Devon School of Fly Fishing Team blog

Fly fishing in devon has really been pretty good. Despite some ups and downs with the weather the fish have been pretty happy to give a well presented fly the time of day. Dries are still working really well although a nymph hung below the dry in the deeper pools has picked up an extra fish or two.

The mayfly hatch is now just a small trickle towards the end of the day but you’ll still see me tie on a grey Wulff at the slightest sign of a slashy take at the surface. This has been the case as late as the Sunday just gone and I have still used them to try and drag a sea trout up to take a look.

I had 3 days with Steve last week and it was his first season on moving water. The really nice thing was having plenty of time to go through the casts and approaches to maximise success for him and it was great to net his first wild brown trout. It is great to be a part of landmarks in someone’s fishing career and something I will never tire of!

Steves first wild brown trout

We fished all sorts of places to give him a good chance to experience everything a river could throw at him and to show him how far he had progressed. It is great standing next to someone and see them fire a cast straight into the right spot and a fish leaps on to it and think to your self “my work is done”!!

Fly hits its target first shot

Steve rose to every challenge thrown at him and the trout of Wales and wherever else he ventures better look out!

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It feels and looks like we are just about through the best of the mayfly hatch now. That having been said they are still trickling off and the great thing is that the fish are used to seeing a big fly on the water and even better still aren’t afraid to have a go at it too!

Most of the people I have had out recently have been happy to sacrifice numbers of fish for the chance of bringing a big one up from the depths but I have been trying my best to assess each pool as we approach it and hit it with the appropriate fly which in some cases has been a size 24 midge pattern. It is fun tying on a big fly and seeing it work but it is equally as rewarding showing my guests that just because it is a small fly it doesn’t mean that it won’t work.

I had met Wilfred and Anne-Ruth a few years back and they had managed to track me down to show how they had progressed as fly fishers. They live in Holland which might not be thought about as a fly fishing hot spot but there is a large and loyal bunch who will cast a fly at just about anything and these two guys are in that category.

They had booked a days guiding and we headed off to a small stream. Anne-Ruth was soon catching fish and I took Wilfred upstream to try his luck.

Low, slow water was working but you needed nerves of steel to not strike when you saw a fish come for the dry so after a few we headed up to some faster water where the fish would have less time to inspect the fly and would make a more positive take.

Anne-Ruth works up a pool

I dropped Anne-Ruth off and wanted to take Wilfred up at least 4 pools to try his luck. On the way up though I saw a few fish rising and as ever I find it too hard to leave them so despite a tricky climb into the pool we were in a great position to target the fish.

It looked to us as though the fish were taking ascending nymphs just subsurface so I quickly tied on a pheasant tailed nymph and we were in business.

Wilfred with a beautiful Taw brown

It was a great day and the guys did a great job, Wilfred ended the day with 2 13inch trout which was some achievement!

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It is good to be out on the water in just shirt sleeves again. There have been times where I had wished that I had picked up the heavier fleece rather than the lightweight one to go over my shirt before hitting the river but it feels like those days are behind me. It is great being on the river every day and seeing how things unfold. One of the key features of late have been the emergence of the mayfly.

It is fair to say that we in Devon don’t get the hatches that might be seen on some of the chalkstreams but the last few years there have been enough to get the fish interested in them. Seeing how this hatch develops and how the fish suddenly get locked on to them is really nice to watch and it has been great to tie on a Grey Wulff and throw it at an angry slashy rise and to get the fish to hit it is real fun.

We have had a few days like this and it was nice to have the legend that is Dave from Portland back for another day on the Taw. We were going to head into the moors but the mays were too good to miss. The day started slowly and just got better and better with Dave picking up a number of fish. As we were about to call it a day I noticed a rise that was right up tight to the bank and right underneath a bush. It looked like it was too hard a call but by watching we could see that the fish was picking up newly emerged mayfly duns in a back eddy. The great news about the back eddy was that it meant we could get upstream and make a downstream cast into what was still a tricky spot. I said to Dave to just to go for it and he did just that. All hell broke loose and we had a nice brown in the net!

Last one of the day!

Next day I was guiding Gavin for a couple of days. I was excited to tell him about the mayfly action and we decided to fish a may outright from the off. This worked pretty well and after lunch we headed to our new beat and saw a fish move. Gavin dropped the fly right into the spot and the fish took. I had my suspicions when the fish took off and they were confirmed when I netted a sea trout. It was Gavin’s first sea trout and certainly his first on a Grey Wulff!

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It seems like the weather is starting to settle with warmer temps and more stable conditions. I am never one to moan BUT it would cool if things were like the Caribbean and we had a bit of rain overnight just to freshen things up and keep the river at a nice level. That having been said the low water has concentrated fish into areas where you would more expect to find them. The places that have worked best for us have still been tails and bellies of pools rather than faster runs and the weapon of choice has been the dry fly. It has been great to see the larger fish make an appearance at the surface and yesterday was a small landmark as I was guiding Anne who managed to hook and land our first fish of the season on a mayfly pattern.

Mayfly have been coming off for just over a week but the fish are only just starting to take notice of them and seeing and hearing fish taking to the air or making an angry slash at a newly emerged dun is pretty exciting stuff. The other good thing is that fish are starting to feed later into the day now rather than a swift 5 o’clock finish.

There is just a sniff of a few of the larger sea trout on the hotel water which is great news and now the evenings are warmer it is a great time to be on the water!

A well earned Hob Nob break during a casting session for Chris

Mikes first ever fish

Pauls first Taw brownie!

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It really feels like the fish have started to wake up now. They are where they I would hope to find them and they are starting to look skywards. With the water still very cool and the north easterly wind we have had slacker, slower water where we have concentrated on landing our flies.

Pam covers a pool

There have been some big hatches of black gnats but I haven’t seen much interest from the fish in them and I was nearly caught out thinking this was what the fish were on on Monday. It turned out by watching for a few moments that there was a tiny hatch of olives happening at the same time that the fish were locked on to. A quick change of fly and we were quickly in business.

The pattern that has worked best this week for me is the sparkle dun but also tying on an olive balloon caddis during the early stages of an olive hatch has brought some fish up too.

Alan into a fish

I had the pleasure of seeing Pam and Alan down for 4 days of guiding. I took them to a variety of venues and can barely remember ever tying on a nymph. We really worked on water craft and it was great to see them land their flies in the right spot and bring the desired response from the fish. I am the worst person to ask how many we caught but all I know was it was quite a few!

Followers of the blog will be pleased to hear that Dave from Portland was back for some guiding on Friday! The weather had turned and it was a lot cooler and wetter than the previous days we had enjoyed and I thought that we needed to head for a more sheltered beat to find fish. It is great when these things work out and Dave did Portland proud with his fishing and his ability to polish off one of the hotels famous steak and kidney pies with a side portion of chips for lunch!

Spot the fish!

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We’re through the Grannom and most of the Large Dark Olives for the time being but other hatches are starting to occur now but these are just getting going and are more of a trickle right now. From day one of the season there have been plenty of midges on the water but I have not seen signs of fish showing interest in them right now. Last year the fish only seemed to care for them once mayfly were out of the way. It will be interesting to see if this is the case again this season.

Talking of mayfly I was on the river on Sunday and thought I saw a lone one come off. I mentioned this to Dave who was guiding further upstream and he’d seen one too. Looks like these boys are bit early and given that everything seems to be a couple of weeks behind schedule they were jumping the gun by a long way.

We ran our first course of the season over the weekend which, I think, went really well. Having two days meant that we were able to cover everything in depth, from the set ups, casting and approaches to moving water. It was great fun with everyone catching fish in what were  tricky conditions. Hopefully it showed the topics we covered in the course worked in some small way!

The team!

Ira was new to fly fishing and her friends thought she wasn’t going to catch anything. A day and a half with us proved them wrong on both our lake and on the river too!!

First fish for Ira!

I had the pleasure of teaching David and Rachel for the day. They had never held a fly rod before but I was amazed and during the day we covered all aspects of fishing and casting. They were even double hauling at the end of the day which is highly unusual for two novices on a day course. Well done guys!!

Superstars in the making- Rachel and David

If you would like guided fly fishing on private beats or fly fishing tuition on a private trout lake feel free to contact us, we’d be happy to help!

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It has been really nice to see some more consistent rising trout. Up until a week or so ago it was more a case of an odd rise or “oncer” as I often call them. The nymph has generally reigned supreme with the odd slash at the dry. It feels like things are starting to change now and perhaps the tungsten bead heads will be consigned to the back of the fly box for the time being. I really love this time of year being a fly fishing guide. It isn’t about going through a routine but scanning the water and looking for what stage of the hatch the fish are interested in and in what bug. It can often be the case that you see a large number of one fly on the water but is it the one the fish are taking?

Grannom can often mislead and when you have a large blanket hatch it is easy to miss the odd large dark olives that the fish are really interested in. It was the case with Richard yesterday and the momnet we tied on a compara dun the magic happened!

Comparadun strikes again!

The lake although still looking new has seen plenty of action and was christened with a group of 4 novice anglers. Stephen, Mike, Charlie and Mike all went home having learnt to cast and caught a few fish too.

The guys tackle up!

Gordon has been fishing for a number of years but wanted to learn a few new tricks in presentaion and casting generally. We did this on the lake and then headed down to the river to put it into practice. I also showed him how to fish spider patterns as I know where he fishes and there is a stretch that suits them perfectly!

Gordon swings a few spiders

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We’re just over a month into the fly fishing season in Devon now and it feels as though after the long hard winter the fish are really starting to wake up a bit. I had a great day guiding James yesterday who was a newcomer to fishing our rivers and after going through a few casts on our lake we hopped down to the river to try things out.

James into the first of the day

We’d had a heavy frost and I had worked on the basis it would take a bit of time to warm up and so we did a bit of walking to a few of my favourite spots a little further downstream.  He’d fished the famous chalkstreams a couple of times and I think he liked the more rough and ready look of our wild streams especially when I had him limboing under barbed wire to get to a pool I liked the look of!

The hatches are getting more steady and the river is fishing through to about 4.30pm or so but there just isn’t quite enough warmth later in the day yet. One highlight yesterday was seeing fish rise a little more consistently than the one off affairs of late and seeing fish take an aggressive swipe at a dry is always a great sight.

I had the pleasure of guiding Paul on Monday. It is always a great time we have on the water and after a long lay up and shoulder operation he was rearing to go. We started with a casting tune up and worked on fine tuning hauling and then some single handed spey casting. He wanted to fish some new water so I obliged. As he has a insatiable thirst for knowledge I showed him how to fish spider patterns down and across which was great fun.

Paul strikes!

Our first real big hatch has been grannom and although popular theory is that the fish prefer the ascending pupae than the adult I was fishing the Wye in Wales for a couple of days last week with Ray (The Dude) courtesy of my wonderful wife (thanks Em! X). Anyway, he shouted form the other side of the river that they were taking grannom off the top. There were a few Large Dark Olives around too but not in the same numbers but I thought it might have been these they were taking but trusting his judgement I tied on a balloon caddis and picked up fish. It is funny when you see this but you get back and think about it for a bit and ask yourself a few questions (well, I do!)  The main one was the fish were in or on the edge of pretty fast water making the detection time pretty short for them and so would they have hit a Parachute Adams anyway?. You can sort of go round in circles and end up over analysing and at the end of the day the fish needs to eat and if you can get the fly to him effectively and efficiently then you are in with a chance but most of all it is about enjoying the time on the water!

I get lucky every now and again!

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It has been good to be out on the river in warmer weather. The fish are starting to bite a bit more and a few are even taking an interest in the dry. The hatches that have been backed up are starting to get going and I think I have seen more March Browns than last year already. The first few Grannom are also starting to trickle off which should also help liven things up a little.

I am sneaking off to Wales for a couple of days with Ray (The Dude) to try our luck. It is a birthday present for me and part of Rays” leaving the UK tour”. The plan is to head off early, meet up and have a big breakfast somewhere and fish straight through. I have a feeling this will be the pattern for our trip but that’s fine by me! I have tied up a few “left field” flies that have had a bit of success here but I want to see what the Welsh trout make of them.

Mark had his first time on our rivers in Devon and took to it really, really well. It is always nice to get an email from a convert to our fishing ranks!

Mark into his first Devon trout!

Hi Pete,

I wanted to thank you for an absolutely fantastic days guiding on Friday.  I had a great time and learnt so much!

The following couple of day’s fishing allowed me to put what I had learnt into practice (with success!!) and made our stay in Devon a truly memorable one.

Many thanks to Emma too, for suggesting we stay at the Fox & Hounds. What a great little hotel and lovely food!

Take care

Mark

P.S.  We’ll be back again soon!! (maybe for a spot of sea trout fishing!)

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We noticed for the first time that the swallows were back at home today, primroses are in the hedgerows, the large dark olives seem to be more abundant and the trout are more in their rightful feeding spots. Perhaps this is the first time so far this season that things feel like they are getting there. I even taught in a fleece and T shirt today.

Temperatures are set to rise a little and this should give the season the kick start it really needs so the trout better watch out!  I have a day off tomorrow and after seeing the anglers at the hotel I plan to head out for some trouting myself.

The new lake is now full, although it still looks a bit “just finshed” and it needs to settle. But it is great to be teaching on there as it is a great size and I am really pleased with how it has turned out. As it is not a public fishery I have planned it so that not only are there  lots of areas to fish from but also areas that will be useful to teach casts, especially single handed spey casting. The fish are on order and will be in soon, so then it will really come to life. It really is a great addition to what we are trying to do and offers a great spot for anglers when the river is unfishable.

Mr Barrow gets to grip with the double spey

Leon lets one fly!

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