Sandbagged!

Sandbagged!
Photograph by Steve Barnett

Sunday, 12 August 2012

Evening Mist - "A Bad Thing!" - Really?

How many of you feel your heart sinking when a mist descends over the river?

It is hardly a boost to one's confidence.  Nevertheless, mist descending is really just another set of conditions that you have to make a decision or two about.  Tonight the mist came down over the water and the first instinct is "Oh dear!  That will switch the fly activity off.  Maybe it is time to go home?"

The thing is though, Henry and your regular rod had only just emerged from a day indoors, processing films and photographs.  (Yes some of us still use film as well as megapixels.  That's another story for another time perhaps...)  Going back indoors was not really what we had in mind.  So...

The conditions meant the first decision was to persevere and do our best. 

Lo and Behold!  Some fly activity was still happening.  The hatching flies had more or less packed in for the night but the spinners were committed.  Their energy packets can't last indefinitely.  Mated females with fertilised eggs have got to complete their missions.  So at least some of the spinners out tonight had to come back to the river.  This they did in sufficient numbers to make some fish prepared to rise for them.  It was not a night of furious activity but there were enough fish interested in the dead and dying spinners to make fishing for them a worthwhile proposition.

The usual PPS was deployed and casting to the intermittently rising fish proved just effective enough to make the night a delight instead of a fruitless struggle.  The tally was a modest leash comprising: one very fine female grayling; one very strong two pound plus brown trout that fought a very hard fight until the big, long-handled, net was lifted; and finally a splendid wild rainbow trout that when carefully released, behind a stone in the edge that makes a pocket of slacker water giving released fish a sheltered spot to full recover in, simply flew, like an arrow, back whence it came and eschewing the sheltered water completely!!!

Hmm...  another McNab! 

The second decision was made. 

Pack up and go back home! 

It had been a splendid hour and anything else was going to be an anticlimax.  Go home happy, rather than go home in disgust at the mist. 

Surely a just reward for ignoring the doctrine and instead having a try?


Regular Rod
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9 comments:

  1. cofisher12 August 2012 at 21:57

    My .02 Rod. The trip was worth it just for the beautiful photo you posted.

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  2. Anonymous13 August 2012 at 16:29

    It was strange to see spinner in the mist.

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    Replies
    1. Regular Rod13 August 2012 at 18:55

      I'm not so sure about that. Once those females are mated they have no option but to lay their eggs at the alloted time. I can understand emergers deciding not tonight thank you, but the spinners really have no choice but to "keep calm and carry on"

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    2. Anonymous13 August 2012 at 22:59

      Last nights mist seems to have been created, not by air cooling to its dew point, but by evaporation of rain drops in the warm air. I believe both mating and egg laying were taking place last night, and this suggests it isn't the mist that kills the evening rise, but the fall in air temperature of which mist is a by=product.

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  3. Beryl15 August 2012 at 14:02

    I recently stopped two hours before planned having caught a pound WBT that is specimen size for my small stream. It just didn't feel right to carry on. I'm new to this so I may grow out of it.

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    1. Regular Rod15 August 2012 at 17:01

      No! You would be regressing to grow OUT of it! Keep in tune with those feelings, such as it not feeling right to carry on, and you are growing INTO that elusive state of residency that changes everything, multiplying your joys exponentially each time you "feel" what is right and wrong. You did the right thing and I bet you will continue so to do...

      Regular Rod

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  4. Anonymous16 August 2012 at 08:47

    Just as a side note, we have a number of tailwaters out this way that run warm in the winter with water temps. in the high 30 degree F range. Yet the air temperature may be 15 or 20 degrees colder. That often gives us heavy, low lying fog along the surface and the one thing I've noticed with the winter Blue Winged Olive hatches is that the excess mositure in the air, from the fog, causes a slow drying of the wings. They ride the surface much longer and then take flight, sometimes into a snow storm. Makes for some interesting dry fly fishing as the longer they drift to dry their wings, the more the trout key to taking them as they drift. Easy pickings on the trouts's part I would imagine.
    I love your observational approach to all of this.... A true dry fly man! If anyone ever figures it all out some of the fun might be gone! I would imagine every species and sub species has a window within which it can preform the dance.

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  5. Anonymous17 August 2012 at 21:10

    RR I am hitting your Holy Wye on Sunday and will be knocking on your door in the afternoon for some pps!! If your not in leave them with the wife... Thanks Glen
    By Glen Pointon on Evening Mist - "A Bad Thing!" - Really? at 17:58

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