time to think about summer grayling

my login passwords for business systems are starting to reflect the names of european grayling streams.... time to plan another fishing holiday :-)

mouse patterns!

one of the best flyfishing short films I've seen... absolutely brilliant photography and editing...

Needle Fly fest

A few weeks ago I spent a weekend in Wales with some friends. we fished the Wye on Saturday and Sunday and the Lugg on Monday. The fishing was tough. Saturday afternoon was probably the high point in terms of fish being willing to eat a fly. we had a few fish each fairly quickly to dries and nymphs. as the afternoon drew on I noticed a growing number of needle fly in the air.

I moved to a 2 fly combination of a larger more visible dry as a spotter followed by a small (size 16) needle adult on the point, the results were quite amazing. I missed a lot of takes and connected with quite a few... what was remarkable was how fish were coming out of nowhere to have a go at the needle fly, even in the fastest shallowest water.

my best fish was a 40cm grayling that ate the needle fly 5 times before I managed to connect.

The needle fly pattern I used is extremely simple, consisting of a turkey biot tied facing forward anf then pulled back over a few turns of CDC which are tied in using a split thread technique.

Phil White showed me this pattern while we were both tying at the Spring show this year... thanks Phil!

sunday morning in the meadows

I nipped out this morning for 2 hours on one of the small tributaries near my house....
















loaded with wild brownies and grayling.... and a perch. most were on a small shrimp under a dry (that stream is packed with shrimps) and toward mid day the browns started eating the dry.

the yarn spider makes 'em crazy!

I spent a few hours on the little kentish chalk stream down the road yesterday evening... good hatch of Danica...

but I didn't fish Danica patterns, I tied on a size 16 yarn spider with olive legs and black yarn "body" at the car before really looking at the water's surface. I only changed flies once (to replace the one I hung in a tree with an exact replica). the fish loved it, 4 browns and a few fat roach all came to the dry like missiles.

i love the yarn spider... tying more tonight!

Look what flew past the kitchen window last night!

Mr and Mrs Danica are out and about... I need to get on the stream tomorrow morning!! Look at the size of that thing!

spring in the tribs

Jacques and I got out for a day on a tiny tributary yesterday that flows through crops near my house in Kent. we got a handful of wild browns, grayling and chub on small nymphs and emergers. the hawthorn flies were out in huge numbers with a lot of the dead ones drifting submerged... maybe that's why the fish were pretty difficult.