A new stream

I have had my eye on a little stream in a little sleepy village for quite some time now and last week I had the opportunity to fish it for two days straight. The main river which it runs into has hardly any wild trout population mainly salmon and sea trout. I have seen one or two wbt in this little stream whilst on looking off the road bridge once before. Anyway my better half was going to take the car for an MOT test and it was on the way so asked her to drop me off and pick me back up later in the day. The stream is very urbanised with stone cages at the side of it to prevent flooding but i thought i would give it a go anyway. I was using my little 7ft 3# hardy featherweight with a size 10 olive extream klinkahmmer to start off with. 

I placed my fly in the slow water at the side of the fast water as straight away a little fish rose to my fly but did not hook up. So i ut it past the fish a few times and a few times it rose but did not hook so i moved on. Working through the runs and little pocket water the same was happening. Fish rising but no hook ups so i tore off the size 10 extream klinkhammer hook and put on one of my size 14 klinkhammer/emerger patterns to see if they would be able to take the smaller fly a little better but stuck to the same colour (olive) as they obviously liked it.

Within a few casts i was into a little fish but sadly came off. So i moved onto the next runs. I don't know why but for some reason due to the floods which we have had lately i have been sticking to the side of the fast water. Forgetting that after floods the fish like to stay in the fast/pocket water for more oxygen so gave it a go instead. In one pool alone i managed to catch 5 fish in the fast water and it was the same all the way through the stream aswell as missing a lot of strikes too 

But i will definatly be fishing it a lot more (now that i know there are fish there to catch) and as far as i am aware i am the only one to fish it for a long time as a lady said to me that i am the person she had ever seen fishing it and she thought there was no fish in it. Then i catch a fish in front of her 

the urbanised part of the stream 




Then after half a mile or so its goes high up into the mountains and as wild as you get get 







The thriving fish 

Good day on the stream

As the sun was shining and the river/stream levels had dropped in the past few days i thought i would give my hardy featherweight 7ft 3# a walk on the local stream today. I started off a little late in the day at 12:30pm. As i got to the water i could see that the water was Gin clear and not a lot of fly on the water or in the air too so I knew it was going to be hard fishing. I opted for a size olive 14 Klinkhammer tied on a partridge extreme klinkhammer hook. in the first few pools I didn't rise a single fish in the fast of flat calm at the side of the fast water in the runs and got a little frustrated. So i carried on fishing through the day on the same fly picking off the odd fish or two aswell as the odd splashy rise as I plodded along but it didn't matter as i was out in the county side with a clear mind and not a care in the world  After working through the pools i came to a pool called the crossing pool (for obvious reasons) there is a lot of pocket water above which i have only fished once before in my life and normally walk straight past it up into the mountains but not today. As I didn't have much time on my hands i fished all the pockets and fast water and it payed off beautifully with lots of wilder than wild brown trout as every time i placed my fly at the side or in the fast water there was a trout there to have a taste of what i had to offer  (as you can imagine I wasn't complaining) but then i had the dreaded phone call with what signal i had on my mobile phone due to being so high up in the mountains to say that i had to go from my beloved stream and wild brown trout to go to a bbq 

How i wished i had stayed on my beloved stream and carried on fishing until the light faded but it wasnt to be. But like the great Arnold said. I WILL BE BACK 


Plenty of these about  



My fly went from this at the start of the day

To this at the end of the day

Some mouth watering pocket/boulder water full of wild brown trout

The improved PTN

With the rain making the rivers and streams swollen in the past few months I have had time to catch up on my reading of the book fly fishing and fly tying part 2 by hends products.

I noticed a few nice nymph patterns in the book which I thought might do the trick with the high and coloured river levels so I game them a go.  To no surprise they done the job pretty well by catching me a good number of trout.

Here is a Step By Step of a nymph which i like to call the improved PTN


A size 14 jig hook from Fly Tying Boutique with a 3ml silver slotted tungsten bead.  You can tie it with any bead from 2ml to 4ml depending on what water you are fishing

tie a few fibres from a cock hack or a Chinese hen hackle and then work the thread back to the bead forming a taper.

pinch down some copper wier

then attach some pheasant tail and wrap both together down to the tail of the fly

wrap the pheasant tail around the hook up to the bead and tie down with a few wraps of the thread

Make a few turns of the cooper wire to the bead, tie down hard and twist the excess copper wire.

Dub on some crystal flash ice dubbing and wrap around as a thorax.

Then dub on some hares ear over the ice dubbing but not covering it completely

Then whip finish around the bead, put some varnish on the thread to hold in place and use a dubbing teaser to pull out some fibres to make the fly more life like.

You can also use pink for the summer/winter grayling