The title of this blog continues with the theme of having a cold from last weeks tale, though frankly it has little to do with my current dose of the sniffles. I will warn up front this blog is a bit of a rant!
I quite fancied heading to a river this weekend, the Tummel was my immediate thought but I was told it was high and it’s a tricky river at the best of times without contending with a high volume of water. I had made semi-arrangements to head to the upper Clyde but a late rise meant I wasn’t up before fishing buddy Radek had already been down and said it was very windy and pretty busy. He had turned around and headed home….so that saved me a 100 mile round trip!
Plan B
So stockie bashing it was to be, and I decided to drop in on Orchill which as the weather improved towards midday I thought might be quite busy, but which in point of fact was fairly quiet on arrival. Granted there seemed to be a fair few anglers coming off, and it sounded like there were quite a few blanks too. What the reason for this was I could not ascertain tackling up in the car park but it must be said there was a very cold swirly wind.
I had tied up a fresh batch of Golden Damsels and based on their prior success here and also that we should be well into fry bashing season, I thought it might be successful today. But that wasn’t the case. I fished one, with a couple of Diawl Bachs as an opener, near the lodge and not a sniff did I get.
Sitting Ducks…..erm, Fish?
I walked around by the boathouse and could not help but spot there must easily have been between 1 and 2 dozen fish, in the wee bay in front of the hut itself. As they were fairly easy to see, it seemed a bit of an opportunity to drop a few flies over their heads and see what took their interest. The Goldie was totally ignored. A few though did seem hungry to chase the red collar on my Roman Moser mini-con on the end of my intermediate fly line!
Maybe red was the colour? I tied on a red Diawl Bach and a red stalking bug on point. However, these failed to illicit more than the odd turn towards them as they plopped in, then utter disdain.
I gave up after 3-4 fly changes, maybe this was simply a disinterested pod? I fished along the bank from, I think peg #12 for a while and nothing. There were three anglers on the far bank and I could hear their conversation that they had caught a few, but they were all fishing the bung. After I moved up the bank to peg10, another angler came along on my bank and from the conversation I understood he had caught 7 or 8 over the whole day.
There were fish splashing and skittering over the surface all over the loch. However, it was evident very few were being caught. When the fish move like this I reckon they are hitting the small shoals of pin fry that inhabit Orchill at this time of year. I could see them in the margins from time to time and infact later on in the day a fish was almost under my feet hammering the fry in the marginal grass. I have in the past found a small black flashback Diawl Bach to be effective but it was not getting me any takers today. I had tried both a floating line and my initial Intermediate to no effect.
The Guys fishing bungs all ended up on my bank and the first guy was once more into a fish.
The Bung: Fly Fishing? discuss……
Time for a wee rant. If you are a fan of the bung you may want to look away. Now I have no particular bone to pick with the bung as a method in Stillwater. I fully “get it” that sometimes the best way to catch fish is totally static managing the depth with the floating indicator. However, in my experience these occasions are rare. Usually fish respond to movement of some sort, whether very slow, very fast or somewhere in between. If absolutely nothing else is working I will use it myself (very rarely though). However I do prefer to fish a big dry fly like a Stimulator or big Klinkhammer to support the subsurface patterns if I at all can. My main reason for actually using a bung like an airloc, or a fish-pimp (once I have ascertained that static is the only way) is visibility, i.e. If I simply can’t see the dry fly doing the indicator job. It seems though these days many anglers adopt the bung as their first try “go-to” method and I think that is a shame. However, each to their own… Where I really take issue with it as a method though, is what I saw today.
If you are going to fish it, and justify it as fly fishing, at least keep hold of the rod and fish the flies. Casting them out and standing back on the bank with your arms folded waiting on the indicator to disappear under is not in my opinion, fly fishing. Discussing knocks as “line bites” is not fly fishing. Watching the indicator disappear several times and not touching it, isn’t fly fishing. If you want to do that, you might as well put some maggots on and head up to Orchill’s coarse ponds. You are float fishing. Overall when it is your first try “go-to” method I see it as lazy fishing. There is utterly no reason why straight-lining buzzers or nymphs on a floating or midge tip line can’t be as equally effective, and a lot more satisfying as you actually feel the hit as the fish grabs the buzzers. The takes can be electric. Where the fish want it static is the only time I think the bung can be validly employed. If you then put the rod down to watch the indicator/float though, there is a real risk of a deep hooked fish. Maybe not a big concern on a take ticket but on C&R it’s just not on IMO.
I get it that ultimately the reason we fish is to catch fish, but we also accept when fly fishing that is it probably the hardest way to catch a fish. There are so many challenges to it as a method, from learning to cast, selecting the right depth, choosing the fly, the right retrieve and presenting our fly that you ARE going to blank and struggle some days. That’s what keeps me coming back, not sure about anyone else. If you simply want to lob out flies under a float, and put the rod down you may as well go bait fishing in my opinion.
Determined not to follow
I was determined NOT to resort to the bung. A guy on the other side of me was doing likewise. He tried “bung-like” methods like a greased up Blob with a couple of buzzers and a washing line set up but like me was finding offers non-existent. I had tried foam daddies as top flies hoping it might get a response but no.
With the fish behaviour saying “fry bashing” to me I decided to try some flies I tied a while ago, and had some success with but rarely put on. Floating Fry. Now the best ones I have seen are beautifully tied and trimmed deer hair creations, coloured up to look like Perch. Mines were far from as elegant, they were basically a silvery fritz body, a white marabou tail and a foam back pulled over the top and coloured with a permanent marker, and a couple of eyes fixed with resin at the head. I cast this out on my floating line in the area where fish had splashed.
The fish attack the shoals of baitfish and stun numbers of fish then turn back to pick up the casualties so takes can be hard to fish for. As I spoke to my neighbour over my shoulder ( he was leaving) a fish rose for my floating fry but I totally missed it as I was too busy blethering! We both laughed.
It happened twice more and it became apparent the fish were interested in the fly but not off the top. I also think they were looking at the flashback Diawl Bach based on where they rose relative to my point fly.
I decided I had to turn things round and get my floating fry sub-surface.
Back onto the intermediate line, I cast out as far as I could and let it sink to the bottom, which takes about a minute. Then slow twitches back, you have to imagine the floating fry bobbing up and down midwater. Almost right away I felt a resistance and tightened in to find I was hooked into a very strong fish that once netted would have been about 3lb.
It took me ages to get netted it was so strong. I then had about two more casts and it happened again, this time a slightly smaller fish but no less strong. The only issue with this method is that unless you get good solid takes and runs take detection are hard because there is slack in your tippet despite trying to manage the slack and staying in contact with the flies.
I had a move to where the other chap had vacated when he left and rose a few more fish as the fly hit the water but didn’t get any takes here. With a final quarter of an hour to fish I went to where the bung boys had been fishing and detected several pulls that were just too remote feeling for me to get hold of but I was definitely onto something and with time I reckon I might have got more but it was time for tea, and no need for Bungs.
