Total Flyfisher Magazine

The brief was simple enough; the contributor I was working with was going to catch fish in clear, cold water. Now this is, at times, fairly easy; you can see what you’re fishing for, they can see your flies and nine times out of 10 it’s quite an easy task.

Sometimes, though, God decides to throw a spanner in the works.
The weather had been settled and quite warm at a steady 8ºC to 10ºC, but the day we turned up to shoot the feature it was minus 2ºC and the bitter northeasterly wind meant it felt a good deal colder. To say this knocked the fishing on the head is a dramatic understatement – it was terrible! The guy fished hard for several hours without so much as a touch.

The fishery manager was on hand to offer all manner of assistance but nothing was working, so I decided to fish. Two rods, after all, can be better than one.

I fished a very small, size 18 Pheasant Tail with a little copper bead on a very long, 18ft leader.
Within two casts, I was in!

I stuck the camera on ‘manual’ and asked the contributor to take some pics, but just as the fish was coming to the net the bloody thing came off!
Now, here’s the strange bit, we never touched another fish all day, despite trying every trick in the book!

Meanwhile, the one other person who was fishing came over and asked how we were getting on, and if we’d caught. With a slightly despondent air we both muttered: “No.”

“Try this,” he said, handing us a bright green Egg Fly. “Fish it a foot below a bung – I’ve had nine on it, one of them a double at about 12lb!”
Fishing, eh? It has a habit of kicking you in the teeth every now and again!

On a brighter note, I recently qualified for the England River’s Final in August, after picking up three first places in four sessions on the Welsh Dee. He giveth with one hand, and taketh away with the other!

Steve Cullen