Matching the Hatch

'Well, I'm back'. The closing words of Sam, having returned to the Shire at the end of Tolkien's epic. Simple words, and yet carrying so much weight with them, as the reader has journeyed 1300 emotional pages to hell and back again is his company. Unremarkable such words might be, were it not for this journey that we've been on. And with a similar feeling can it be said, 'well, we're back'.

I've laid low, not saying too much too publicly, only close confidence with those who might understand. Maybe that's an unfair slur, maybe folks are more sympathetic than I give credit for, yet fear of proof to the opposite perhaps being true holds me back. We've come a long way in the past few months and I'm sure that we've still a long way to go. It feels a mockery when grief is still all too real. Lost people, lost security, lost plans and insufficient experience of the like to process it all. It's less than two months till I was due to be married, the happiest day of your life so I hear. And yet now we can't quite be certain of where we will be in two weeks time. And yet, as I wrote about in the last post, angling and its wild places offer just the refuge, the escape to process, that I'm sure so many people need right now. And with that I bring this rambling introduction to a close: The return to fishing is a sweet thing and all the sweeter for the bitterness of late.

I've missed country lanes. Scooting along, half asleep, woken periodically by a patch of loose gravel or blind corner, driven through the gloaming half light of dawn by the thought of fish. Maybe they're already on the feed, maybe we've missed the tide? This early in the season such concerns are largely without merit, the fishing is rarely as dramatic as activity towards late summer. But such sessions early in the season prove a valuable learning experience, finding the marks that might prove fruitful later in the year without wasting that precious window. On this particular morning, Stuart and I planned to check out a headland new to both of us. Without any reliable information online, we were left to spend the first 45 minutes or so simply working out access routes to a rocky platform below. We're beaten back on many of our first attempts, the schist proving too snappy and steep, or small blobs of windswept grass crumbling away from their poor foundation of thin soil upon rock. Happily, an access route is eventually beaten, though requiring some slab traversing on thin pockets above deep water - less easy with a rod in hand.

'I think we have grown soft', Stuart concedes to my suggestion as, to my surprise, he's the first to buckle to sitting a little while out of the bite of the penetrating east wind. As suspected the fishing isn't easy, with just a couple of small pollock to myself and a foul hooked sandeel for Stuart (quite a remarkable catch really) but it's nice to catch up and be back on the exposed SW coastline. We traverse back as the tide rises, mindful not to lose our barnacle encrusted route to the lapping waves, giving a shallow bay a try for a wrasse. Happily, one such fellow obliges and gives my natural black minnow a smash as it was drawn perpendicular to a kelpy shelf. The donkey-like teeth of ballan wrasse generally make short work of such a soft bodied (and expensive!) lure, but this always seems to outperform other soft plastics in locating wrasse at a new mark. After a short scout around coast path for any more likely looking spots to check out next time, we call it a day and part ways. Or at least Stuart calls it a day, I've still got the whole afternoon on my hands...

Give us a kiss... incredible blue and green rubbery lips give way to crab crunching molars.

It's quite amazing how quickly litter can accumulate in my car: empty engine oil bottles, CD cases, half chopped leaders, custard cream packets. After a brief rummage, an OS map is located. Crunching down yet more custard cremes, I trace the blue veins of the rivers of South Devon, stretching upwards into the depths of Dartmoor. The lower reaches of these waters are prized, lorded over by gluttonous clubs asking ticket prices in excess of my budget to feed myself, let alone cast a line. One particular square of this map is located however where no such barrier is to be found, where the river is so narrow that it can be jumped in many spots and tangled branches reach across the whole way. I follow a hunch and make my way up there, it's kind of on the way back anyway I justify.

Little to my knowledge, it seems that everyone else has had the same idea. Pulling up towards the car park, I notice a lady sneer from her Range Rover at the occupied parking bays before skulking away. I manage to back my wearied campercar up onto a grass verge, making sure to keep the front wheels clear of loose gravel so as to allow my escape later. I soon realise that perhaps not everyone has had the same idea and start to get the distinct feeling of being a zoo animal, as families passing with picnic mats and tugging cries of children suggest a very different purpose for their being here, young children staring at my uncouth waders to their parents embarrassment. No matter, I'll keep off the busy highway of the footpath through my own path of the riverbed.

I stop for a moment to photograph a mayfly upon my wing mirror. The first I've seen this year and a sure sign of the season and with it the good things to come. Getting to the river, the clutter of buggie wheels are drowned out over the soft rumble of this clear, low river. A canopy of oak and sycamore filter the heat and brightness of the mid-afternoon sun, encapsulating a damp, dappled-green tunnel. Large mossy boulders offer cover from which to cast in the thin water, whilst long fallen trees bridge the stream and offer vantage points. Black gnats buzz and in thick clouds over the fast water at the heads of pockets, and a small black klinkhammer is tied on to try to best match. It might seem an absurdity to an onlooker to try to get inside the mind of a fish, the brain being perhaps the size of a pea at best and yet such is the central dogma of much of fly fishing. In fairness, behavioural ecology models do suggest that it can be energetically beneficial to an organism to lock on selectively to a small food item and ignore rare more calorific food items when such small items are encountered frequently enough, so forgoing a large (and less agonising to see!) mayfly in favour of a pathetic tiny black imitation does have some sense. The trout however disagree, as pool after pool is fished through without the usual suicidal approach of Dartmoor's diminutive brownies.

They're not always big in size but wild Dartmoor browns certainly lack nothing in character. 

Having fished through one particularly deep slot in the gorge, with only a half-hearted inspection by one unimpressed fish, I looked ahead to the next pool. A cursed golden retriever came bounding through into the shallows, followed by owners. Disappointment is hidden best as possible beneath beard, cap and polarised glasses, as the couple hold a phone aloft to take a picture of this real-life, wild, free-range adolescent fishing dirtbag, spooked trout skittering behind unbeknownst to them. I take a moment to sit and think, or more realistically sulk, this is quite a pleasant river but the fish really aren't having it. As I do so, a young child walks along the path above chattering happily to their mother about looking for tadpoles, bucket in hand. I crack-up into a smile, remembering being that very kid except I, unlike most, never seemed to grown up from seeking out the wild squishy beasties of the outdoors. Who knows, maybe this kid will grow up into an unwashed obsessive angler too.

But it sparked a moment of thought too. If you were to read much into the fly selection of lots of aesthetic traditional fly fishermen you might think that the humble brown trout has the weightwatcher's own slimming club diet, only picking at the dainty little insects that float. But if you look into the real diet of brown trout, particularly in nutrient-poor acidic rivers, bigger individuals need to be stomaching much more substantial items in order to hold any weight up, the biggest fish often even becoming cannibalistic. Here comes the potentially controversial bit: matching the hatch, a phrase often tied up in the aesthetic world of select dry flies, should then often lead you to try to imitate the fatter more nutritious items than just little midges or even (dare I say it) fishing mayfly patterns for the sake of tradition (I recently made an appearance of Fly Culture's podcast with Pete Tyjas, touching during that time on that very matter. It was an absolute blast and honour, and you can listen to it here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/402997).

Looking down into a shallow eddy, I spied those little black squirming figures that made up many a childhood escapade. Surely a tadpole must make a pretty nutritious and welcome meal for the desperate trout of Dartmoor? It certainly doesn't come with the awkward chitinous packaging that most arthropods that they're used to do. Nipping off my klinkhammer, I delve into my fly box for a likely imitation. Perhaps were it not for so many hours in the flat, sinking deeper into madness late at night and into the peeping hours of the new day, I might not have tied up some of the less orthodox patterns in there. I thank my moments of madness on this occasion, as I pick out a heavy tungsten weighted jig hook, dressed with black dubbing and a short black marabou tail. Perfect, as tadpole as tadpoles come. The pool here looks as though it reaches depths of perhaps 4-6 feet, though hard to tell in the crashing white water. Clambering above, it's possible to flick the fly into the churning undercurrent and hold it deep on merely the leader and a foot of fly line outside the tip of the rod.

Tadpoles and my little tadpole imitation.

The drift stops, flicking the tip upwards to free the fly of some snag, only to find the snag pulsating and throbbing in the strong current. It worked! In such a manner, a handful of otherwise elusive brownies are brought to hand, including a very nice fish for these parts of 10.5". Slipping the barbless hook from the upper lip, my fingers graze some sharp teeth. Such teeth surely can't be for sipping little insects and, save sexual selection, nature is rarely superfluous. Here's the noodle bending bit, was this capture an excellent exercise in matching the targeted food item, or merely exploiting the aggressive tendencies of trout towards an easy meal. Might it not equally be said though that to fish a dry over the water, even a mayfly, when the trout are not feeding on such is not matching the hatch but instead just inducing the aggression of trout towards surface food items?

That's like a real sized trout! Quite a specimen compared to Dartmoor's usual standard. 

I catch plenty more trout as the afternoon wears on, just shy of 30 and the majority on elk hair and CDC caddis in shallower glides. No caddis hatch was seen, but such a fly is buoyant and visible and thereby easy to fish when the trout aren't being too selective. Despite the usual esteem for dry fly fishing as being the 'proper, right and respectable' way of catching trout, those fish which came to my tadpole imitation were those which felt most rewarding. It sets the mind wandering, where there's a bunch of thumbnail sized froglets about in a few weeks, will the trout lock onto those too? What possible Frankenstein frog fly could imitate them? You can keep the mayfly, it's all about the tadpole hatch for me now...

Okay, I guess mayfly fishing is kinda cool too... 

Where shall we go when the gates are locked?

Skylarks mockingly sing their cheerful tunes, parachuting effortlessly to the ground before flitting back to their aerial displays. I wobble unnervingly, just about holding balance as my front tyre sinks into the rut of another babyhead, carrying sweaty momentum forwards. Apart from the lumbering heave of my panting, the crunch of dry grassland and shrill calls of moorland birds, the landscape is empty. It’s no wonder, even in the long carefree days of school summer holidays this corner of Devon is never busy, and that’s exactly what’s drawn me here. I unclip my pedals in relief as I reach a gate along the bridleway, the path has given up here, not me, my legs have held this far. Reaching for the latch, an angry person has entered my company, seeing a shiny new chain and padlock barring this public right of way.

I’ve no right to complain about the circumstances we find ourselves in during lockdown and perhaps my biggest reflection upon this time is to judge those around me as far more commendable than myself for selfless acts in trying to cope with the COVID pandemic. But after 47 days of working, resting, eating, calling friends, cleaning and maintaining gear and all the other things that make up daily life all within the confines of an inner-city flat, the spirit grows deflated. I’ve grown lazy for lack of excitement in life, and regularly sleep beyond the beckoning call of dawn, mustering a purpose for the day a real marathon effort. Anxiety creeps around the covers as uncertainty grows over the ability for us to hold our long-planned wedding this summer and well laid plans for my PhD research lay scattered. This is the world we find ourselves in though, and no wallowing in self-pity will change that.

Wilderness has always been a refuge for the restless mind, from biblical stories of spiritual growth in the desert to the modern fable of Chris McCandless making peace with American middle-class society by retreating to the hard frozen landscape of Alaska. There’s something about these places that gives us the chance to feel small, give space, to vocalise our grief, put ourselves back together and perhaps return with greater fortitude for it. In my own small way, this process is not alien to myself either. Finishing my final exams a few years ago, I packed the hatches of my kayak with a stove, bivvy gear and a few supplies. In the year prior, in youthful optimism, along with some friends we had decided that we would head to Svalbard to document and make clear the impact of plastic and noise pollution on this apparently pristine arctic wilderness. But with mere weeks to go, we were 10’s of thousands of pounds short, committed by our belief in the need for this kind of work but on the brink of financial ruin. After kayaking a kilometre offshore, a wobbling spec in the waves, a rough landing onto an empty beach and spending the night under a clear sky, resolve was found to commit to go for broke, to see it through to the end. More recently, with no home to speak of but my old car, the weight of a long field season and accompanying loneliness made the deteriorating health of my grandfather all the harder to stomach. Walking the banks of the East Lyn, casting a line for small wild brown trout, washing my cares out with a plunge into the cold, cleansing water, the pieces of life seemed to fit back together.

A dip in the East Lyn. 

I’m very grateful for the ability to still get out running and cycling to break the monotony of everyday life, it’s quite hard to imagine how those in the rather more strict measures of Spain are coping. During these times I ponder where I might go when clipped wings are allowed to grow again, to cast a line. Will I head alone to Dartmoor’s tumbling acid rivers, enjoy the improbable buzz of urban trouting or roam the coastline making more time to chat with long missed partners than to cast? The question reverberates: if you could go anywhere, where? Meeting this locked gate across the bridleway reminds me that I cannot go anywhere, that choice has been taken long before I was even able to walk, swim, cast, climb; the UK’s wilderness has been diminished and privatised. And nowhere is this more apparent than for our waterways.

'But on the other side, it didn't say nothing. That side was made for you and me'. 

A very wet run.

It’s 00:30, a scattering of hook packets lay around my bed, loose dubbing covers my shirt and a selection of scruffy flies are packed up in an envelope. An OS map glows from my laptop screen, numerous tabs open beside. The task at hand to equip a friend with the ability to get out fly fishing. His psyche to get into fly fishing is only matched by my elation to have another fishing partner without a pension scheme. Flies complete, I’m looking for likely looking local water for him. Forget the major rivers, a ticket on these is likely to cost a month’s rent or at least more than what we’d pay to feed ourselves for a week. Instead, I seek out the neglected, arse end tributaries, the turd on the shoe of the lordly water. This is the paradigm that we’ve come to work by, accepting that the most beautiful wonderful places in our own country are held at arm’s length. Not because they’ve been put there by these exclusive fisheries but instead are claimed on some antiquated documents of fishing rights, held as scripture to condemn ruffians such as ourselves. In the words of Joni Mitchell, ‘They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum, then they charged the people a dollar and a half just to see them’.

One of the better rivers we've found, even more fish than trolleys!

Back on my ride, I’m now cruising along forestry fire tracks. Looking at the conifer plantations, I’m taken to the wilds of Northern America. The land there is vast, so I hear, rich, true wilderness. Interest is stoked by Stuart’s tales of fishing in Tasmania, a temperate wilderness not unlike what the UK could have been. Rather than scratching through local post offices, obscure forum entries and dodging the gnashing of untamed farm mutts to knock on doors, here you know your rights. A state fishing permit allows you to roam wherever your spirit might take you, never fearful of having a crazed nutter attack you and steal your fishing rod for casting towards ‘his side on the river’ (a story for another time). I wonder if the populous of these countries suffer the same Nature Deficiency Disorder as we’re widely experiencing in the UK, with school children unable to identify our most common species. We shouldn’t have to fly half way around the world for access to awe inspiring rivers, with such landscapes abundant within our own country, and yet every year it proves more accessible for many people to do just this.

Nick Hart said that I reminded him of one of the American 'Troutbums' on one of the first occasions of meeting him. It took sometime to understand how great a compliment that could be!

In true University Student fashion, I’m milking the most out of a free trial to FishingTV, cancelling this before I have to pay. On the list of top rated films is ‘Chalk’, a story of chalks river fishing in the UK. And you know what, it’s everything I feared that it’d be. To give credit, the nod towards river restoration on the Wandle and smaller Yorkshire catchments give some lift in spirit. But the rest just serves the alienate, as home county accents wax lyrical about the tranquillity, perfection of these rivers, overlaid with slow-motion videos of anglers dressed up in thousands of pounds worth of beige, casting rods and reels worth more than my car, not exclusively retired. Words say that this is the glorious heritage of British fly fishing, what is heard is that you are not welcome in this natural beauty unless you earn such an exquisite income so as to buy your way in.

Aforementioned car. 

A small experiment for the next time you are at a party: Firstly, tell people upon meeting that you are a rock climber. Results generally consist of, ‘Awesome’, ‘Wow that’s pretty cool’, ‘Man, I’d love to go climbing sometime’. Now try and tell the other half of the room that you enjoy fishing for wild trout and you might expect such responses as, ‘I wouldn’t have expected that’, ‘each to their own I guess’ or ‘I’d never have the patience for that’. Now for the purely hypothetical part: I reckon if you repeated this experiment in cultures with open land access, right to roam and without the hoarding of natural beauty behind pay gates, the result would be totally different. Indeed, it doesn’t take much looking to see the difference in the fly fishing scene between the UK and America, New Zealand and Tasmania. The average age of anglers in the latter must be at least a generation younger, full of psyche and positive energy, not arthritis. What would it take to get young people enjoying their own right to wilderness, to give space for their spirits to roam, to find peace against the doomsday barrage of news in the media? Cut the locks, remove the ugly barbed wire, both people and the sport will be healthier for it.

Scottish winter climbing. See a mountain, climb the mountain. Marvellous. 

On a lighter note, various passport style schemes are making a positive change here. The Westcountry River’s trust launched their ‘Fish Pass’ app a little over a year ago, making wild fishing available and easily located for the cost of a pint and pasty. Hats off to them, it’s good to see and has made a big difference to my own fishing. But sadly this remains the exception.

Where will you go when it’s safe for us to wander again? This time of confinement has made all the more clear the need for all people (not just those on London salaries) to roam, to experience wild places and be refreshed by clean air. It’s been suggested that our society will change for this experience. I sincerely hope that the British countryside will become a more welcoming space and the ability to fish a far less exclusive acquisition when we do return.