My brother Sean and our old buddy Mark McCann head west at this time of year to fish Lough Arrow in county Sligo. If things go according to plan (and they usually don´t) their brief adventure coincides with the hatching of our old buddy Ephemera danica although the mayflies this year appear to have not kept up their part of the bargain and didn´t really get going during the days of their visit. Unfortunately I am unable to extricate myself from duties here in Spain but I am there each year in spirit.
Continue readingCategory: Fish and fishing
Sunday was as hot as hell but I had it in mind to take a trip to the river. I was equipped with my strange newly-concocted worm fly in case a carp or two were around but, in the event, I never had a shot at a carp which was an outcome I more or less expected. I did however at least see a couple. They had been spooked from a shallow broken section and pushed ahead into a relatively broad slow-flowing pool. It was my fault that they were disturbed. I was some distance away but clearly they had their antennae tuned in to whatever wavelength I was broadcasting.
Continue readingIf you only allowed me one month a year to fish the Río Grande I would probably ask you for March, or maybe April. The heavier rainfalls of the winter are pretty much done but the river holds a good volume of water and, if there has not been a recent shower, the river runs clear. I have never fished a chalk stream but my friends who have tell me that the Grande has many similar qualities at this time of the year. Who could ask for more from a river than that?
Continue readingI once worked with a guy who used to be in the boy scouts. He told me that his troop had to go on some long trek that involved camping and all that. In preparation the scout masters gathered all the scouts together. First up, the scouts were instructed to empty the contents of their rucksacks onto the floor. Then they were told that they needed to leave half the stuff out and to repack again. Once this had happened they were told to to the same thing again – empty the rucksack, take take half the stuff out and re-pack again. In the end they had only the very minimum needed and were not carrying an ounce more. No doubt the scout masters thought that they were imparting meaningful life lessons with all this palaver, but I don’t know if this is true. I suspect that when these boy scouts grew up they might never have got very far in terms of career progression. I can picture them turning up to job interviews wearing only their underpants.
Continue readingI came across a guy on the banks of the Río Grande on Christmas Eve who was looking after a large flock of goats. I asked him how many goats he had. He didn´t tell me. Instead he said “guess!” And so I did.
250?
He shook his head. I had to try again.
Continue readingA friend of mine, Johan, has just gone and bought himself a sport fishing boat! She is christened “Impi” and is moored on the Island of La Gomera, one of the Canary Islands, sitting way out there in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. Johan´s idea was to create a charter operation to allow people like himself to have a chance to get out into the ocean and fish for some of the most iconic sport fish that you can find anywhere.
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