We all know a ticket to a bonefish island or to the Kola or to Argentina is a grand thing to have but, in the end, you just can't beat the UK. I've just returned from two day son the mid River Wye and the beauty was startling. I'm beginning filming for a new Sky series and we decided to try for grayling. We prayed for crystal clear weather, blue skies, nights of bone-crunching frost and we got it all.
We even got a dropping river with fast-clearing colour. We had settled days with next to no wind. Morning temperatures on both days began around freezing but by lunchtime had climbed to ten or eleven. One minute you're crying with the cold, the next you're taking off base layers.
The fishing wasn't easy. Grayling came more readily to float fishing with the new Marksman coarse range than they did to the fly. But in freezing conditions like this, you can't be too surprised. And, you also have to realise that my Czech nymphing technique is ‘sort of' rather than ‘spot on.' If you're wanting the perfect grayling nymph rod, I can't think of a better one than the Marksman ten foot, four-weight. It's a joy and because I knew mobility would be important, despite the freezing temperatures I was happy with EWS waders and a pair of thermal leggings underneath my trousers. Perfect. Mobility and warmth and comfort.
As ever, when you get home you have to sort out what you've learnt from a trip. Being methodical can help you cut corners and save time the next occasion you face the same sort of conditions. Here goes!
- I found the slower, deeper runs seemed to hold the majority of the fish. This was probably to do with the icy water conditions and the burning sunlight.
- Afternoons seemed considerably better than mornings. Probably the peak of the action was between three and five p.m. on both days. One can only assume that after seven hours of sun on the water the fish responded to an increase in temperature however slight.
- Finding the depths to fish nymphs at was critical. I really don't believe that you can fish a nymph for grayling without a strike indicator whatever the purists might say. Apart from signalling bites, an indicator allows you to fish your nymph at exactly the depth you want and this proved essential both days. If I were ever more than a foot from the riverbed I just didn't catch. Simple as that. The fish evidently weren't willing to come up in the water column.
- A fly might work for fifteen or twenty minutes and catch a couple of fish but that would be it. In all, I guess I experimented with fifteen patterns on at least three different sizes through the course of the sessions. Tiny black Goldheads, in the end, probably worked as well as anything. Although I don't like going too light, spider's web leaders also increased bite frequency.
- Half the bites were barely bites at all. The strike indicator simply paused or deviated or fractionally dipped. Almost all the bites that really rocketed down and away were out of season browns. For this fact alone, it's best to fish barbless.
These two days of endless beauty were made exquisitely perfect by the appearance of a large dog otter twenty yards from me on the second morning. He heaved out a struggling three pound eel and there before our delighted faces he munched away oblivious to the whirling film cameras and the click of my Nikon. And do you know, I had the entire river to myself. Not a soul. Not a footprint. Thank you God! And than you Stephen Marsh Smith, Simon Evans and the Wye Usk Foundation for making it all possible. (www.wyeuskfoundation.org)
