Trout catch reports in August are always low for the big UK reservoirs. In the cooler depths, even with a DI8, they are hard to find. Especially when the reservoirs are 30m deep. But we had some toys. We aimed to enjoy a sunny day drifting across the lake, talking rubbish and theorising why we [...]
Gold flashed and I ducked behind the shrubbery. In the pale morning light, a spectacle emerged. A thick black cloud of fry penned in by chub, barbel and bream. There was no urgency. The fish seemed to take turns at the soup kitchen. Fresh fish soup was on the menu. They would slowly cruise into [...]
Sploosh. Another huge rat jumped off the shore into the river. Their swimming prowess underwater is unreal. The speed, agility and comfort in water was surprising. I am sure that pike are all too happy to snack on them. Anyone who watches Fly vs Jerk will have seen the huge success of the [...]
A golden olive back porpoised in the wind rippled surface. Then another, and another. The surface was alive with barbel tucking into dinner. We had found them. Finally. The small balbyter ant plopped near the action. Within seconds pale lips loomed through the surface film to sip it down. A light lift of the rod [...]
"You won't land that fish", said Piet. A sense of finality from the first glimpse of the huge shape passing under his canoe. The most bitter sweet fishing event I have experienced. A family trip floating down the Orange river is magical. Relaxed, social, happy. The fishing pretty good too. The water was ultra [...]
Illuminated subjects, dreamy shadows, texture and pitch-black background looks cool. Low key photography is a genre of photography that caught my interest. What would flies look like shot this way?
Snip, snip. Hack, hack. A fluffy spray of fibres and thread peering out over the hook eye. Familiar? How easy is it to sharpen fly tying scissors? YouTube has many videos on how to sharpen kitchen style scissors with a sharpening stone. It looks easy. But I could not find the same for delicate [...]
A wide 'side-on' profile provides a big silhouette of a struggling baitfish. Easy pickings for a pike or ambush predator. Yet, getting a wide profile deep quickly without much weight is a challenge. Enter the silicone flank jig. Paul Clydesdale and Gunner Brammer inspired the flies shown here - check them out on Youtube. [...]
Manually spooling 300m of backing off and back onto a fly reel after every saltwater trip is painful. But essential to prevent corrosion. A fence wire spooler and a cordless drill offers an easy solution. Fencing spools come in a variety of diameters. This 30 cm version gives you almost a meter per crank [...]
Flames erupted. Fur, plastic and flash morphed and blackened. Smoke everywhere. It stank -the whole house. But the DIY fluff incinerator worked. Next time I will wait for the glue solvent to dry - duh. My fly tying is usually scruffy. I never leave enough space for the head. I forget to add weed guards. [...]
