Spending their days in clear shallow water, the gypsy barbel on my local river live lives that, compared most freshwater fish, are subject to public scrutiny. They may find keeping secrets a more difficult task to pull off than the fish of deep or muddied waters, but they remain nevertheless mysterious creatures. View full article »
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I don´t know how you feel about it, but life can begin to seem pretty grim at times. The UK today signed off on an engagement and involvement with Europe that they had maintained for 44 years, and for no single good reason that I can fathom. They have set sail blindly into uncharted waters without a map. And idiotic as that may appear, the first prize for idiocy goes, as usual, to Donald Trump who is busy reversing any rational policies of his predecessor. Next in the firing line is the environment. I happen to teach Science for a living and I could probably wander into the primary section of our school and find dozens of youngsters who are more scientifically literate than this bozo. View full article »
It´s not quite summertime yet and it may be a little early yet for the cotton to be high, but fish are certainly jumping. On the way back from fishing on Saturday, I came across some gypsy barbel on the Guadalhorce who treated me to to a fine display of their aerial acrobatics. View full article »
The fish on the Río Grande must have nerves of steel. On the face of it, theirs might appear a pretty chilled existence, but things are not always as they seem. The world seems to conspire against them. Not only does the protracted summer heat suck most of the water out of the river, marooning the barbel in isolated pools, but even in the good times they are subject to noisy intrusions on their lives. Not only do you get guys like me sneaking up on them trying to ruin their afternoons by fooling them into taking a little artificial nymph, but there are cars and farm vehicles motoring across the shallows and goats being driven from one side of the river to the other. View full article »
I heard a good yarn yesterday from Norman Smith when I joined him and his wife Maureen for a bite of lunch and a few beers at the local watering hole in Villafranco.
A few years back Norman was fishing for carp in a stocked water close to where we both live. It is not a big water, this one, and it is quite easy to observe your fellow anglers. After a little while Norman noticed there was something a little odd about an angler on the other side of the water. He seemed to be keeled over. It turns out that he had dropped down dead. View full article »
At this time of year I am deep in armchair fishing mode. The forecast here is for a weekend of rain. My local river will be colouring up now and the fish will be sulking.
I imagine that I am joined, while in armchair mode, by the vast majority of the world´s fly fishermen who, I imagine, live predominantly in the northern hemisphere. They are likely to be pacing around now annoying their wives and waiting for the onset of the spring and the prospects of a new season. View full article »
Harry Abbott has been tormenting me again. At the moment he is down in the South Island of New Zealand helping himself to some of the large trout swimming around in the Clutha river. So when I arrive home, weary with the burden of work and responsibility, and I sit down to open up my emails who should I see grinning at me but Mr Abbott. View full article »
Harry Abbott, my old partner in crime, is down in New Zealand at the moment. He has just been over to Lake Onslow on the trail of the fat brown trout that swim around there. Unfortunately the weather is against him and it is unseasonably cold. After 3 hours or so of misery he threw in the towel. View full article »
The publication of the article “Young Bucks” in this month´s Fly Fishing and Fly Tying represents a little milestone of sorts for me. It is the 12th of my articles that have appeared in that august publication and I feel very pleased that my modest contributions, if placed end to end, would now span a full year.
The first of these, “Naked Trout Fishing” appeared in July 2010 and the others have turned up intermittently since then. All of them, in their original form, are here on the blog. View full article »
