Ok, it's been a long time since I blogged but lots of personal probs for all of us and I'm sure Mick (Bone) won't mind me mentioning the sad passing away of his lovely wife, Angela, a couple of weeks ago.
As you can imagine, since our super mayfly days on the Dove we have not really been in a position to do much. And when there was a window of opportunity, we were often defeated by the weather.
But we have been busy in other ways: A 24 hour fishing match for Douglas McMillan cancer charity with 15 of our good friends, some days struggling on trout lakes and an all nighter on a lake trying for some elusive large carp.
We failed with the elusive large carp but have recently got it sorted with some nice carp on fly tackle at a lake less than 5 minutes from where we live!
It all started after I put a 'bog brush' thing on a fly rod in the 24 hour match. I promptly hooked and lost a large carp.
The next week, Bone and me had another go, throwing out dog biscuits and putting our deer hair balls amongst them. Lots of takes but no hook ups.
So we got our heads together. It would be so easy to glue a hook to a dog biscuit but we didn't want to do that so we got some wine corks and I cut them, shaped them and balanced them with hidden shot so that a nice size 10 Viper circle hook would sit on the top.
Well that did it. On Thursday, I nipped down for an hour and had four!
Today we had an even improved version! I lost a fish of about 15lb after playing it out and waiting for Bone to net it. In fairness to Bone, it was my fault because: 1, I had forgot my net and 2, I had to wait while he landed his!
As you can imagine, since our super mayfly days on the Dove we have not really been in a position to do much. And when there was a window of opportunity, we were often defeated by the weather.
My new bivvy. Impossible to see.
This is how the fish see me. I would imagine
We failed with the elusive large carp but have recently got it sorted with some nice carp on fly tackle at a lake less than 5 minutes from where we live!
It all started after I put a 'bog brush' thing on a fly rod in the 24 hour match. I promptly hooked and lost a large carp.
The next week, Bone and me had another go, throwing out dog biscuits and putting our deer hair balls amongst them. Lots of takes but no hook ups.
So we got our heads together. It would be so easy to glue a hook to a dog biscuit but we didn't want to do that so we got some wine corks and I cut them, shaped them and balanced them with hidden shot so that a nice size 10 Viper circle hook would sit on the top.
Well that did it. On Thursday, I nipped down for an hour and had four!
Today we had an even improved version! I lost a fish of about 15lb after playing it out and waiting for Bone to net it. In fairness to Bone, it was my fault because: 1, I had forgot my net and 2, I had to wait while he landed his!
Bone with a well deserved carp on the fly rod.
We had a great couple of hours.
That himalayan balsam needs attention!
ReplyDeleteFunny you should mention that. Along with some other things, it is going this week!
ReplyDelete