FISHING THE TIDAL RACE! PV

Part Five (techniques)

Thank you

Andys' Flies go on Holidays

Fishing Report - April 04 David Anchell

I spent Monday and Tuesday of this week fly fishing for pike in the Northeast. As part of my continuous development plan for SEAi I have partnered up with a pike fishing guru. Peadar O’Brien is a fully qualified pike fishing guide with more than 15 years experience in Pike guiding including International clients. We have been working together now for some time and I am learning the ropes, locations, boat management, safety and much more. I hope to bring you excellent opportunities in the next few months for some quality pike fishing both on fly and lure in some truly remote and beautiful locations.

I had invited David as a ‘test’ client to fish with us for the last two days in order to demonstrate and experience the quality of the fishing available. David is a widely experienced fly fisher having fished in many locations like Alaska, the Bahamas, and Belize to mention a few. David is also a regular customer of SEAi and has been bass fishing with me now for four seasons.

The weather in the run up to our two day expedition proved to be ideal and on Sunday as temperatures dropped to below zero I made the dash to Peadar’s house some two and a half hours away. David was to meet us on Monday morning and we would go straight to the fishing. Temperatures had dropped overnight to well below freezing and on monday morning as we headed towards the first location, along and over rolling backroads, the sun rose slowly into a perfect blue sky. Launching the boat was an adventure and as we headed down the little river heading into the lake, shoals of roach and perch were active all around us.

Water temperature was reading between 3.3 and 3.8 degrees so sinking ines were the order of the day and we headed towards the leeward side of the lake into the sun. We were fishing for some 10 minutes before David had his first fish to the fly and thats the way it continued for most of the morning and into the early afternoon. Fish on then fish off as we had hit after hit in the glorious winter sunshine. Yes we went through quiet patches too but we had eleven fish to the boat and probably missed as many if not more again. Anticipation was already building for tuesday.
Tuesday dawned a little cloudier and windier and Peadar had us lined up for a new location that had a reputation as an excellent fly water. I changed tactics slightly on this occassion and shortened my leader to less than 1.5ms of .6mm fluorocarbon and a 20 cm wire trace. I also increased the size of my fly and was fishing with a giant 25 cm beast, at times it felt like I was casting a wet sock. The tactics paid off and I had some wonderful fish take the fly. It was good times for David too and as Peadar worked around the lake we continued to take fish in many key areas.

So over the the two days of fishing we took 22 fish all on the fly to the boat. Water temperatures varied from 3.2 degrees to a positively tropical 4.4 at its best. The fish performed in little windows and tactical placing of the boat and the fly produced the best results. I'm back working with Peadar next week and we will keep you informed of our continuing adventures.

Landing Gear

Rod - Redington CPS #9
Reel- Danielsson - LW #6/9
Line - Jim Teeny T300 and T400
Leader - .6mm Gamma Fluorocarbon (1.5ms) and proleader
Flies - as above up to 25cms