RH Fly Fishing

  “Roses are red   Violets are blue,   I’m schizophrenic   And so am I”   - Bill Murray     A couple of days after Storm Bella blew through came the last Fluff Club outing of 2020, Meon Springs. We were here approximately a year ago, as well as episodes 10, 27, 34, 40 and 59. Once more into (Tier Four) Covid lockdown, I could think of plenty of worse places to be, even with the sleet, hail, rain and day temperature of just two degrees C. I hoped the six degrees drop had been sudden enough that the water would not have cooled that much, because trout can get lethargic when it’s below five degrees. Yesterday, the barometer couldn’t get any lower, the only way is up, baby! Cold fingers crossed, I rigged up a six weight with an intermediate, checked in through the lodge window with Greg, before squelching off along Whitewool. The fishery operates a loyalty card scheme: nine stamps on your card and you get a free fish; today, I could pay for two and take three.   The Inspector had

    This one goes back 14 years. We’d managed to put together a couple of days for a fishin’ road trip. Not that there were many miles involved, there’s no comparison between the UK and the USA,. To paraphrase Bill Bryson “In Iowa you’d think nothing of a two-hundred mile drive just to get pizza”, but this side of the pond, at least our trip involved an overnighter.   My fishing buddy and I started with a day on the Itchen, chasing Grayling, and were only partly successful: we both netted some out of season Brown trout, I managed a half-pound Grayling, plus a five-pound Chub. Next was a bit of a detour to collect a small antique B had bought on-line, then we turned for Gloucestershire. We had booked into a highly recommended Inn, The Plough, for the night. A very enjoyable evening ensued, copious amounts of Landlord before and after an excellent meal, really top scran! Comfortable en suite rooms too, my night’s sleep only disturbed by the electrical storms and heavy rain. Ablutions d

  “When I die, I want to go peacefully like my grandfather did – in his sleep. Not yelling and screaming like the passengers in his car” – Bob Monkhouse.   Time once again for the Fluff Club’s annual John Hardeley Memorial competition, (which the more discerning readers can see from their notes), took place previously in episodes 29, 39, and 50. In my previous scribblings I know I muddled Kingfisher and Spring at least once, so for the record Spring is nearest the car park, then It’s Kingfisher, followed by the Leat. The attendance was twenty percent up on last year’s (!) but notably absent was the Headmistress, prevented once again by the committee-designed human spine. All three ponds are smaller than most of our local fisheries, so I knew I wouldn’t be under-gunned with a #5 Geo, matched to a Pflueger Trion and camou lake intermediate line.   Overcast, wet, with a cold breeze; the rain kept stopping ... for just a minute at a time, a definite case of the dreich, (for our Scottis

      “If you are going through hell, keep going”-W Churchill   Nine Fluff Boys today! Well, that’s really eight plus an ex: if we took the register it would read the Professor, the Admiral, Moneypenny, the Inspector, Lumberjack, Threepio, Galilee, Whytee, plus the ex (the Engineer).  Duncton Mill looked beautiful. A settled barometer, a half moon, and a still(ish) overcast day, all indicated the fishing should be okay, but what do I know? The car park was quite full and I think total attendees must have been around twenty, no wonder the fragrant Carole looked so chipper, beaming her greetings. At this time of year the fishing is usually concentrated on Birch and Rosie’s pools, but Carole informed us that Coot was also on the cards, having been cleaned up and re-stocked, and has become the favourite of the members of late.   I started on an intermediate line, rigged on a rod just bought off t’web, a s/h Sonik Black, at 9’. On the business end I knotted a CW variant: a hook with a flu

    I don’t want to repeat too often, but The Wild Trout Trust’s auctions of fishing lots (other auctions are available,  e.g.  S&TA, Angling Trust) are great ways to help fund the organisations we all need in these hazardous times. This not only raises funds but in return provides great opportunities for fishing other than your ‘home’ waters. So, keep an eye open, be in it to win it!     My buddy B bid successfully for this trip: two in a boat out on  Farmoor  II.   Autumn weather can be agin you, indeed, for two days previously no boats were allowed out, due to the wind gusting to 40! It still blew on our arrival, and only four  other  hardy crews would venture out into the chop, with maybe a dozen other anglers scattered around the perimeter. Everyone soon realised the fishing was going to be tough. Indeed, the guy in charge had mentioned they had recently put in a load of stockers ,  specifically in hopes th e  new fish might stir up the older residents , who haven’t shown much

  “… as alert as a tree stump…”- Woody Allen   The Fly Dressers Guild couldn’t hold its Spring Bank Competition in that season, due to that new ‘C’ word, but re-arranged it after lockdown, once again to be held at the excellent Elinor fishery. The Fluff Club’s tiny competition section entered the Professor, the Admiral, and the Inspector, with Whytee as sub, just in case. When I awoke, very early doors, I felt really crook with the second severe dose of a bad cold and cough. I thought about pulling out, but that’s not the team ethic, and the whole point of our entering competitions is for experience, so I drove the 143 miles, grimly, not at all looking forward to the return trip later.   The competitors assembled, albeit fewer than usual; we could see nearly all the boats were already out and plenty of other anglers ranging the banks, but there was more than enough space for all. I expected it to be tough, what with a brand-new moon tonight and wind from the north-east, but a few

    About nine months after our last visit, Meon Springs was showing her bones, the level appeared to be about three feet below normal; we really need some rainfall soon, especially the small streams such as the River Meon. Today was going to be sunny, cloudy intervals, and highs of 24 degrees C, an Indian summer again.   Half a dozen noobs were getting ready for some tuition, and there were another eight anglers or so spread around. Representing the Fluff Club were the Professor, Moneypenny, Foggy, Threepio, and Whytee, joined by Dodgy though not actually a member. After the first hour we were joined by Lumberjack, who had taken a diversion to Arundel on the way here, having got his Springs confused! Spreading around Whitewool the low, clear water made it easy to see where the fish were at – usually holding close to the several springs in the ‘lake’s‘ bed, enjoying the cool influx of well-oxygenated water from the chalk aquifer deep below. Foggy had gone up to Coombe for a look but

    Every once in a while, you see something which makes you stop in wonder. In my experience this never happens when you have a camera with you; Mother Earth knows all about this, and then gives but a glimpse, leaving an image burned onto your cranial hard drive. Two such instances were separated by several years, but happened within twenty-five feet of each other.   Weston Shore, lapped by Southampton Water, has a tiny rivulet flowing into it across the stony beach at West Wood. A shingle bank has caused it to flow parallel to the Water for about two hundred and fifty yards, deepening it in places and backing it up before it spills over and through the shingle in tiny threads out into the sea . The source of this trickle once upon a time filled three ornamental ‘lakes’ before flowing through a culvert under the road to Netley, where it has scoured out a deeper channel and a pool before turning right, into its short course to mix with the seawater. Those ‘lakes’ have just about disa

  Lee Wulf once said “Game fish are too valuable to only be caught once”. In current times we ought to substitute ‘Any’ for the word ‘Game’. The increasing pressures on environment and climate alike mean that, more than ever before, fisherfolk have a major obligation for the welfare of the denizens of the underwater world we share the planet with. This is not merely a case of preserving our sport, we must also recognise that recreational fishers are the key guardians of all the sub-aquatic ecosystems, because of the vested interest, and also because of our world-wide spread and presence. There have been the great thinkers and writers in our sport, whether coarse, game, or salt, (and all the other subdivisions of each). During the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, great strides were made by anglers and their associations when the pennies finally dropped and realisation dawned that we could take the sport of fishing further, alternatively, we could bring about its total demise inc

    When I walk the dogs, I head to different places so I don’t become bored, (can’t speak for the dogs though). There are several New Forest walks I like, and on this particular one, on a warm day, we made a short diversion to a ford across one of the many Forest streams. While the dogs drank and splashed about in the gravelled shallows, I saw something out of the corner of my eye. Just upstream was a dark, slow pool, tailing-out into the shallow ford, and in that pool a fish had just made a classic rise, concentric rings still spreading. I watched for a repeat, but there wasn’t one before Maya hurled herself into the pool for a swim. We continued on our circular walk, but a spark had been struck, deep in the cranium. I’d read somewhere that the New Forest streams are recorded to hold twenty different fish species, including Brown Trout and its sea-running brethren. This stream, I was pretty sure, eventually became part of the Beaulieu River (it’s pronounced ‘byou-lee’). I also knew t