I reckon I walked about seven miles or so up and down the bank of the river looking for rising fish. I also did a lot of siting about watching, so it wasn't too bad. I'd heard that there had been an obvious increase in fly life and fish rising to them. This was confirmed, as I was get ready, by a man in a van that stopped to have a look. While there was fish rising they were mostly dace apparently. He'd only had one trout to dry fly this season. The problem he reckoned was that he was never there at the right time. It was only while he was at work and passing that they hatches seemed to happen.
As I wandered down to the bottom of the stretch I saw very little fly life apart from 'black stuff'. The rising fish, as predicted, where all dace. Among the little 'uns were a few decent sized ones which will no doubt disappear once the coarse season starts. As I wandered back upstream things were no different. I tried a few random casts with a midge pattern that resulted in the odd little dace. By the time I'd got back to the car, some two and half hours later I'd seen none of the olives I'd been promised. There was, however, a mayfly trying to cling to the car window in the breeze. A couple more were fluttering about in the field.
After a cuppa and contemplate I decided to give the little river another chance and not move. There was an increase in fly life as I wandered back to the bottom. The number of olives of all sizes wasn't huge but there should have been enough to entice the trout up. I wasn't far from the bottom of the stretch when I spotted a trout rising. It was popping out from under an overhanging willow and grabbing something. I changed to a John Storey, a good general emerger type pattern, The first cast was with in inches of the tree but the current dragged it immediately. My wiggle cast, to overcome this, was either eighteen inches short or landed in the tree. Luckily it didn't snag. After several attempts it was clear I'd put the fish down.
Just round the corner another trout was rising right in the side of the bank. I normally avoid wading in this river as it's mainly a sandy bottom which you can sink into or it's rather deep in places. I could see the bottom here and it was reasonably solid. Despite my cast been a bit wayward the fly disappeared after six inches of drift. A rather acrobatic fight ensued before a nice fourteen inch brown trout was landed. I popped back to the previous spot but after fifteen minutes of waiting there was no sign of the trout.
I didn't see any more trout for quite some time and the fly life was thinning out. At a log jam another trout was rising but at the upstream side. A wiggle cast landed a bit short of the mark but the was enough slack for it to reach the log. A couple more of the these and a very splashy rise and I was in again. A slightly small fish at thirteen inches but very powerful that jumped out of the net as I started to lift it. The hook hold held I got it second go.
Not a great day but if the fish aren't looking up then there's not much you can do. Hopefully if the hatches get more regular better sport will be had.
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