Some where over the rainbow.....

........the trout season on rivers may be over - but there is a pot of silver at the end of the rainbow!

Silver in the form of a grayling. 

The lady of the stream. 

Ladies of the stream (Lots) is the name of the womens/female fishing group that is slowly growing in numbers. Sign up to join us or find out a little more

Catch and release and the weedy problem

Ok, so finally the fish is well hooked - unlike the 'tap it and flee' fish that occasionally seem to predominate - you faff about with your landing net whilst trying to control the rod and fish. The fish cavorts up and down the river. You now have your net in the river and realise that the play on the line has changed. Your fly is hooked, but no longer to the fish. Out comes the fly (hopefully) with a long stream of healthy river weed attached. Again!
Damned clever these catch and release fish!
Hey ho.... Well at least the net dries rapidly - having bought a replacement Snowbee rubber-mesh - incredibly cheaply - ordered from Peter Arfield at the Bakewell fly fishing shop. They do them in different sizes. I can recommend them. As long as they are the right rim measurement I should think they fit any net. They are better for toothy fish and the hook less readily attaches itself to the mesh.

Updated river fly diary page

Crane flies and bright flies seem to be the order of the month. Crane flies (or daddies) for the windy days and gold bodies for the bright days. Sedges and spinners in the evening

LOTS - Ladies of the stream fly fishing Derbyshire Wye August 2016

Six women fly fishing met up with Dave Southall on a gloriously hot day on the Derbyshire Wye. No wading - which was a slight disadvantage in the heat! Dave gave us some tuition on Tenkara and Italian casting. I have the video on my phone of Dave 'bicycle' casting (without wheels), which I have yet to master. We had a very enjoyable day. I applied the 'bright sun, bright fly' principle, which was productive for me.

We went for a late and extended lunch and resumed fishing until dark!

A wonderful day. Thank you to all who have given us these fly fishing days this summer. 

Tight lines and lets get more children and women fly fishing!

The heaviest catch at Wolfscote

What a weighty beast being hauled from the river by Sarah. Not a very large trout, but a very wet and firmly stuck large lamb. It had clearly done something many of us fly fishers do at the waters edge and thought solid ground was between us and the river, discovering our error as we sink into the water! Unfortunately the lamb could not recover itself from this position and, had Sarah not so obligingly and professionally, stepped in, I am sure the animal would not have survived the night. It was sodden. The lamb was lucky that we had Sarah with us - she keeps sheep and knew what to get hold of to haul it out - without landing herself in the river too.
Well done Sarah, you had the largest catch of the day!
To make it a double sheep catch - this event was preceded by Hilary releasing a noisy lamb with its head stuck in fencing. Which just goes to show that a day fly fishing at the river isn't just about fishing!
LOTS (Ladies of the Stream) were fly fishing on the temple beat and Wolfscote yesterday. The drizzle persisted almost all day - but - there was only a gentle southerly wind, highly unusual for Wolfscote Dale. The fishing was hard but we all stuck at dry fly fishing - with results.
I only caught grayling - but then, we are not called the Ladies of the Stream for nothing!
Next event on the 16th of August on the Derbyshire Wye. Check the Womens river fishing days for details.

LOTS of ladies go Tenkara fly fishing

The 6th of July found seven of the 'Ladies of the Stream', womens fly fishing group; fishing with Tenkara rods on Cressbrook & Littons stretch of the Derbyshire Wye with expert instruction from Dave Southall.
As he demonstrated the cast with a small beaded nymph

a fish took it

and was speedily brought to the (Glen Pointon floating) net!

A very good day of Tenkara fly fishing had begun. Thanks Dave, we had a great day, great instruction, great river.
Our next LOTS (Ladies of the Stream) is already fully booked. We are taking places for the 16th August. Check the Womens fishing days page shortly.
Tight lines

Emerging mayfly

A mayfly emerged fresh from the river. Its greenish hue was a colour I used in making some successful artifical foam bodied mayflys. See the river fly diary page for examples

Just to prove it wasn't my fishing bag altering the colour here it is from the trouts point of view!

Ogden day 10am Sunday 5th June 2016

Ogden Day, Sunday 5th June 2016 from 10 am just downstream of the main road bridge in Bakewell.
On this day it will be one hundred and fifty one years since Mr James Ogden demonstrated his floating flies on the Derbyshire Wye below Bakewell Bridge. The day after, the dry-fly-only rule was adopted on the Peacock Fly fishing water and has been in place ever since. 
There will be a re-enactment of his demonstration to catch a fish. Let us hope he is successful!

Ladies of the Stream - fly fishing day on the Derwent near Hathersage

A wonderful stretch of the Derwent. And what beautiful weather we had. The following shots were provided by Hilary and give a good idea of the enjoyable day we had.

There were seven of us to fish, though Isobel and Juliet mostly guided during the day. Mayfly were starting to come off and the fishing was most productive.

The colouring on the wild brownies is delightful.

The olive uprights were in abundance at the end of the day, flying in clouds around us as we were packing up.
A great day. Thanks to all for attending and especially thanks to Juliet and Isobel for organising the day.

The mayfly begins!

Finally a warmer day. I don't usually choose to fish on a Sunday, but the weather was beautiful and so I decided to wander down to a quiet river with no footpaths, to fly fish.
Started off with the hawthorn - which caught. Finally, during the afternoon, saw a fish jump for a mayfly - so on went the Philip White hair-wing mayfly. Missed the first fish, but there were others that rose to the fly.
Yes, on that river the mayfly are certainly on. Hope it is the same wherever you are...
River fly diary page has the fly that started a slightly longer day than I had anticipated.

English riverfly survey reveals abysmal state of our once gin clear chalkstreams

Just to update yourselves on the poor state of our rivers, please follow the link to the Salmon & Trout Conservation Uk website.
Perhaps scroll down to the bottom of the page to make a donation to survey the health of more UK rivers?
To quote Paul Knight, Chief Executive of S&TC UK:

“Most of the rivers we analysed were impacted to some extent, although the chalk rivers were the worst.  England’s 200 or so chalkstreams form about 85% of the world’s total stock of this richly diverse and complex habitat.  Almost all of them are in a dismal state of decline. Plants, insects, fish, mammals and bird-life are suffering as a result of the loss of flylife, which plays a crucial role in the aquatic food chain. Basically lose your flylife and you will lose many other important species too.”

Mayfly, spinners and poachers

I think it was on the 17th of May, whilst walking down the river Bradford about 6 o'clock (not fishing|) on what seems to have been the only balmy evening so far this year; I was delighted to see mayfly coming off the river in reasonable numbers. Also some spinners - I think they were olive uprights, they had tremendously long tails - at least 3 times the body length. 

Unfortunately the balmy evening also brought out the chancers with spinning rod! A call to the river keeper followed. Apparently these 3 chaps in a white van with ladders on the top had already been moved off the river elsewhere the same evening. The police sirens arrived a little to late for the one river keeper trying to block in 3 mouthy individuals.

Ladies of the Stream - May 24th 2016 next womens fly fishing event

We have a day on the Derwent near Hathersage. A wonderful stretch of the Derbyshire Derwent.
If you are a female fly fisher do make contact to join us on what is our first day of this season.
Unfortunately our day on the Derbyshire Wye in April was cancelled due to dire weather conditions. We will rearrange a new date shortly
Let us hope on our day fly fishing we see a number of these emerging from the water!

This one emerged from the Lathkill just a couple of days ago - during heavy rain.....

Updated River fly diary page for 2016

Finally got round to updating the River fly diary page on the blogs. The fly above is an olive upright. Correct me if I am wrong? A big eyed male. It landed on the car and the colour deepened as I took several photos of it

Lamprey spawning on the Derbyshire Wye

Early May 2016 saw me fly fishing along the banks of the River Wye, not far from Bakewell. After recovering my fly line from the edge of the river - those wild rainbows occasionally do a dash to the bankside to drop the hook - I looked into the clear water and saw.......

something in the water....

Closer inspection revealed spawning lamprey. The first time in my adult life that I had seen them. I counted about 8 of them. The upper photo shows the size of the 'scrape' that they had made. They were about 5" or 12.5cm long. Impressively one of them was fanning its tail end across the gravel, shifting the stones, preparing the spawning bed.
Lamprey were spotted on another stretch of the river some days later - on the Peacock Open Day in fact.
They belong to a primitive group of fish that have sucker-like mouths instead of teeth and jaws. As they mature they stop feeding and develop the sucker typical of a lamprey. Once the adults have spawned, they die. So having spent the first part of their lives hiding away in the mud of the river bed they emerge, spawn and die - apparently!

Peacock Fly Fishing Club Open Day on May 7th

Wow! Try the fly fishing on the beautiful Wye in Bakewell on May 7th. See the attached flyer Peacock Fly Fishing Club Open Day for full details. Bring your rod - and your Environment Agency rod licence of course! See Licence to fish page if you need one just for the day, the week or the season. Make sure your fishing gear is clean and dry too!
Tight lines

Lets get more women fishing! 2016 fishing days begin this month for Ladies of the Stream

Getting the balance - Ladies of the Stream fishing events

To start off the new season, we have two days organised for April. These and more events will be posted on the Womens fishing days page as details are confirmed.

These events have been organised and fishing generously given to encourage more women and girls to get on the water fly fishing. Lets get the balance a lot or even a little more even? 

Reservoir day

Tuesday 19^th April

Carsington Water – including an educative training session in the morning with Don Staziker. Then out on the boats in the afternoon.

There will be a cost for this day which includes:

Training session in club room

Boat and engine hire

Fishing for the afternoon

The cost depends on numbers - the more fishers the lower the cost

Please make contact for further details

River days

Tuesday 26^th April

Fly fishing on the Wye – Bakewell and area stretch of the Wye. Dry fly only, no wading, barbless hooks preferred, catch and release. Clean and dry kit and boots please.  Would suggest a long handled landing net makes fish releasing much easier.

Make contact for further details.

Not 1 woman fly fishing but many women fly fishing

Ladies of the Stream fly fishing news

You may have noted the page 'Womens fishing days'? Finally I am not the 1 woman fishing - we now have quite a group. We have had a couple of meetings and I will be updating the page with all the days given very generously by a number of clubs. We also hope to fly fish further and are looking into organising some fishing holidays.
If you wish to join us get in touch by email or keep checking the blog for updates.
Fly fishing is a wonderful sport, which if you fly fish I am sure you already know. If you know anyone who wishes to learn or is interested in learning more please refer them to the blog.
Let's get more children fishing too. How many of us are fishing now because we were entranced by rivers and stillwaters as children - I certainly was and am still unable to walk straight on past any river. The river does everyone more good than sitting in front of the computer - which means I need to end here and head outside!
Tight lines for those of you who fish.
Enjoy!

Have you remembered to buy your fishing licence?

Last years fishing licence expires on the 31st March. Finally remembered to renew mine online today!
Follow the link from the 'Licence to fish' page on the blog to renew online.

Impatiently waiting for the fly fishing season to start

My son bought me a fly tying tray for my birthday this year! He also has one - which I admired whilst visiting him - unfortunately he does not tie flies on his - he rolls the dire and dreadful roll-up cigarettes. Hmmmm!
I have been putting mine to very good use. Just need to drill the holes a little larger for the fly holders.
Tight lines to those of you fishing the 2016 season. May you wet your net. I await April 1st.

Grayling meeting Bakewell, Derbyshire

The next meeting takes place Wednesday 10th February.

Stuart Crofts will be giving a presentation entitled:

"The Famous Four, insect groups that drive our dry fly fishing"

Stuart will be discussing different insect groups and the types of flies used to represent them, when and how to fish them, giving examples of commercially available flies as well as tying some of his innovative patterns as examples.

As usual the meeting is at the Rutland Hotel, Bakewell, 7.30pm.  Entry £3, all welcome.

The last meeting will be on March 9  when Dave Southall will be giving a presentation.

All Welcome's