Monday 29 May 2017

Reward for an Hour

A nice relaxing day yesterday, the morning spent in the Garden pottering around, planting up the vegetable patch then parked myself in front of the television for the Monaco F1 race. With time to kill before dinner I decided to slip onto the river for an hour, I wasnt hoping for much as the sun was still high in the sky and the water very low and clear.

Opting for a dry fly approach as I seen a couple of small fish rising whilst setting up I made my way to where I had seen them rise.

3 casts and I was having to re tackle after a fish lunged at my fly and broke my tippet before I even got the chance to strike. Opting for the same tippet as it has been good up to now I re-tackled and stuck on another fly.

I looked around for rising fish but none were forthcoming, then further upstream on the downstream side of a bush I seen rings appear on the water, it had to be a rising fish and being this far downstream I couldn't see if it had any size to it. Walking upstream along the bank until I was on the downstream side of the bush and watched for a few moments, Nothing.

I decided nevertheless to pass a fly over the top of where I had seen the rings appear from and see what came of it. 2 casts over where I thought I had seen the rings appear from and ever so gently my fly was sucked down, Fish on.



At first I thought I had hooked into a good grayling the way it had barely broke the surface and took the fly, and it was motoring under the water like a Grayling in the first initial runs then when it surfaced I knew exactly what it was..... a chub.
I knew there are a few in this part of the river as I have landed one in the past from just upstream but to take a size 18 cdc they must be hungry.



I have to admit in the past I did like fishing for chub, cant beat being on a good shoal of them trotting a stick float downstream and watching the float disappear.


a couple of quick photographs and it was gone at speed off back to the depths of where it came from, Some of the coarse lads I know will by this time be gagging to see a chub like this as it is still the coarse closed season until June.

Walking a short while further upstream to the next pool and saw another fish rising at the tail so covered it again and almost a retake of the first fish I cast to, a lunge, no strike and the fish had broke my tippet. Now twice on the same day makes me wonder if it is indeed the tippet itself. Having just bought this one at the start of the season which came highly recommended for its low diameter I think I will switching back to my more reliable tippet material which gave a bit more cushioning to these type of lunges. With that I decided to call it a day and head back home for Sunday dinner, but well worth the effort of being on the bank for just over an hour



The riverbank was a sea of colour from whites & creams to full blown yellows, a lovely sight to see and when brushing past them set off a multitude of aromas into the air.

                  Not a bad hour indeed!

2 comments:

  1. George we have fall-fish which are very similar, and they are a very formidable opponent on the fly.
    Veggie-planting, F1 racing, and fishing..a complete day.

    ReplyDelete

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