IMPORTANT
SITE UPDATE:

Visit the relaunched
Fish & Fly at fishandfly.com

NIGHT FISHING

Many thanks to Howard Thresher of the Crediton Fly Fishing Club for this educational and entertaining account of night fishing on the Teign...

We've not had the best of summers if weather were the only criterion. Happily it is not. The prevailing south-westerlies that have been absent for much of the last few years, have returned this year, bringing with them moist (read soaking) warm winds (read occasional gales), filling our rain-fed streams throughout the spring and summer. Good for the fish and good for fishing.

The Creedy and Yeo have exceeded all expectations this year, with good catches of trout being reported every month, even August! What a difference to last year.

Having caught a surplus of brownies in recent weeks, thoughts turned to sea-trout, which sadly have not been prolific this year on the club's waters. After nights of thrashing the Taw with little reward but a few small brownies, Greg Mason & I decided to turn traitor and fish the Teign last night.... Greg's idea so blame him ... he can also take the credit, for it was a good idea.

We arrived at about 6.30pm, and the south-westerlies were still packing rain. It was warm, very overcast with blustery showers of fine rain every twenty minutes or so.

Greg had fished there before so he talked me down through the fishing, outlining possible lies and the best approaches for night fishing.

With any new stream, I've just got to get in and start fishing, so I tackled up a short trout rod and decided to test the water by fishing back upstream, whilst it was still light, and leaving the sea-trout pools undisturbed until later in the evening.

Above these pools extended a long run where trees encroached - their overhanging branches lapping the water at each gust of wind. I stumbled up the channel littered with submerged moorland rocks, roll casting a nymph before me... The wind tunnel was too strong in my face to cast a dry fly. My casting was slappy, and the results reflected this. I got out at the top and walked back down to rejoin Greg who had made better use of the time by consuming a leisurely tea and setting up two rods: one for the first part of the night, and another with a sink tip and a heavy Waddington for later in the night and the deeper pools.

Already daylight was escaping over the hills, and the colours of the landscape were dissolving into darkness. There was a loud crash of a big sea-trout just upstream of where we were standing. It was dimpsey.

We decided to split up and each fish down a couple of pools, before meeting up again. After this we would alternately fish pools and the run at the top, resting each pool for as long as possible before covering it again... Another crash, downstream this time.

I started off fishing with a small Dunkeld tube on a sink tip line, and almost immediately there were gentle plucks of the line suggesting inquisitive peal. All that I hooked were small parr. I changed to a more traditional Garry Dog, on a size 6 salmon hook as the current was good and I felt that maybe I needed to get the fly down to the fish.

A little later I met up with Greg. He had had a small peal on a Stoat's Tail tube at about 9pm. When I came to fish the same pool about an hour later, I also caught its shoal mate, this time on on my Garry.

Despite the sporadic showers and persistent wind, the night remained warm. The moon started its arc, cresting the hill to the south, but we were unaware of its presence for quite some time. Cloud totally obscured its shape for the first couple of hours after dark. As it rose higher the cloud cover seemed to thin and the sky lightened from intense blackness. Occasionally the cutain of cloud would be pulled aside and the whole scene would be bathed in the dazzling light of the full moon as it continued its course above the tree line. At these moments we would have to freeze all movement until the racing clouds once more provided obscurity.

Once, whilst I was casting downstream, two shadowy figures appeared in the swirling current. I was more aware of the wake that they made than any actual substance or shape. They seemed to move slowly upstream and them drift back with the current each time that my fly line crossed their path. Later during one of the brief episodes of moonlight, I saw them on the bank close to where they been weaving their ghostly patterns on the water. Just two mallards.

A fox came down to the water's edge to drink a little while later, and I was pleased that the ducks had chosen the opposite bank on which to roost.

The sound of the river always increases at night, sometimes when all other senses are deprived of input it can reach a deafening crescendo. Tonight was different, there was the wind, there were the tawny owls and there was the sound of hounds baying in the hunt kennels somewhere in the distance. Added to that thee was an extremely indignant green woodpecker who maintained a perpetual yaffle for at least half an hour. Possibly he was disturbed by the owls or the fox, who knows.

Quite a bit later again, Greg caught his second peal from a lie where we had seen a fish move just at dusk. I continued to fish and rest, fish and rest. I tried a large Mylar Medicine with no improved result, changed again to a Falkus sunk lure, again a Medicine. There were the occasional splashes of sea-trout, always in the nexy pool, but I had no more fish.

At about 2am we both remarked that the current seemed to be flowing stronger, and the fly was working faster in the dark swirl. I was hooking leaves and twigs with increasing frequency (something that makes your heart pound each time it happens as you anticipate the delicate tug of a peal). A rock that I had stood behind on the edge of one pool was now almost under water. Although we had had quite a lot of showers, we hadn't been totally soaked. It was evident that higher up on Dartmoor there must have been a deluge a few hours earlier, and we were finally the recipients. What comes down must go up when applied to river levels.

We continued to fish another hour, before deciding the river was becoming unfishable.

The rain had eased off for that last hour and we returned to the car in happy state of mind, surprised to find that it was already 3am. I had heard the church clock chiming midnight, but had been quite oblivious to its other chimes.

The peal we caught were only 13-14", but nice fresh fish for all that, and mine was quite explosive when hooked. I was grateful for the offering and for the memories, and I shall return next year."

Howard Thresher is a member of the Crediton Fly Fishing Club based in Devon. Find out more at http://freespace.virgin.net/howard.thresher/cffc1.html or http://freespace.virgin.net/howard.thresher/glyndwr.html