A Multi Cultural Week.

Well firstly it’s been a while but I have been very busy with one thing and another, but the guiding and casting instruction has been in full swing, the rivers of Wales are super low making the fishing a little harder than normal in May, it’s been quite interesting for me as no two days have been the same, one day good hatches and the next nothing.

But both the Wye and the Severn have fished well considering the low water conditions, the main tactics are long light leaders and being quite stealthy in our approach, nymphs worked well on the Wye and strangely considering there weren’t many rises for this time of year dries worked the best on the Severn.

Over the past week I have taken out gentlemen from America, Canada, Holland and Wales, very multi cultural and almost like the start of one of those old jokes,  a man from America, Canada, Holland and Wales walked into a pub !!

Not Long Now

It’s been a very busy 2016 so not too much time for posting on my blog but things should start to get a little quieter as the weather alters, mind I really do hope we have a good winter this year not all the rain making the rivers un fishable ( fingers crossed for good river levels )

Lots of very nice people learning how to cast, river fishing techniques and generally learning how to enjoy the outdoors, loads of trout and grayling were caught and carefully released to fight another day, also amazing on many of the days the amount of wild life we saw, otters, kingfishers, buzzards, red kites and the amazing swimming squirrel that swam from one side of the river straight at us on the other bank, even making us move out of his way before he climbed up the bank and was on his way.

When I hve a spare few minutes I will put on my blog a few flies that have worked really well over the past few seasons.

 

Seeing Double

Oli came for a days fishing on the rivers of Wales, it was a bit of a deja vu moment as the week before I had Toby Oli’s identical twin fishing with me, also with Oli was his wife Joanie who had never picked up a fly rod, so the day started off going through the basics of casting while Oli fished on his own, which for the first part of the day wasn’t going to well, once Joanie started fishing I could give Oli some attention there was next to nothing moving on the surface so I thought my choice of nymph fishing was the way to go but watching Oli fish there wasn’t anything I could see he was really doing wrong, so I thought it was time for a change so we tried a dry caddis I wasn’t really 100% sure if it would work but they certainly didn’t want a nymph, three cast later a fish came up and smashed the caddis, then another and the grayling wanted to play as well, nothing really rising but the good old caddis never seems to fail.

Toby Oli’s Twin

 

Day Two

Day two with Toby and Gabe went well, a lot more fish caught and the fish caught were bigger to, again fish taking dries were few and far between but they really were getting there fill on nymphs.

Toby caught this lean browny but with a spade of a tail, he caught this fish in a lovely spot right underneath an over hanging tree, drifted the nymph in and bang straight away the fiish took the nymph as always it’s all about presentation.

The grayling were also loving the nymphs as well, I’m not sure how many fish came to the net as I lost count but another good day was had by all.

 

Interesting Afternoon.

Quite an interesting afternoon guiding Rae Borras of the Compleat Angler series that was on Discovery a few years ago. It was down to me to guide him on the upper Severn for Fishing TV, always a little daunting when there are two film cameras on you, it usually spells the kiss of death to the catching side of fishing. After nearly a two hour delay with a puncture we had rather a late start to the day which just added to my stress levels!

As we walked up the river there weren’t any fish moving, so I thought that was it! The first run we tried was a little slow, even though it is usually a bit of a banker for catching a few fish, so on to the next one and Rae caught a small brown right under the grass on the river bank. As the run got deeper I saw a fish move to take his nymph but Rae was just lifting off the water, so close but no cigar. Three or four more casts and it was fish on, it was a nice brown, around three quarters to a pound in weight.  The cream on the cake was the film crew was flying a drone over us for  a different angle of shot and bingo, a better fish came up and took the dry and the whole fight was caught on the drones camera.  I think that will be something to watch hopefully when the filming is all edited and put together.

Mixed Weather But Great Results.

Well today was another mixed weather day sunshine wind, rain a good Welsh mix, today I had Chris with me a coarse angler wanting to learn the gentle art of fly fishing, to be fair Chris was a joy to teach picking everything up really quickly, roll cast, off both shoulders, overhead cast, shooting line and false casting it all came very easily to him, we spent a couple of hours at the casting, then a spot of lunch and onto the fishing I showed Chris a basic nymphing tactic and away we went a little bit of practise in a shallow run to get used to what he had to do the Chris moved down into slightly deeper water and the fish started to come first a couple of grayling, then a nice trout around three quarters of a pound, on the next cast a lovely grayling but it came off but luckily Chris got a good look at it, as we slowly moved down  the run it seemed fish after fish several trout around the pound mark so well worth putting up with the odd rain shower.

Hard Day At The Office !!

Yet again the rain comes down to make my life harder and for the clients not such a nice time, Michael turned up and it was pouring down and by the look of the river gauge it had been raining most of the night, the river was dropping but the way the rain was coming down I didn’t think it was going to be dropping for very long, so we had a chat about what we were going to do and Michael said let’s go for it.

So I took him way up stream looking for clear water but we didn’t find any so deep and heavy sort of day it was going to be, it was very slow fishing to say the least but perseverance was the key and we kept plugging away and finally all the effort payed with a nice brown thrashing away in a fast flowing river, sadly all my fears were confirmed the river was on its way back up, we had a some lunch and moved on down stream to what usually is a slow moving run, but today it certainly wasn’t Michael fished the edge of the fast water and another three browns were hooked two small ones and another half decent one.

The fly of the day was something that I thought I would never use, it was given to me last year or even the year before and been sat in my box, so thank you KJ for the squirmy worm, I think in conditions like this it might be close to matching the hatch in a fast flowing very coloured river.

 

One Of The Best Days In A Long Time

As the title says today was one of the best days on the river I have had in a very long time, it’s been blisteringly hot weather so I asked Ben if would like to meet up a little earlier than we said, he was up for it so we meet on the river at 6am and it was a lovely morning,  in around 15 minutes it was getting even better as fish were being caught and after the first run an amazing amount of fish were hooked I would guess around 30+, it’s not often I’m amazed when it comes to fishing but this little short shallow run was amazing they must have been sitting on each others shoulders, trout and grayling of all sizes.

The sun was now starting to burn through and I thought I would get Ben on dries as the odd fish was moving on the top, Ben was catching and missing quite a few fish but as the warmth started to build the fishing seemed to slow up, we tried a few deep pools with a couple of bigger trout, but by mid day it was starting to get un comfortable in waders so it was time to make a retreat for home, but an amazing morning was had and the time flew by.

Were Never Happy !

Another day on the rivers of Wales the high water has gone and now we have next to no water, as has been said before were never happy are we the main thing is lovely sunshine hatching insects and loads of fish, the river is 1cm from being the lowest it’s been on the EA’s web site gauge, so the river is really low and super clear so presentation is key, fishing at a little more range super fine tippet and of course good casting, the set up is going to be trio  dwo/ldo klink and two size 18 nymphs and 3lb tippet which worked exceptionally well for Drew with a mix of 15 trout and grayling coming to the net a few low impact catch and releases ( came off ) as well.

More Guiding More Bad Weather

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Day out with Bob fishing was good weather was poor, at the start of the day  thought it was going to be a very poor day as the river was coming up loads of debris coming down and very little fly life, it was a slow start till lunch time then things picked up fish on both dries and nymphs to be fair neither Bob or my self had any idea on how many fish he caught but grayling to just over a pound and trout to a pound and a half, with one trout a bit of a lump that unfortunately snapped Bobs leader.