A Cold Morning, A First Trout

The night had been long, dark and cold. Morning broke a cold winter grey with a heavy overnight frost lighting up the dark depths of the trees. The wind blew cold against my face as I got out of the car and tackled up.




As I was putting my rods together I examined the lake I had come to fish. No ice thankfully, a slight riffle on the water but no sign of any trout, although I knew they were there, just deep down in the water.



Fly fishing was still new to me then, having come from course fishing, I had only taken it up some two months previously.



In my ignorance I had never looked into fly fishing as I assumed it was a sport of the rich, with no place for the likes of me.



It was 2 months previously that I had first paid a visit to a nearby trout fishery. I had heard about it as I used to fish for carp on a nearby lake. The trout fishery is made up of two small 2 acre lakes surrounded by woodland interspersed by views across open country.



I met the fishery manager and asked if it was ok to take a walk around. It was there that I met an elderly gentleman, George, whose enthusiasm for fly fishing was infectious.



George has fished for many years and was enjoying his fishing even more since he had retired



He blew away all my misconceptions about fly fishing, and introduced me to a number of the regular fishing "crowd".



It was then that I decided to take the sport up, and had a long talk with the fishery manager about tactics and the waters he presided over. You can never have too much local knowledge.



It always surprises me the number of people who turn up to a new water to fish, but never take the time to actually find out about the water they are about to fish.



Going back to the morning I arrived to fish I still had yet to catch my first fish. This was probably due to the fact that my casting was still improving, as was my understanding of the whole fly fishing sport.



I decided to fish the further of the 2 lakes that morning. This lake is known to be the more difficult of the 2, probably because it is very deep and quite exposed.



Despite the fact that I knew the fish were probably holding down deep in the water, I decided to use a floating line with a long leader and a dark fly, a Bloody Butcher.



My favourite fly fishing method is dry fly fishing, but in winter and with nothing hatching, this was not an option on this occasion.



To this day I still find an intermediate or sinking line more difficult to cast, so I use a floating line with a very long leader attached.



There were three of us fishing the lake that morning. After about an hour and a half I started to find casting difficult. The line just did not seem to want to shoot.



I then attracted a number of jovial comments from the other fishers, one of which was something like "it's harder to cast when it's frozen!" Sure enough, my rod rings had completely iced up!



The others were packing up, considering it too cold to continue. I decided to give it one last try. I went against the rule of "dark flies for dark days" and put on an Orange Fritz.



First cast - my first fish!



I was so excited about catching my first ever trout on the fly that I determined to come back the next day, and I did, full of confidence. I must have fished that Orange Fritz for over 3 hours, but didn't even get a "knock".



These days I wouldn't consider fishing the same fly with no result for that long and it just goes to show how fickle trout can be, interested in a certain fly one day, completely uninterested in the same fly the next!



Zac is also a keen fly fisherman. For some great tips and deals, visit his latest website about fly fishing combos where you can get information on buying balanced fly fishing combos which is generally cheaper than buying the individual components you need.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Zac_Kurtsmier