What is your favourite method of fly fishing? Lures, nymphs, dries? I know there are times when it pays to use a certain method to the exclusion of others to get results but what is your number one way of catching trout?
I love to fish on mild days with some sun and cloud and a gentle breeze to give a ripple on the water. The mild day can be at any time of the year; it does not have to be a summer’s day particularly. In fact I think I like September and October more than most other months.
Stillwaters….. I really like large still waters, lakes, lochs or reservoirs. Among my favourites are Stocks Fishery and Laneshaw in Lancashire, Ladybower in Derbyshire and Fionn in Sutherland, each of which has its own very distinctive character. Rivers come a second favourite mainly because I do not fish them very often as I find many of them physically more demanding than most stillwaters.
….Or Rivers? I used to spend a lot of time on the Derbyshire Derwent fishing for both trout and grayling, depending upon the season. I occasionally have a session on the Aire near Skipton and fish rivers in Scotland and Ireland several times each year. I am not decrying river fishing, merely expressing a preference, but having said that a day fishing for salmon in the north west of Scotland takes some beating.
Tackle Tackle is also an important factor in enjoying a day’s sport. In recent times I have scaled down to five and even four weight rods and lines after spending many years with WF8 and casting into the distance every time. I use a 9ft rod most of the time and I own a lovely four piece Fulling Mill, a very short Daiwa and an old Geoffrey Bucknall fibre glass nymph rod that still copes well with a light line even in windy conditions.
Methods of fishing I do not like going to a water which is populated by a couple of dozen regulars who seem to stand in the same position week in and week out, casting thirty yards directly in front and waiting patiently for a shoal of ‘stockie’ rainbows to swim by. These guys even dress the same and use identical tackle having three rod each with a floating line, an intermediate and a sinking line. They do not resent newcomers to ‘their’ water but exchange knowing looks if someone fishes in a different manner.
I remember some years ago standing in a line of anglers on a prominent Lancashire water when a new arrival came along and, by sliding quietly in and out, went round the water in about forty minutes. The line of anglers netted a couple of fish between them during this time. The newcomer landed ten. His strategy paid handsome dividends but their were snide comments, for example, “Lucky bugger”, “Beginner’s Luck”, “Flash Bastard” and the like. I do not wish to cause embarrassment but it turned out that the angler in question now appears quite regularly on “Tight Lines”. He knew what he was doing.
Fishing on Derbyshire rivers in my youth, I rarely stayed long in one place and I would traipse the bank up and down in a search for a feeding fish. Similarly on stillwaters I love nothing better than to walk the water, look for fish movement and then decide where to fish. Then, having exhausted the fishing in one area, move on to the next.
I fish with lures, for example at this time of the year a zonker fished deep is the fly of choice in the Quarry Lake at Raygill, that lovely fishery in Lothersdale that lies just into West Yorkshire. I very often fish nymphs, perhaps more than any other method.
The dry fly However, my most enjoyable fishing is, without doubt, with a dry fly. There is nothing to compare with the surge and take of a dry fly by a healthy and hungry trout. A two or three pound rainbow on a five weight line and four pound tippet provides sublime sport. Having said that, I can remember a couple of occasions when wild brown trout of half that weight have given a comparable fight. It is quite possible to fish the dry fly in the depths of winter and I have risen, hooked and landed good fish in December and January on milder days. I start each session with the dry fly just to see what is on the move and, if I get no enquiries after a few minutes, I change to something else or move somewhere else on the water.
Light tackle, dry flies, a fine day and venues that entrance the eyes and the promise of two or three hard fighting fish. That’s the ideal. Having said that, most of us go out in all kinds of weather to distant and almost inaccessible places and still enjoy our sport.
