the cinematography of every episode, it really is one of the best things currently on the telly!

Can’t help feeling a bit low now too, knowing there’s not another Episode.

Let’s hope the next series gets Green Lighted really quickly and they start filming ASAP.

So now what am I going to look forward to watching?

[coppice]

The tip of your rod as it lunges to the savage take of a big zander down on t'canal?

[nigelpugh7]

coppice said:

The tip of your rod as it lunges to the savage take of a big zander down on t'canal?

Yes that would be nice John!

I’ve not managed to get done the canal much lately we have had too much work, but I’m not complaining!

If I go and specifically hunt for Zander in tut cut, what kind of lure shall I use, any you recommend that will increase my chances?

[coppice]

It's not so much the lure as timing , location and technique but a paddle tail or spikey shad type pattern on jig hook will work for most predators.

[nigelpugh7]

coppice said:

It's not so much the lure as timing , location and technique but a paddle tail or spikey shad type pattern on jig hook will work for most predators.

Good point John, I fully understand that I am a complete novice in these matters, as lure fishing is totally new to me, but it’s a fun journey to learn.

[nigelpugh7]

I’ve also been out and about with work, and once again seem to manage to find a locally based water to fish, that oddly always seems to be just a few miles from the area I am visiting for work.

This week I had to do a pre site risk assessment over in Kinver close to Kidderminster.

The local BAA water was the Stour, at Stourton Castle, a stunning venue.

I was most Impressed at first with the weir,so started off there, but after a while released it was way to snaggy, and managed to loose one of my lures there.

It was pretty though, but actually amazingly noisy!

[nigelpugh7]

And of course having one of the drones with me I had to get a 180 degree panoramic view of the weir too!

[nigelpugh7]

So as the weir was a nightmare for snagging I moved up steam to the water along the top stretch by the top of the weir.

As you can see the Stour here is only a small rivers, but quite fast flowing, and not that wide so early to cover large distances with the weighted lure is was using.

The River looked very Pike friendly to me, I really must go out one day and specifically target Pike with the correct rig setup.

[coppice]

Cripes -where I fish you'd risk encountering a Typhoon or F15 with your drone. The buggers fly so low that on a still day, you even get a whiff of their fuel.

But it was all quiet on my last day of the season's river fly fishing , which always feel poignant , never more so than this year . A mixed bag of trout and grayling . no monsters but delightful - 16 all told. All on 6ft Shakespeare #3 weight with 10-12ft leader and a small PTN. Joined by a busy family of long tailed tits as I fished the last pool . A day to tide me through the winter. And now it's pike/perch.chub/barbel time ...

[dickymint]

coppice said:

Cripes -where I fish you'd risk encountering a Typhoon or F15 with your drone. The buggers fly so low that on a still day, you even get a whiff of their fuel.

But it was all quiet on my last day of the season's river fly fishing , which always feel poignant , never more so than this year . A mixed bag of trout and grayling . no monsters but delightful - 16 all told. All on 6ft Shakespeare #3 weight with 10-12ft leader and a small PTN. Joined by a busy family of long tailed tits as I fished the last pool . A day to tide me through the winter. And now it's pike/perch.chub/barbel time ...

Lovely pan size fish or do you grill em?

[nigelpugh7]

coppice said:

Cripes -where I fish you'd risk encountering a Typhoon or F15 with your drone. The buggers fly so low that on a still day, you even get a whiff of their fuel.

But it was all quiet on my last day of the season's river fly fishing , which always feel poignant , never more so than this year . A mixed bag of trout and grayling . no monsters but delightful - 16 all told. All on 6ft Shakespeare #3 weight with 10-12ft leader and a small PTN. Joined by a busy family of long tailed tits as I fished the last pool . A day to tide me through the winter. And now it's pike/perch.chub/barbel time ...

Ah yes John, we are well aware of the RAF low flying cells and their Operations, as commercial operators we are encouraged to work with them closely in those areas including monitoring and issuing NOTAMS where needed.

I haven’t posted about my trip from yesterday yet, but these boys we’re doing touch and goes into Gloucester airport and I was just down the road!

[coppice]

dickymint said:

Lovely pan size fish or do you grill em?

I put back nearly all wild trout - because

-I don't fish to eat

- I don't especially enjoy eating them anyway

- we have a catch and release policy

- even if we didn't , I'd put them back. The upper length(15 ,miles plus ) of my river have never been stocked and being able to capture such lovely , indigenous creatures is reward enough.

The only fish I kill are big stock rainbows which I get smoked .

[pequod]

coppice said:

I put back nearly all wild trout - because

-I don't fish to eat

- I don't especially enjoy eating them anyway

- we have a catch and release policy

- even if we didn't , I'd put them back. The upper length(15 ,miles plus ) of my river have never been stocked and being able to capture such lovely , indigenous creatures is reward enough.

The only fish I kill are big stock rainbows which I get smoked .

This ^^^ is the way I go about this fishing lark too.

Whilst I like smoked trout I would never take a 'wildie' as they are now quite rare down here on the lesser rivers, and a lot of the WBT caught of that size on the commercial beats are stock fish to keep members happy.

[dickymint]

coppice said:

dickymint said:

Lovely pan size fish or do you grill em?

I put back nearly all wild trout - because

-I don't fish to eat

- I don't especially enjoy eating them anyway

- we have a catch and release policy

- even if we didn't , I'd put them back. The upper length(15 ,miles plus ) of my river have never been stocked and being able to capture such lovely , indigenous creatures is reward enough.

The only fish I kill are big stock rainbows which I get smoked .

Well I certainly read the photo wrong and assumed as he was on the bank he'd felt "the priest"
Fish I return are shaken off and not "landed".
Our stretch of the Usk is stocked yearly but they have to be specially bred from the indigenous strain.
I take a max of one for me and one for Wifey and only pan size.
No Rainbows in the Usk but was amazed when I caught one about fifteen years ago! Nobody has any idea how it got there.

[pequod]

dickymint said:

coppice said:

dickymint said:

Lovely pan size fish or do you grill em?

I put back nearly all wild trout - because

-I don't fish to eat

- I don't especially enjoy eating them anyway

- we have a catch and release policy

- even if we didn't , I'd put them back. The upper length(15 ,miles plus ) of my river have never been stocked and being able to capture such lovely , indigenous creatures is reward enough.

The only fish I kill are big stock rainbows which I get smoked .

Well I certainly read the photo wrong and assumed as he was on the bank he'd felt "the priest"
Fish I return are shaken off and not "landed".
Our stretch of the Usk is stocked yearly but they have to be specially bred from the indigenous strain.
I take a max of one for me and one for Wifey and only pan size.
No Rainbows in the Usk but was amazed when I caught one about fifteen years ago! Nobody has any idea how it got there.

Rainbows have escaped from fish farms down here and it's not unusual to catch one on the river Test! Yes, I know, the hallowed waters but it is a long river and many different ff owners/clubs have inadvertently released them.

I look forward, one day, to gaining my N Yorkshire permit to fish stretches of wild rivers and land a genuine WBT bigger than 4 ozs!!

[nigelpugh7]

I went to a new BAA site yesterday, long story but will update later.

But in support of Catch and release i was surprised to see signs at the water relating to “ Operation Leviathan “

Seems that BAA decided enough was enough, and wanted to stop people fishing without a membership, without an EA Rod fishing licence, but more importantly to stop such people catching fish without a licence and taking them away from the water with a motive to kill and eat those fish.

https://www.baa.uk.com/latest-news/announcements/p...

I will be honest i was quite shocked such a thing actually went on!!

Edited by nigelpugh7 on Friday 2nd October 18:47

[nigelpugh7]

nigelpugh7 said:

I went to a new BAA site yesterday, long story but will update later.

But in support of Catch and release i was surprised to see signs at the water relating to “ Operation Leviathan “

Seems that BAA decided enough was enough, and wanted to stop people fishing without a membership, without an EA Rod fishing licence, but more importantly to stop such people catching fish without a licence and taking them away from the water with a motive to kill and eat those fish.

https://www.baa.uk.com/latest-news/announcements/p...

I will be honest i was quite shocked such a thing actually went on!!

[pequod]

nigelpugh7 said:

I went to a new BAA site yesterday, long story but will update later.

But in support of Catch and release i was surprised to see signs at the water relating to “ Operation Leviathan “

Seems that BAA decided enough was enough, and wanted to stop people fishing without a membership, without aN EA Rod fishing licence, but more importantly to stop such people catching fish without a licence and taking them away from the water with a motive to kill and eat those fish.

https://www.baa.uk.com/latest-news/announcements/p...

I will be honest i was quite shocked such a think actually went on!!

From your linked article, this is the real problem ...

''The real aim of Operation Leviathan is catch and convict the type of criminal that can cause greater harm to the sport by using nets, traps and long lines to remove fish. This type of offender is often involved in other types of organised crime.''

I'm not surprised (or shocked) that this goes on and. I dare say, there are plenty more examples up and down the country of poaching on an industrial scale.