Parachute Adams and a Pheasant tail nymph

You would think with the beautiful weather we had here in Cape Town lately that I would be fishing every weekend. Sadly I have had very little free time of late and just haven't had to energy or even the will to tie any flies during the spare time I get.

The reports from our local streams are not to good anyway with low water levels and only having a small window for some fishing early mornings  before the water temperatures gets to hot. Thankfully it seems that things are starting to turn a bit with longer nights and cooler mornings.

Even my favorite dam that we stock has been of limits during these hot months. The dam has always been my go to place when I have a short hour or so free as it is only 5 minutes from my house. Normally the fish would not survive the summer months as the water levels dropped considerably and the water temperatures rise. This past summer though we decided to keep the dam full during summer by topping it up thanks to the farmers new water allocation. It seemed to have kept the water temperatures lower and from all accounts it looks like quite a number of fish has survived the summer, so I am looking forward to catching a few monsters soon.

I did sit down and tie a few bread and butter flies a while back. These are nothing spectacular and are pretty much just the standard High Vis Parachute Adam's and Pheasant tail nymphs that always in my fly box.

Gray, Black and Olive

A great day's fishing on a cool mountain stream

Yesterday was my last day of leave and I celebrated it by spending the morning on a cold mountain stream. I rigged up a dry and dropper system with a CDC and Elk hair Caddis and a #18 Hot spot Pheasant tail variant nymph. I started fishing at about 7am and till about 9am all the fish took the nymph.

Pheasant tail variant

Shortly after 9am a fish took the dry followed by another smallish rainbow shortly after. I took off the nymph and tied on a dry fly spider pattern and from then on all the fish came up confidently to the dry fly.

The most memorable fish was the brown below that shot out from under a bush and launched himself a meter out of the water smashing my fly.He also gave me the best fight I have ever had for a brown trout.

I lost another good brown later in the morning but all the rest of the fish were Rainbows ranging from about 8 to 16 inches. Normally the fish in this particular stream would be in the fast water but today they were sitting in the slow flowing pools which made it a interesting exercise casting to them and not spooking them. There were six fish rising occasionally in the pool below and I managed to fool 4 of them into taking my dry. The other two I spooked with sloppy presentation. I also had to put lots of pressure on every fish when it took the dry to prevent him from screaming of upstream to spook the next fish.

Normally at this time of the year the water levels are pretty low and the water temperature heats up quite quickly, but at the moment the streams are just perfect, the fish are in great condition and its a absolute pleasure just being out on the rivers. I spend a great deal of the morning just sitting on a rock with my feet in the cool mountain water contemplating life.

If Douglas Adams was a fly fisher I am pretty sure he would have come up with a different answer than 42.

Well Monday its back to the daily grind. On a more hopefull note: The Lotto tonight is R15 mil, I have a ticket in my pocket and with the right amount of luck I would be able to spend lots more time sitting on a rock getting the correct answer to the meaning of life  for all of you.

FROM THE TYING BENCH

Going to fish my local dam again tomorrow and needed some more Pheasant tail nymphs, so I tied up a few tonight. These little flies worked well  some time back as they sink fast. I fish them on the dam with a long 5x leader on a floating line. I just let the line drift in the wind and give it the occasional twitch.

With the dams water being so clear at the moment I also love to cast them to cruising fish. You can often spot the fish turning toward the fly if you get the fly in its path.

HOOK: Knapek Midge Pupae 

BEAD: Gold tungsten

TAIL: Pheasant tail

BODY: Pheasant tail

THORAX:  Peacock Hearl

THORAX COVER: Medallion sheet