Lough Mourne (sort of)21st April

As I haven't been out fishing for a bit, i was looking for the first opportunity for a spot of water thrashing.
Getting out early from my class on tuesday afternoon my thoughts imediatly turned to takling Lough Mourne. I had heard very little buzz about this place, this always makes me very curious about a new venue. Either it's pants and no-one fishs there or it excellent and those that fish there keep it secret.

So off i went. As usual my trip was meticulously planned, I had a vague idea that it was opposite Upper woodburn. There is a path that leads off from a layby opposite and i figured this was the bunny. So after getting suited and booted off i went. After twenty minutes doubt was beginning to set in that i maybe wasn't in the right place. After an hour I was certain that i wasn't in the right place and as dusk was settling in, I began to worry about finding my way back to the car. Soon I arrived back on the new line a mile away from the car. After a quick march back to Woodburn after giving a couple of speed walkers a bit of a strange site(you'd think they'd never seen a fully outfitted fisherman this far from the water before) I managed to get in about ten minutes of fishing.

Fly tying fairies, the next best thing

For a long time i've been leaving a saucer of milk out for the coursework fairies, in the hope that i'll get up one one morning and they'll have done the work for me, I may have found the next best thing.

15th April, Killylane Reservoir

Just when you think you're cracked this fishing malarkey, a day comes along that puts you right back to square one. After the previous Saturday's outing, I had started to feel like a real fly fisherman, as every fate had decided that she had had enough of my high horsed thinkings. To begin with I had an arranged class that I was considering ditching, the weather was too perfect and i wanted to go back to Killylane. After much internal debate, off I went to class. Luckily though the class ended early and there was still time to hit the water.

On the way there I was confident that we'd catch quickly and frequently, I was expecting similar conditions to last weekend. In some ways they were, the water was wet and the banks muddy. unfortunately the key ingredient of rising fish was not there. We had a couple of hours before dusk so we circumnavigated (that's a great word) the reservoir to see where to fish from on a better day. David even managed to get in a bit of tiddler fishing in small feeder stream

Even this was to no avail, although he did manage to get more bites than Andrew or I, even a size 16 hares ear nymph was too big to hook one.

Through-out our evening we waited expectantly for the fish to start to show themselves, but unfortunately this didn't happen. Factors or excuses include, no cloud cover, wind quite strong and finally the time of day.

At the end we were fairly disappointed, but looking back now, I shouldn't expect fish everytime i bring a rod out and at least we managed a proper recce of the reservoir.

F Flies and Duck ass juice

After the buzz i got on Saturday with fishing with F flies I had decided to replenish my dwindling stock of them. For this I used Flies buy the dozen they do an incredible service if you are buying in bulk.

One tip for fishing with cdc is to use some ducks ass juice(don't know what else it's called) this is essentially the gland oil that ducks use to keep the preening gland feathers in shape. When applied to cdc flies this increases their floatablity tenfold. The one i use is from Petit Jean, all you do is apply the oil to the cdc feathers before fishing and allow them to dry.

12th April, Killylane, Take two

I'll try and do this properly now.

Was joining up with Andrew and his cousin David at Killylane reservoir, originally it was to be Ballykeel, but we' heard it had been stocked recently. By the time i got there it was obvious that there was fish in the water, alot of activity at the surface. I'd started out with hat worked last time, cats whisker, but there was no takes. After a bit my fisherman senses started to tingle. The fish were a the surface, what could this mean?

A change of tactics was needed, on went a buzzer and indicator settup, this of course induced no takes. Strange that, with some much fish at the surface. After a fair bit of changing from this to that, it eventually dawned on me. They were taking flylife off the surface.

on went the F-fly and out came a fish. The f-fly is one of two dry flies i carry, the other is a elk hair thingy. I don't like to use floatant. Andrew switched soon after and he was quickly ino a fish too, this was unfortunalty lost at the net, so he 90% caught his first fish of the season.

A brief sensation of loss was felt whenever my personall favorite fly(i was thinking about nameing him) hopped of my fly patch and was lost forever in two inches of murky water. DAMN YOU GRAVITY, DAMN YOU.

12th April, Killylane

oof, i am now going to to do two thing that i promised i wouldn't.

1.post whilst drink
2. post whilst listening to rage against the machine.

oof this going to be tough, too involved, i give up, i'll do it tomorrow

9th April, Killylane Reservoir

Andrew and I had been getting a bit beaten about in uni with coursework so of course so rather than solve it by doing some work, we decided that the best option would be to go fishing. Seeing that time was tight, we made some very intelligent choices

1. choose a venue that was far away
2. Drive around a local town (a couple of times) to find a post office
3. choose a day where one of us was working in the morning and the other had a unmissable appointment that evening.

All of which left us with minus 15 minutes to get changed into waders and hike to the waters-edge.

Even with the odds staked against us, we still managed to have a good day. I feel as though I deserve a special mention after spotting rising fish whilst rigging up and then casting into the open mouth of the only fish that would oblige us by being caught. After which i could entice nothing to nibble my offering. First cast, straight into a fish, felt like a legend(for about ten minutes). Andrew managed to hook into a few fish, but after a brief struggle they were off again. At least he draws closer to his first fish of the season. When he does catch one, i hope for his sake it's huge. He deserves it, with the amount of patience he has shown.

We mainly stuck to lures, the only fish caught was on an orange cats whisker. Activity at surface was spotted but mainly dried up after the first half an hour.

Cardmaking and fishing, the two worlds collide

Thought I would share this amazing birthday card. Wifey made it for me for my 30th birthday, the picture was taken at Moorbrooks and will remind me of a most incredible day flyfishing. if you're interested in cardmaking or scrapbooking, you should check out her and her sister's blog at Cleocrafts

Cormorant Vs Pike

I was quite intrigued by the cormorant attack on my fish, i was a bit sceptical and thought that although the bird had attacked the fish, it was unlikely that he could have swallowed it. How wrong I was, check this article out from the Daily Mail.

Full article here

4th April North Woodburn

Set out with three objectives

1. Not to fish with buzzers and pimps

2. Use flies that i tied the night before

3. Catch a fish

Turned up late as usual, and after speaking with Derek the fisherman/councillor/tree surgeon/hillwalker/white-van-man/naturist learned that the reservoir wasn't fishing too well. Also got my update on the wildlife at the reservoir. He's a very knowledgeable man about many of the things that interest me.


So with the advice gleaned i set off down the far bank, it wasn't long before Derek was into a fish and afterwards he cleaned his area of weeds. I'd tied on a green cats whiskers that I'd tied myself (and was inwardly very chuffed with) and fished under a floating line. Worked my way along the entire bank and received no attention at all. At the end, I was wearily de-rigging the set up, to change to my usual buzzer, when i remember I had also tied an orange Cat whiskers and I decided to give it a whirl. On the second or third cast, Bang, the line tightened and i was into a fish. After a quite a long struggle to get my landing net open i eventually landed the 1lb rainbow. I'd originally planned to return the fish today, but I'd hooked the poor we chap quite far done his throat, so he was quickly dispatched.

It's not a great photo. but you can almost make out the scars on it's side. Then on the next cast a lively little rainbow took the fly again. this one was better hooked and went back straight away. After the brief period of excitement I decided it was probably best to head, I'd promised Wifey i wouldn't be all day.

After proudly showing fish to Derek, I learned that the scars were made by a cormorant trying to eat it. Was also introduced to a friend of his who gave me a couple of casting tips, I didn't catch his name, but cheers. He also was able to cast my line out probably twice as far as it has ever been casted before. I'm sure the running line got quite a shock at seeing daylight. unfortunately this means i can't blame my equipment for the shoddy casting.

All in all i had a great day, met all my objectives and had some lovely smoked trout for tea.