I've been so focused on ticking off a 2020 fly fishing bucket list - trying to fit in special fishing trips in the limited free time I had, rather than squeezing in the regular stuff - that I somehow forgot about the fisheries on my doorstep. For instance, the thoughts of chasing after big Clanwilliam [...]
Is there such a thing as a perfect fly? I believe there are many well tied flies that have a great 'strike rate' among different fishes - these, in my book, qualify as 'perfect' flies. When I say 'well tied' I don't mean 'pretty', but rather clever combinations of materials to create buggy flies that [...]
The Berg River in Paarl is a special place for me and many of us at Feathers and Fluoro. I have fished the river's headwaters for trout and, a bit lower down, for smallmouth bass. That was before the province built the Berg River Dam flooding what was some of my favourite river fishing close [...]
I have often wondered when the original art of fly tying will finally be replaced by its modern incarnation, as fuelled by social media and the fly fashion show: fanatically dressed lures for fishing on fly rods. Much as I admire modern ingenuity and engage in hours of toil behind the vice in order to [...]
You're standing right above them, on a bridge, the water is crystal clear and about a metre deep. Its flowing quite strongly and the carp are sifting along the bottom, nose into the oncoming current. We've all been tempted to drop a fly off a bridge somewhere along the line, we can see fish clearly [...]
Having to channel all my fishing desires into fly tying like many others in these strange times I have been honing some pattern ideas for carp. One fish food source that is abundant in most freshwater bodies is tadpoles and around here they are about all year round. Like many creatures, hundreds are born to [...]
When Frontier Fly Fishing brought out a bunch of new rods from their in-house brand Horizon, we stuck our hands up to conduct some long-term reviews. There was definitely an element of nostalgia behind such a magnanimous display of selfless volunteerism. Many of us still have or have had Horizons. It’s been around a while [...]
Everyone should be well aware that carp on fly is now entering that ‘booming’ phase - that exponential growth phase in popularity when most trout anglers discover just how nice and challenging it is to catch something else on fly, like tarpon...While reading up on the carp fishing history in our country I realised that [...]
I recently bought a spey rod, not for searuns, steelhead or salmon, but for carp on fly...You see I live in South Africa and we can cast across most of our trout streams with a 3 wt (and we don't have any searuns, steelhead or salmon). While I'll definitely also be hurling flies into the [...]
A story of two smallmouths and water under the Gouritz River bridge by LeRoy Botha in issue 19 of The Mission "14 November 2012. It’s incredibly hot and the wind is shunting. I’ve come prepared for a day or three’s fishing: food, tent, beer, gear. The Upper Gouritz River at this point is a wide, [...]
