Short Lived Action on the Fly

A nice little rise in river levels on the Bandon last weekend offered up the opportunity to take the fly rod out once again. I fished the fly less during low water as fish seemed a lot more reluctant to rise to a fly. It seems this is a trend for this time of year, with their noses seemingly stuck into the gravel at times. Many fish are now stale and past their best but a lift in the water brings them on the take as well as enabling fresh fish to run.

Saturday morning I spent a bit of time tying up a suitable fly to fish for the weekend. I opted for a Park Shrimp as lately all I had been using was a Green Butt Cascade.

In essence, this Park Shrimp isn't really a true Park Shrimp as I didn't use arctic runner. Mine uses the same colour scheme but uses a small pinch of bucktail at the base and more finn raccoon in the tail, tied very sparsely in this instance with plenty of fiery orange ice wing to set it off and catch the eye of the salmon. Heading out on the river to my spot of choice I tied on the new fly... 2nd cast and whallop fish on! 5 minutes later and I had a plump little 3 and a half pounder in the net. 

As it was a hen fish I returned her to continue her journey upriver and hopefully achieve her goal on the spawning beds. 

Sunday the water was even better, with a slight tinge of colour in it. The day was mostly overcast with a light southerly breeze causing a ripple on the water. I fished for 2 hours in the afternoon and managed one more fish on the Park Shrimp, another stale hen which I returned, weighing approximately 6lbs.

In the next spot I hit a second fish but I knew immediately that it hadn't taken the fly properly and it came off after a couple of minutes play. A fine fish by the looks of it too, 7-8lb weight and bright silver. 

The water level has now fallen once again and so has the fishes interest in the fly so I haven't been out much this week but I did have one more small grilse on the worm. My next plan of action is to tie some flies on size 15 hooks, incorporating more late season colours such as red and purple/claret.