Luring Trout, Or Not

As the Bank Holiday traffic didn't look too bad I made my way out to the beck. I took both fly and lure kit with me, just in case. A quick wander about, on arrival, showed it to be much the same as last visit. Plenty of midges and very little else, so I grabbed the lure rod and headed to the tree tunnel. There was even less space than last year and even less sign of fish.

With a bit of care I was able to flick the little lure about with out snagging up too much and after a few casts I had my first follow, a tiny little pike which swerved away at last moment. A bit further on a trout of about 9-10" hit the Salmo Minnow with a thump and, despite a good strike as well, throw the hook on it's first jump. Inspection of the hooks showed one to have the point bent over. Must inspect hooks more often when bouncing lures over gravel stream beds. 

Near the end of the tunnel, with a new lure attached, I contacted with another fish. It felt quite substantial initially, but soon gave up and turned out to be a 8oz chub hooked in the belly. Not really sure how it managed that as the lure was stationary when it hit.

Out in the open again, I spotted a few olives fluttering about along with a few damsels and a mayfly. This looked like a good hint to get the fly rod. Wandering back to the car it was obvious there was quite a few olives about, but no sign of fish rising to them. Despite wandering about for an hour with the fly rod the only rises I saw were from small dace.

I'm not really sure where the trout have got to, although I've known it like this in the past. They can suddenly reappear, whether they come in from the main river, drop down stream from the little feeder streams I don't know. One can but hope.