You know how it goes; romantic notions of the birds singing anew, the smell of wild garlic carpeting river banks and crushed beneath your wader boots, that nervous excitement of wondering if you can still throw a decent loop, tying on one of the hundreds of flies that you have tied over the last few months… Spring trout fishing is full of cliché. It begs the question though, if enough people are coming to the same conclusion, maybe it’s for good reason? Since moving to Devon, I’ve been spoiled for choice for rivers to wax lyrical with the same cliché, throw some dodgy flies tied in the absence of time on the water and drifting further from their intended pattern, and maybe even snag a fish or two. Fortunately, between fighting to improve my computing to analyse trout genomes, I’ve found the time to get a few trips in between initial high-flows and latter east winds that have otherwise given a uninspiring start to the 2021 season.
On one such trip, nymphing deep through some pots I’d noted last season, I eyed up a few rises as the upper reaches of this river ran cold and clear off the moor, likely sipping the odd large dark olive or midge that were feebly coming through. Snipping the 4.5mm tungsten depth charges off the leader, a pair of small simple spiders were subbed in, the point with a little copper bead to anchor the rig. Crawling on my knees, eyes intent on where rings had formed a few minutes ago, willing another rise to confirm systematic feeding, I nearly jumped out of my waders where a voice hollered over, ‘Any luck, mate?’ I’ll not give the offender away, but by saying that they were male and middle-aged to elderly should suffice for a description whilst still including 99% of the club members. ‘Not yet’ I slyly replied, one eye still on the tail where the fish had been rising. With a shrug, they moved on and eyes were back onto the pool ahead, crawling up the riffle. Casting spiders on a French leader isn’t the easiest, but content that I was close enough, I waited for one more rise to confirm that I hadn’t spooked the source of the rises. Another dimpling of the surface and the spiders were slung over, rod raised high and a nice 11’’ fish was soon brought to hand.
The rest of that session was fairly quiet, though I expected
the best of the water in the second half of the beat where I’d caught my best
fish last season. You can imagine then my horror as not simply one but two
generic middle-aged men had, having seen me fishing downstream, decided to wade
and fish upstream of me, spooking the water that I’d anticipated. They smiled
and walked over, consoling that there were no fish rising and that it was still
too cold, expecting me, the scruffy junior, to agree. Apparently put back by
this upstart, they boasted gladly of the 2lb brownies that they had previously
caught on this beat and high on the moor, on the very same flies they had tried
today. A car crash of a rig if I ever did see one too, barely 7ft of leader to
a generic klinkhammer, with a large gold beaded hares ear tied with maybe even
thicker mono only a few inches below. It seems that they expected the trout to
bow before their angling egos, rise obviously and hang themselves on a blunt
and dragging fly. Having my butt kicked more often than you’d like helps you to
remember that you’ve got to bring something in your approach to the river and
the trout owe you zilch, when you get a little too big for your wading boots.
Perhaps I’m just bitter though…
The last year has had many of us thinking about making the
most of what’s on our doorstep and fishing local, something that was once more
of a necessity than a quirky notion. That spring a few years ago was a whole
disaster bucket of stress; preparing for final university exams, trying to
fundraise £50 000 for an plastics pollution project in the space of a couple of
months and fighting the slugs off of my veg plot in the midnight hours. Sparse
log book entries reveal the unsurprising fact that fishing had taken a back
seat. With limited time and reliant on pedal and foot power for transport, it
was a good opportunity to indulge in a game of, ‘find the tiniest stream nearby
that you can catch trout from’, with a myriad of small coastal brooks feeding
into the large rias of Cornwall to choose from. Strolling out on a sunny spring
afternoon, donning wellies and a cheap 7ft fly rod in hand, I set out to scout
one such spot. Tucked into a valley behind a large residential housing estate
and draining off two large reservoirs, heavily culverted and canalised before
meeting the sea, and narrow enough to jump across in almost all places; this
had all the makings of an high-scoring location in the improbable trout stream
game.
Picking between trollies and suspension springs, bow-and-arrow casts and squashed rolls were just enough to get a scruffy nymph into some tasty looking deeper pockets. To my amazement, time and time again, the yarn indicator would hesitate nervously, prompting a strike and a wonderful jewel of a trout would be revealed. Some fair fish too, up to 11.5’’ which is not to be sniffed at in the West Country. As it turns out, this little stream is a real pocket of refuge to wildlife in an otherwise built-up area, with a friend’s camera trap even managing to capture otters and water rail making use of this habitat. Walking here, I’d not expected much but to steal away a few hours for my own silly little game. I was happily gifted with more than one might catch from a big-name river on another day, adding a spring to the welly-clad stride on the 45 minute trudge back.
Fishing on a known river can take some of the joy out of
this absurd game that we revere as fly fishing, expecting the river to deliver what
it has before. The clichés tell the truth – the river is never the same one day
to the next and yes, I’m afraid, even if you have shelled out for an expensive
ticket, it really doesn’t owe you anything. Perhaps that is the joy of spring,
as we all fall in love again with aquatic and riparian ecosystems bursting with
life, seeing it all in high contrast after yet another monochrome winter, not
falling into expectation for this trip to be the same as the last. You bet that
I’ve got some big plans for the season ahead but for now at least, you’ll find
me chuckling away at another humble brown trout and enjoying each gift from another
overlooked stream.
