My rides up the dirt road put me in 10-11 minutes of Zone 2 (heart rate for an older person) and then 20-30 minutes in Zone 3 with an occasional bit in Zone 4. Steve decided to start building a mountain bike trail on our property by connecting and clearing deer highways. With enough switchbacks and perimeter trail, it can be close to a mile in length, with a good quarter mile uphill that quickly puts my heartrate into Zone 3 with the remaining part downhill or flat. I’ve yet to ride it because Steve crashed hard on his first attempt, finding hidden “features” beneath the duff. My self-appointed job it to pick up all the dead branches and small trees along the trail to beautify it and reduce fuels. That deadwood is hauled to the dump to be chipped. It’s a lot of work but gratifying.
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I am a fly fisherman, of course. And like every other fly fisherman, I have a huge imagination. Ever since I was a young boy, I’ve known about enormous fish monsters living in the bottomless depths of lakes and rivers. And growing into an older boy hasn’t caused this imagination to diminish in the slightest; big fish ARE out there!
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"Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing."
---Ben Hogan
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Tomorrow, as I write, James and I will be running another BFCC meeting. This one is in Kent, so James is driving now after picking me up from Bristol where I was working all week. We'll be doing a lot of travelling over this weekend – both taking turns to drive. We’ve just stopped at a very busy Sportfish Theale and watched trout leap for damsels and saw emerging mayflies. This almost made us break out the rods and start fishing! We're currently stuck in busy traffic on the M25 but we're hoping to get to Kent to do some casting practice, mainly me as I haven't cast a rod for over a week.
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I have an excellent new line to try at the next competition, it is made by a new company called Celestial Fly Lines. Initial impressions? The coating is very slick and hard, and consequently shoots very well indeed. I have tried a few prototypes, but this is by far the best one. It is 120’ long, features a 73’ head which means your carry has to be fairly high.
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Last weekend we took part to outdoor fair. There were lots of interesting gears and things. Few which I would love to have. Well we see during the summer how those things will end up.
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Well I didn't follow up on the mullet this week. The forecast kept changing and I almost didn't fish at all, but luckily I woke up on Monday and it was glorious weather rather than the forecast storm. I was still feeling cautious in case the weather turned, so decided to stay local and take a walk up the local river.
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Last year a few mates and I went for a four day walk out to the western lakes. It started as usual, hungover and barely seeing straight, perfect for an early wake up of 10am. We drove out and started the walk from Ada, smashing out the 17km in record slow time, getting to camp as the sun was just setting. With high hopes, we dumped all our gear and started looking for a few spinner feeders. We saw a few smaller fish jumping for spinners, but being pretty buggered we called it quits for a hot dinner and early night.
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Yesterday Nick and I filmed the 110-115’ video. It’s starting to get a little more technical. The video normally takes about a week or so to edit. There has been some really interesting comments and questions on the 100’+ video, some of which we comprehensively answer in this next one. I’m sure it will lead to ever more questions of course, but that’s also good too.
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Another one of Dr. John Tebbetts Keys style Tarpon patterns......The Pale Green & Yellow Grizzly
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Next weekend is the second BFCC day of the year in Willesborough, Kent. If you’re interesting in attending then please check out the BFCC website or the Facebook page – the entrance to the cricket ground is easy to miss so there are detailed instructions on how to find it listed.
As far as the competition events go, the first meeting was dominated by Bart (taking 6 wins from the 7 disciplines) and I’m sure he’s training for a repeat performance. Whereas I’m hoping that things are not going to be so one-sided this time and will be gunning for an overall win on the day, as I’m sure will other casters.
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Well, I think this is the one that will get the most views! The funny thing is, once you’ve learnt to distance cast efficiently, it’s a relatively easy cast to make, especially in terms of actual effort involved. It doesn’t take much force to get the line out there, in fact, the less force you use the further it will probably go. Casting long is not always about distance, it gives you the skills to cast into the wind better, where the fish usually are.
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So Saturday came, it was myday. That is what Satu told me. Do what ever you want but do not be at home, I will be cleaning house. Those words any husband wants to hear from wife.
So in the morning I went to search gps tracker, which I knew was dropped from reindeer's ear. It dropped few days earlier and I went to find it then, there was too much snow to locate it. After finding gps, I did some small things at farm....
And then wearing waders amd getting fishing gears in the car. Satu had made picnic lunch and coffee to take away. I had two spots on my mind. First one had little about one mile walk and other less than quarter mile. First spot would be great for fishing and lot of nice holes and spots to fish.
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I decided to go down the coast in search of mullet this week. Given the conditions it might not have been the best decision, but I'm not that good at mullet and if I want to get good, I need to go and actually be actively rubbish at it for a while.
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Today I’m editing the 70-100’ casting video that I made with Nick. It was supposed to go live today but that will end up being Saturday. I know! How is it possible to be this organised?
I’m sitting in the back of the Battleship with a storm rolling down the lake. The interesting thing about storms, is that I never know how intense they will be. Often they announce themselves in the distance with some rumbling and a few flashes of lightning, but the first thing that descends upon you, is not the rain; it’s the wind.
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It’s an interesting world we live in. Some of the finest fly fishing rods were produced 30 years ago. I know because I bought one! The G. Loomis IMX 9’#6. In fact I bought two because I fell on my first one, on my very first trip to NZ at the ripe age of 22. Somewhere up the Greenstone River, having just met Camo-Guy for the first time, while following his red socks.
Steve Parton built it for me. It’s a small world. I built the second one myself, giving it “character”. Fitted with SICs throughout, I took my first fishing instructor exams with it back in early ‘96. It was an awesome rod. I remember years later meeting up with Chris Rownes, who said Mel Krieger had told him, that this was as “state of the art” as a fly rod could get.
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Still recovering from the broken ankle and a few minor complications, so no fishing related activities going on this week. Because of that I have decided to re-run a piece from May of 2019. Hard to believe this was written prior to the Global Pandemic, and the chaos that ensued for the next few years. I don't know about you guys but I still don't feel "normal" yet. But, the fishing spots are still there...and so are the fish. And as soon as the ankle heals a bit more I pan on paying them a friendly visit.
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I met up with Callum again this weekend for some competition practice. The plan was to do some S55 (double handed, overhead) casting followed by some accuracy rounds. Given the steady wind on my usual distance casting field I was confident that Callum would put a string of casts together that were further than the BFCC under 18 record and I was also expecting a significant improvement on his personal best. It was therefore with great anticipation that we set up the tackle – right up to the point where I realised that I’d forgotten to bring the salmon rod.
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When it comes to fishing for trout and grayling in rivers and streams, match-the-hatch-dry-fly-fishing is challenging and interesting. Sometimes it’s difficult to ascertain what the fish are feeding on and often it requires some knowledge of entomology and the insect fauna on particular river. But it’s an old saying that grayling and trout find 89% (or more) of their food below the surface, where they are rarely seen. Which is why skills in nymph fishing are good to have. Wet fly fishing too, for that matter, but this FP is about nymph fishing.
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At the this moment when I'm writing this FP at home, instead exactly a year ago we were sitting on a plane from Helsinki to Istanbul. And when you are reading this on Friday we were just about to land in Kuala Lumpur. Those were the days of our lives......
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We've just had Golden Week here in Japan, which is a spring holiday with a load of public holidays strung through it, most people take a day or two of leave to get the whole week off. So I didn't fish, I never do because there're just too many people on the rivers and lakes. I climbed a few mountains instead and had some intersting animal encounters with lizards, snakes and a parasitic wasp which was pretty nice.
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It was really nice to go back to where I used to live and work, especially since the fishing up here is absolutely fantastic. Not only in terms of rivers, but Stillwater trout fisheries are plentiful and productive.
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It’s been a busy week! I have an interesting weekly blend of online casting coaching, running Sexyloops, Ironman training and fly fishing. And the weeks just roll into each other. Saturday is my long bike ride day and I do 4.5hrs plus on the bike. Phew. Sunday is a full day of recovery. Either Tuesday or Wednesday is a long 2-2.5hr run (and beer shopping day). And the other days are a mix of everything: swimming, biking, fishing (actually fishing is every day). It’s quite good fun actually!
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Bones heal, pain is temporary, and chicks dig scars...
---Evil Knievel
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This is going to be a short FP as I’m knackered – today I spent 7hrs on a casting field with Tracy, Callum and WP from the board. We were casting various outfits in preparation for the next BFCC day towards the end of the month – Tracy will be promoting this event, in Kent, sometime soon.
Callum is a junior who attended his first BFCC competition in March this year. I first met him last year when his regular casting instructor approached Tracy and myself saying that they had someone who was keen on distance and willing to put the required practice in. The 7hr session today probably indicates how keen he is to improve – and those improvements are coming fast.
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Two of the most significant hatches to in May are the Yellow May Dun and the Brown May Dun. The first named Heptagenia sulphurea, the second Heptagenia fuscogresia, in latin. They hatch more or less simultaneously, the Yellow May carries on a little further into June than the Brown May. I think the Brown May is the ones called Large Brook Dun in English fly fishing terms.
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I had good casying training period going in winter. Weather was hard and still I enjoyed training. Past month has been more or less something, lot of work around reindeer to get them to the wild. Weather has been nice but circumstances not, so I haven't been casting.
They say that men are having crisis of the fifties. I assume that means that when we get fifty years old we buy or do something to compensate our age. Something like buying motorcycle, sport car, dating younger woman.... something like that. In my case instead of motorcycle it could be snowmobile :D
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I've been tying a batch of dapping flies this week. Not for myself but for a friend in Ireland, dapping isn't something I've got much experience with, but it is quite interesting.
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On Thursday I talked with the young assistant manager at our local fly shop, telling him about our adventures getting skunked. I asked, “Is it something we’re doing or where we’re going?” He very tactfully, said “Probably a little of both.” Turns out we were fishing too far upstream in both instances. He also suggested using different flies. While I really don’t think that the selection of flies typically matters that much, I bought a couple that he suggested. He and I planned to go fish this week, but instead the unseasonably warm temperatures brought run-off in full force. In fact, Missoula has flood warnings posted due to the high temperatures (today it’s 87 F) with expected rain later in the week. It should cool down to the 60’s, which will slow run-off a bit.
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I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night because there was a damn trumpet-playing party all night long. Skinny dipping at 3am. Vandalising trees. Bloody elephants.
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"JUST CAST MAN...."
---Nick Moore
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