First bow

Its all about temperature… And higher is better, because its spring after all. Last weekend I was exploring some Northern Latvian trout streams, with the aim not only to land some fish, but also to experiment with some new trout flies I have tied specially for this season. As you might remember last week was quite hot and dry, by this waking waters from a long winter sleep and definitely this was the time to get in a waders. Quite a lot of options at the moment one may suggest: chub, asp, sea trout and salmon kelts in Salaca, as well as some trout in our tiny rivers. And also pike season is around the corner! But this time for me it was all about the trout and tiny streams.During the snowy winter time I have tied some flies for the spring and besides all time classics (Woollys and Mudlers) I prepared some new stuff to experiment with. So, this was the moment these flies where waiting for.

Saturday still was quite hot, with the few clouds and a light wind breezes. Water temperature in the Pededze was around five degrees at the morning, that was promising, as well as the level. It is not wise to wake up early and start fishing as soon as possible, because water temperature at he morning is low and it increase during the day time hopefully will boost the trouts activity. This is opposite to what you can expect in the summer, when its too hot during the day time.

I started to fish in the Pededze and already in the first corner my bright colored wooly produced some nice fish that escaped after few moves. Not too bad for the beginning! I moved on downstream, but without any success in following hour… Hm, there should be something wrong! And it not the fly, or tactics either – I have changed speeds and angles of the swing as, but with out any success. May be water in the Pededze still was little to cold for high fishing and nasty takes. Virgulica, a small tributary definitely was a bit warmer, because it is smaller and during the hot days warms up faster.

Another bow

Virgulīca is like an alpine creek – only 2 to 5 meters in width it is fast and rocky with bushy banks and lot of sheltering lies for trout. Already in the first spot descent fish attacked my bugger but with out any success. I moved on a little and had another take – this time successful! Nice, average size char was fighting the current with my fly in its mouth. Then another one and after a while Golden trout. F..k, what is this, some one may wonder. Yep, there is hatchery around the corner, so all these beauties has escaped some while ago I suppose. More surprisingly this spot produced another fish during the next minutes, so apparently it was an evidence that trout is seeking for the warmer water, and has entered the Virgulica recently. I reached first pool upstream from Pededze, that definitely was first stopping point for the entering fish. Nice cast under the bush, my fly swigged deep in a black water, and…  Yes – h e a v y   s l o w l y take! Its all about the scale in the small streams. It is nothing special to land a kilo + fish in big river or in the lake, but to see such a creature in small stream is something special. This time it was nice rainbow mail with the ugly sight and behavior – truly nice fish. But, historically, these ones where hatchery breaded, and as a fishermen I am always after wild ones. So, brownies was the name of the game this time! I changed from ugly colored buggers to my newly designed flies. Under the overhanging bush, deep in the dark current, where all types of food are passing by, is the spot that is just what decent trout is looking for. First I checked lie in the front of the big boulder, but without any success.

Almost there...

Then I swinged  my fly deep under the bush and, yes, finally I had what I was after. Nice browny showed his orange dots on the surface and after a while I admired him in my landing net! Wild and fully recovered after spawning he reflected all the beauty you can get out of cold small stream in early spring. During the following hours I landed few more fish: nice rainbow over 1kilo, and few more brownies up to 38 cm in the upper part of Virgulica. What a beautiful day!

At the evening water temperature reached 8.1 degrees , in comparison to 6 degrees at the morning. Amazing! Next morning clouds covered the sky and strong northern winds brought colder weather here! Unfortunately water was colder too – 6 degrees during the day time, with out any significant increase! Fishing was of coarse not so good as day before, but, surprisingly, brownies was less effected by the temperature than others – I caught 5 browns and only two chars, without seeing any bow or something else. Environmental hardiness of these brownies sometimes is just unbeatable!

I ll be back with sea report after a while!

Greetings.

Only C&R

A bit smaller yet beautiful brownie

Autumn Bow

Autumn and early winter  of course is spawning time for Salmonoid species – not only for those  from sea but also for freshwater trout. Week ago, I was visiting Armands place in the Northern part of the Latvia, to see how he is doing with his hatchery and to catch some fish. I would say, that this is one of the most beautiful hatcheries I know- located close and taking water from Virgulica creek , it is perfectly suited for hatching different salmonoids including Brown trout, Arctic char, Grayling and even White fish. So, those who are not shure about their fishing suceess, can prepare some nice pictures of fish from the hatchery.  I don’t know a lot of places in Baltic states  where you can see 2+kg brownee or char. I was even more lucky – Armands prepared such a fish for evening, that of coarse was best addition to whiskey, that we shared during the evening talks. Because the different reasons, this year was not so good for business, but don’t worry, numbers of trout and grayling still is enough to supply the rivers and lakes, where Armands  is in charge of stocking.

Opportunities near his beautifully located house are plenty: big stream, small stream and plenty of pounds, offers different opportunities for almost any fly fishermen.

Checking the corner...

During the late autumn, sometimes even in mid November, you can expect some snow here, that virtually makes day longer and fishing somehow funnier. However, the nasty hands of global warming, are also putting some fingerprints here, by changing the snow to rain and freezing temperatures to muddy river banks. Water level in the bigger stream Pededze was a bit more than enough for fishing,  so I focused my fishing activities to Virgulica – small tributary, which holds wild trout, grayling and rainbows. No doubt rainbows are foreign species that are stocked all around the places in Europe, and because of that in general are not so interesting objects for fishing. But here as well as in few more places in Northen Latvia it is little bit different… First reason – some part of fish was stocked years ago, and is feeding constantly on their own, and second, even more interesting, they have spawned successfully few times, so you can expect a take from 100% wild bows. So, its worse to take a try with a fly rod in your hand. Because of the spawning time I was fishing only in the spots where I was not disturbing brownies, with the aim to see how  nice the bows are in winter here.

Brownie after spawning

Fishing was high in spite of the low temperatures, and more surprisingly there where no rainbows in between first five fish I landed. Guess what? Yepp, the brownies. Most likely they where hungry after spawning – even the smallest fish was quite slim, but apparently fast enough to be quicker than rainbows. I did not landed trophy sized brownies, but biggest one was big enough (around 40 cm) to put a decent bend in my beautiful Opti stream rod. When first activity calmed down, I felt a gentle touch to my minnow type streamer, but with no afterword… Hmm… I made another cast, waited a bit more to let the fly sink deeper, and after the second strip – yes! It was a nice take. Completely wild black colored Rainbow was fighting with attitude until I was able to land it. You can not see such a healthy bows in many waters in our region – beautiful tale, powerful body and natural water type color. Armands tend to think that there are few wild rainbows here, so this was maybe the one. During the next hours I landed few more fish, mainly taken on grey minnows, size 8, so I was happy about this short winter day. All the fish was safely released, and lets hope to meet them again next year.

Absolute beauty

At the moment I have launched a Catch and release contest, so get ready for the next year. Authors of best videos will receive awards from LOOP  and certainly size matters here. More info here.

Also for my Latvian friends – I am working to implement a forum in Latvian for 2010, so come back soon to discuss.

All the best,

Reinis