Tracy&James | Sunday, 2 June 2024
Last week James and I mostly worked away from home so didn't have had time to go fishing or casting during the week. Last weekend we had hoped to have a casting session however the field we normally go to was full of kids playing in a football tournament that went on all weekend. Also due to family commitments we didn't really have time to get to the river, so we spent some of our time going through our videos from the latest saltwater holiday. We haven't posted much recently so James can edit some of the videos, whilst I start researching future holiday destinations. However our next few fishing trips will be UK-based, such as a trip to Rutland before going to Scotland for the Scone Game Fair in July.
Yesterday we managed to get on the river Dee and the river seemed perfect when we arrived with lots of fly-life and only a gentle breeze, however we quickly learnt from a fellow angler that the fish didn't think so. He advised that there wasn't much rising and that due to water being released from Bala, the water temperature was colder than expected. This generally means the fish don't feed as much. However we carried on and waded in to see how things went. The water was cold, though there were a few rises and soon both of us had caught a few fish. As the day progressed the wind picked up, making it feel colder and making it slightly difficult to cast our #3s. However we had a lovely day watching a king fisher fly past, saw several dark blue damsel flies, plus olives and sedges. Apparently another angler had also seen some may fly. This is promising for our trips during the next week.
Watching the videos is making us want to go bonefishing again. However we do need to arrange a better position to set the camera to enhance the footage of the fish, the reel and the rod. I might get another camera so we have one each to increase the coverage of the fishing. Some of our films miss the take and many miss the reel spinning. Also the wind noise masks the sound of the reel clicking, which for me during this trip was much more enjoyable as I had a new reel as a present from James that made a glorious buzz when the bone first took off.
There were also many occasions when I was on my own when I would have liked to have filmed the catch. I remember one in particular where the fish had been tailing in shallow water and it leapt on my fly, first cast and then ran, however the ground was covered in 'sand-hills' so every so often the line caught resulting in the fish running in a perpendicular angle to most of my line and then I had to wind extremely quickly when the line dislodged to take up this slack. During this run, the fish spooked another bone that came swimming straight towards me and typically this one was significantly bigger than the one I was playing. It only spooked again when it was about 15 yards in front of me so I had a good view of it. James had a few similar situations but with small sharks that were spooked by the bone being played, however I remember one of these occasions where I had to run at the shark to scare it away to ensure it didn't try to 'eat' the bone.
Today, we'll be practising on our local field, hopefully without having to cast around a game of football. My aim is to do some 3 minute casting sessions to mimic what we do at a BFCC event. It's easy to cast for say 40 minutes and be pleased with one or two good casts near your pb but more important is to be able to get a good cast out within the allotted time. I also plan to do some accuracy practice as I have mentioned before, having a good accuracy score in the game fair comps can really help your overall total and keep you in the top group. We'll report on this next week.
Whatever you are doing this weekend, enjoy
Cheers
Tracy