Viking Lars | Saturday, 6 July 2024
The Norwegian salmon rivers are closed. Not that it directly affects my own fishing as such, I’ve been to Scotland and Norway already, si I’ve really no holiday left from work to spend on fishing vacations. If the rivers in Norway open again later, who knows, I might be able to sneak in a long weekend at the end of August. We’ll see. It’s summer - a good fishing one, actually, Temperatures are moderate and there’s plenty of rain. Much to the regret of my family, I enjoy rain - as long as it’s not torrential. It helps keep the temperatures in the rivers down, even though it also makes them rise to unfishable levels.
Sea trout fishing in the salt is mainly during the night now, but you can certainly find them during the day when it’s not warmer than it is. The sea temperature isn’t too high (yet). Somewhere with deep water close to shore is often a good choice. Pike is still “open prey”, but they handle warm water really badly and they’re hard to release in good conditions, so I stay away from them, There is a river system, where we can fish them safely, but it’s a while away. Maybe…
Then there are all the untraditional target fish in the summer salt water. Mackerel, herring, bass, garfish, flounders and many more, but I can’t fish them.
It’s been a while since I really spent some time fishing for sea trout in the rivers and I have a small handful of trips planned for the summer holiday. Of course depending on water levels playing along. One of the rivers I fish is very sensible to rain and rises quickly, so a little rain is good, some dry spells and then a little rain again. Water levels going up and down draws up fresh fish and fresh fish disturb the ones that are already there and that makes everything a little easier.
A few of my favourite are set deep in the landscape, which means that night falls early, so the speak. At around 7pm the sun is low enough and the river set deep enough in the landscape that shade falls over the river. That’s often enough to get things going and something not many think about. The advantage is that if you’re at the river at say 5pm, you can spend some time fishing with large for flies on the surface and then as shade falls, switch to large, black flies just under the surface, which is great fun.
Right now it’s pouring down and has been for a few days, so it needs to stop and the rivers need a few days to drop to fishable levels, which is good. My sister’s a pianist and has asked me to join her on bass for a handful of songs at a family party this weekend. It’s been 20 years since I last read sheet music, let alone learned a new song. I can hardly remember where an “A” is found, apart from on the open A-string. So, back to bas(s)ics.
Have a great weekend!
Lars
PoD: Big, black flies work well. This one I’ve tied with a Pro Sportfisher Soft Sonic Disc that pushes a lot of water and is made of rubber, which means it doesn’t pull down the fly. Otherwise, big - 3.5 inches, lots of flash, some glow-in-dark and plent of fluorescence.