Fishing the Nidd

I have heard and seen on a few road trips, of the free stone rivers in the Yorkshire dales and when we booked the holiday in the Dale’s I hoped I might be able to get out on some such river. As fishing wasn’t really the plan I only really looked into what was available after the trip was booked. We were staying in Nidderdale and I guess the clue is in the name that this is the valley of the Nidd. I gave the website of the Nidderdale angling club a quick look over and indeed a section of their water was open to public purchase of a day ticket. It also transpired that a friend  told me his brother was a member there but the river had been very low over the summer so hadn’t been fishing well at all.

I had a mental vision that the river would be something like this:

A freestone river/stream in the Yorkshire Dales national Park

But in actuality it was mostly like this: ( I maybe should have taken more notice of the picture on the club website!)

The River Nidd at Pateley Bridge

I think you can see it’s pretty slow moving and totally closed in by tree’s, Alder’s I believe they are.  At Pateley Bridge the beat visitors are allowed to fish, comprises of a section I would reckon to be about 3/4 of very slow dark water a mile above the village and maybe a mile below. If you were bait fishing I guess you could use a  method like trotting or ledgering, through some of the frankly, narrow breaks in the trees, or from some of the casting platforms set up to make the river accessible to disabled anglers. Fly fishing though is pretty difficult. The recommendation was to use a short rod and to wade. I didn’t have a short rod with me ( it’s not something I actually possess) and  but for a very short section near the top of the beat where it was a little more open and the water slightly faster, unless you could get right out in the middle conventional casting was going to be a tree snag-fest of epic proportions. This pretty well set my options at nymphing Czech style provided you could wade. On a couple of walks with the dog I observed that the lower section was moderately faster flowing than the upper half, and also there were noticeably more fish showing, though getting near them was going to be challenging.

I only had one day when I could get a morning to tackle the river so I purchased my day ticket for £12 and set off upstream on foot ( a bit expensive I felt considering some season tickets up here cost that, though the same permit allows you to also fish Scar House Reservoir about 10 miles away) The river is home to Brown trout (stocked and wild) and Grayling. I did however rue, forgetting my wading stick when I loaded the car for the trip down. This would prove a bit of a disaster. The river is described as being “tea stained”, on my day though there hadn’t been significant rainfall at all, think strong tea with a drip of milk in. In anything more than 18″ of water you couldn’t see your feet. I also discovered that near the bank that there was often a significant tangle of roots from the trees protruding into the river and some very deep holes close in. Wading was for the most part treacherous, for me who isn’t that great on my achy knees at the best of times. ( also bear in mind my fall at the pond the day or two before and I had bruised the ribs in my upper right chest, so lowering myself down or pulling myself up was pretty painful). Actually you have to question the wisdom of fishing at all but hey…. you only live once!

Trying to get my bugs to dead drift but the current was very slow

The first spot I chose to try turned out to be dangerously deep. Certainly a foot out from the bank I couldn’t locate the bottom holding onto a fallen tree and feeling for the river bed. I managed a few lobs into the fairly slow water where I had seen a few fish rise a little further out beyond the range of my attempts at nymphing, but surprisingly and encouragingly I managed to have a fish make a splashy chase at my team of beaded nymphs but it didn’t stick unfortunately.

I had to move on as I was fishing in such an awkward location it really wasn’t pleasant. The next area I seen fish though the water looked similarly deep and unwelcoming, it turned out that with care I could wade right out midstream. The current wasn’t a concern as there was barely one at all. I tried a few different nymph patterns here near the entry of a small stream opposite, but though i got one knock nothing took the bugs and after a while in the pleasant warm sunshine but surprisingly cold waist deep water I decided to move further down where I had seen more fish move. I again was able to cautiously and slowly fish down a section here maybe 15 yards taking my time and feeling for the bottom to find a way before turning back for the bank.

Running a team of bugs through on one of the more accessible areas

Finally I found an area where the water was much fater flowing and the river opened out. However the moving fish were well upstream of the accessible area and though the water was shallower there were some very big boulders just out of view and wading here was equally treacherous. I did though spot a way to get over the river lower down in the fast water, and walk upstream again from the far bank, getting access to the slower water where fish were splashing. However it was so slow here that with anything other than a very small beaded nymph, the flies would just settle on the bottom and weren’t “rolling” downstream like the method really demands. I tried various combinations of bug to counter the slow water but never had a touch and was also bringing up lumps of weed too. I had also taken my Tenkara rod in my waders, and used that to throw a wee olive dry fly which looked like many of the flies I seen on the water but I never rose a fish and to be honest unless you were lucky and put one at the right spot as a fish moved under it, able to see the fly you were really needing some luck.

So around lunchtime I called it a day, it was a little disappointing, but I gave it a go but frankly wasn’t bothered for trying again, it was very difficult access for fly fishing for me to be as enjoyable as I hoped but I don’t regret giving it a go.