Flyfishing FWSW

Tried the stream this afternoon and was welcomed by legions of Roach that
pretty much ignored most of my offerings.
Finally I got one decent fish out of the school who put up a fight and scared
the rest of the school away.

Further upstream I ran into the first trout who managed to escape.
Had a go at the Dace that where feeding in the surface but they saw me and ran off.

When I saw another trout I wondered if the local syndicate had been on
a stocking spree again.
I decided not to use a lure but drift a nymph to the stationary brown, the
fish did not think twice and grabbed the nymph.

The weather was unsettled and when it became dark and thunder was heard
I took cover at the local watermill.

When things cleared up I fished a small white lure in one of the pools hoping for more trout.
Nothing hit the white lure so I switched to black which turned out to be the ticket for the trout.
Hooked one that threw the hook and had two fish showing interest.

When I looked at my watch I saw that I was already well past my intended departure time so I called it a day.
Maybe the trout will last untill next weekend.

The sudden weather change did not forbode much good this weekend.
We went from warm spring weather to a cold and windy weather pattern.
Since I had tied a bunch of nymphs I wanted to test I headed to the stream
anyway despite the less than ideal weather situation.

The weather turned out to be exactly as the weather forecast stated, lousy.
You could get pretty wet from that “light” rain.

At my first tried and tested pool I put some of the new nymphs to a test.
These flies where tied with normal weight bead heads so they would take a time to reach the
proper depth.
I spotted the roach having a go at them even before they had sunk to the bottom which was not
noticable on the indicator.
For some reason I could not get the roach interested to take the nymphs.
Since the stream was recently stocked with trout I decided to switch my setup and fish a streamer instead.
I had a nice trout follow the streamer but it just missed the fly.
I fished the pool thoroughly to get another strike but the trout declined.
A few pools further upstream I caught at least a small perch.
Some more casts delivered another perch which was bigger and fought very well.

I still wanted to test the nymphs so I checked out another pool.
The pool in question boasted some feeding fish as I could see something silvery flanking in the depth.
I had a few hits of some small trout but the silver fish where nowehere to be seen.

When I increased the length between the nymph and the indicator to reach more depth I received the
first strikes.
The roach that came to the surface was of pretty good size.

Two roach was all I got get from the pool.
The combination of low water, not many fish to be seen and lousy weather made me decide
to call it day.
Spring had progressed a little further now that debris from flowering trees where covering the surface of
the stream.

It was interesting to see that for the first time the dace where actively nosing in the surface for edible items.
If only the temperatures would increase then it might be possible to fish the dry fly.
Another thing I noticed where the many goldfish in the stream, I guess somebody had dumped the
contents of their garden pond into the stream.
The herons would probably make short work of those fish.

The day started today cold and foggy but when the sun broke through it got pretty warm.
I fished one of my favorite pools upriver and had a ball.
I even hooked three of the elusive carps which all managed to throw the hook.
I will be back … for those carp.

All kinds of fish species where moving in my pool.
Oddly I spotted two lampreys in the stream, never seenthose before.

Trout season was open so I could fish the full length of the stream again.
Had a go at the Roach and then ran into the stockies.
There where a lot of them and surprisingly small fish as well.
Hooked about 7 brown trout, had one legal size and two small ones
who all went back.

When I returned from upriver I could not believe how many anglers where dunking worms in the streams.
I guess they all hibernated.
If my calculation is right then the stream will be troutless before the end of the month.

Last saturday the weather was not so pleasant for fishing so I tied some nymphs and lures instead.
On sunday the weather was decent so I decided to field test the new flies.

Besides the pheasant tails I had tied some brassies and fitted them with a tungsten gold bead hoping they would do the trick.
I scouted the stream for suitable test objects but the stream looked empty.

After a while I found some fish but to get near to them was quite difficult.
I managed a few drifts and caught the first small dace of the season.

I wondered where all the roach had gone – none to be seen.
As I came near the watermill in the village I noticed that the roach where present.
It looked however like something was chasing them so I figured that somebody might have stocked trout for the opening of the season
next week.
Since I could not clearly make out what moving in the water it might also
have been a perch so I tied on a small lure to see what was in the pool.
One small perch had a go at the fly but that was it.

It was time to switch to the nymphing setup again and vist the good spots where more roach could be found.
At one spot where a tree had fallen in the water I could spot dozens of roach between the submergded branches.
It was an unfishable spot though as the nymph would get tangled in seconds in the debris.
Further upstream I managed to catch a couple of roach and I am happy to day that the fish are increasing in size.

I had a little talk with one of the villagers who mentioned that he had seen quite a few cormorants this winter.
We have to see what effect they have had on the fish population.
It is still early season though so I suspect that the big schools of roach and dace will pop up when the countryside is green again.

The 30th. of April is a national holiday in the Netherlands to celebrate the birthday of the queen.
We use it to go fishing in Germany at one of our favorite haunts which is the Möhne river run by
the fishing store Flyfishing Europe formerly known as Flyfishing Brinkhoff.
Since Queensday fell on a Saturday this year we decided to skip work and fish the Möhne on Friday

My friends and I live near the German border so to reach the river only requires a drive about an hour plus.
We arrived just before the opening of the store and first stocked up on flytying gear before we got our
licenses and headed for the river.
At the store they directed us to the upstream part of the river where we curiously had never fished even
though we had visited the river for years.

The upstream stetch looked good, it even was wadable which is not always the case at the Möhne river since the
banks are usually high and are formed of slippery clay.
It was low water and in this case that was good, even now some of the pools where so deep that
I hardly stayed dry. 
I opted to fish with the streamer, on my first retrieve I already had two trout chasing the fly so fish where
stacked in this section.

I hooked and lost a lot of fish on this day.
Not the big monsters that this river was famous for (haven’t seen them for a long time now) but regular size fish.
There where a lot of brook trout around so I figured the fish had been stocked recently especially since I
spotted a whole group of them in one place.

I fished the river and caught rainbow trout, brown trout and brooktrout.
Furthermore I spotted one koi carp, a pike and a quite hefty chub.

At the end of the day the weather suddenly changed and clouds rolled in.
Suddenly it started to blow which was a sign for me to scramble back to
the car as lightning was immenent.
The first impact was too close for comfort so we sheltered in the car to
see if the weather would improve.
With dusk knocking on the door we moved to a more easily fished stretch of the river
and started to fish when we determined it would be safe to do so.
We where just halfway wnen lightning struck the nearby hillside so it was back running
to the car.

We waited half an hour and had a third go at the river.
The thunderclouds where gone, it only poured for a while.
I fished the last hour with a streamer and had many hits but only managed a last
brook trout and one rainbow trout.
A very good day for us at the river.

I had to travel for work recently to the German Baltic coast 
so just in case I had some spare time I took a flyrod with me.

My collegues and I where visiting a milk processing plant and 
while I was thinking about searun browns at the nearby coast
my co-workers where more likely to go out drinking at the hotel.

With some persistance I managed to coax them into dropping me off
at the coast so I spend my couple of hours on the German Baltic 
sea coast.
The water was clear, baitfish where around and the weather was nice so I was expecting some fish.
But … it did not work out as I planned and although I had fished extensively for a couple of hours I could not get a single bite.







Beach

My lodging, the barn to the left.
I picked the hotel and it turned out that the location was featured in
some well known German soap series … which I had never heard of, whatever

On day two of my visit I was quite early at the beach but then the weather had completely changed.
The placed Baltic sea was now boasting pretty whitecaps and the wind was blowing right in my face.
All that wave action rooted up the seasweed making the water a murky mess.
I could not even spot the large boulders that where spread around so I almost took a swim.
Still it was better to be outside than hanging around in some hotel.







I did chat to some of the locals though for some intel.
Appearantly in the morning when I was still working conditons where nice and searuns where spotted hunting along the shorelines.
Some bait fisherman where still out fishing and talked about catches
of flounder.
If the weather was favourable it was even possible to catch cod from the beach.

Maybe I should have invested in a fishing license for the river in the town where my hotel was located.
The banks there where packed with anglers since the Herring where running up the river to spawn.
Maybe I have more luck if I ever go there again.