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It’s been a while since my last post, but it does not mean that I was dead or have forgot about my frequent readers. Winter was the time to focus a bit more on Forum and fly tying two. So where is the result? Not so fast…

SHRUBE fly

Meanwhile it is hard to design a perfect fly! One that is easy to tie, but in same time with great looks and moves,  but most important -- magnetic to fish. Especially when it comes to saltwater shrimps. And I’m not saying, that there are no great patterns arround -- of corse there are, like Pattegrisen and general patterns likes Magnus and Grey frede. But you always may add or change something… In the search of perfection I was always thinking about perfect Shrimp fly on the tube, with the stable movement in the water and all other benefits that one may have out of tiny small plastic piece. Hence I am a salmon fishermen two I do like tube flies – they are very versatile: you can change the hook if needed, add some prepared tails, put a heavier hook and land the trophy with more confidence. After all, another forgotten benefit – you can tie almost translucent flies, that is close to impossible on the hooks.

Unfortunattelly saltwater fly fishermen in my oppinion so far have underrated tubes, by using trusted single hooks. Maybe only those big game boys who are focusing on Salefish and other giants know the true value of tubes… But not here in the Baltics. Ouahhh..,  still it is hard to find established tube patterns. So, after several modifications, here comes the Shrube fly. Why SHRUBE? Because SHRimp and tUBE, and it is shorter than shrimp pattern tied on tube. Ok, you can rather coppy it or change, but always keep in mind that fly must have a certain mass distribution otherwise it will not move as sexy as sea trout loves it? Certainly you can replace Polar Fiber with Spey hackle or CDC with other feathers, never mind! After all presentation matters most! So, i’m leaving today to chase the Swedens silver and who knows.. maybe SHRUBE will do the thing!

I will let you know…

At work

Yepp, bit late, but its better now than never. Here is the report from our seatrout trip! You can never know… Last year we where bit late, so we have planed our seatrout trip few weeks earlier this year. It is allways hard to predict when to come, because weather can change pretty fast. In the best case we expected that whater will be arround 6 degrees at arrival and will warm up constantly during the trip. From the wery begginig, actually it was friday’s evening, things seemed pretty good.

Instead of pesimistic spin fishermen, who have not cought anything during the last days, four guys, who where drifting in pontoon boats, landed some moderete size sea trout, during the day time. So we where after to land some silvery fish too! Located in the well known spot, actually last years most productive one, we started fishing with best hopes!  First casts are always most excitatory – you are styripping your line in with the feeling that take is around the corner! One strip then another! But this time it was not so… During the next two hours, that we had, I lost only one fish. After the genttle take my leader came apart in a few seconds, and unfortunattely without any fight.  I hooked this sea trout on a dark orange eyed sandeel with the moderate strip speed. After strike, fish made few turns on the surface and was gone. That’s it – my 8 lb 3X Varivas fluorocarbon apparently was not strong enough, and what was even more interesting, I can not say that fight was tought? So, quite a mystery I supposed at that time, and was quite uppset, because it was the only take that we had at that evening.  Even more it is allways bad if you loose the fish because of the tackle! Mikus measured water tempereture – with the on shore wind it was around 4.5 degrees, that was so not too bad for beggining. Few weeks erlier we where not shure about the ice – this year it was quite cold in our reagion. So, these news where prommising.

Thats the place!

Next morning started brilliantly in the terms of  feeling – small lasy waves, light breeze from the sea and… When I just approached my spot I recognized nice seatrout tale on the surface. I decided that it just have arrived, and made a cast in between the fish and the bank. First strip then another one – hands where waiting while hurt was beating faster and faster… I was fishing with rag worm at that time, and either the fish was away, ore my slimshape wormy was not impressive enough. After the second cast even closer to the shore, I checked some deeper spots, but again with out any luck! F..k! This was the chance, and I missed it! During the next two hours I have not seen anything except, one fish, that passed next to my knees. All other guys also blanked except Mikus, who landed  45 cm Kelt, on pinky Grey Frede, that was fished on intermediate line. At least something. After the lunch we proceeded in the same manner, withut changing the location. Around 18:00 I finally had a take. Yes, I even shouted, but… Same story than yesterday’s evening. Second take and second time my leader came a part. I was… Hm, I don’t know how to express this without a bunch of damn words. Anyway – it was my mistake, because I have not checked the leader. After this second incident I emediattelly changed my leader to 1x 12 ft with 12 lbs test. This one was strong enough for almost any fish we can expect here! Keep on working – saltwater fly fishing in Baltics sometimes is like a hard work, when you need hundreds of casts for just a one take. But not this time! Casting was useless and we had no takes during the following hours and apparently fishing was not at its best! Ok, you can always be more or less succesifull, but even if locals „who know the things“ fail it meens sometning. Mikus told us that that temperature decreesed to 2.5 degrees, what was a result of the wind change. Here are the true example how big influence wind has on sea trouting – especially in the cold spring days. Apparently that’s thrue – wind meens a lot!

Still searching!

Mmmmmm… Its serious… I mean waves! Next morning on shore wind provided good weather for surfing! I even had no chance to reach the nearest stones from where we where fishing day before, and, even more, they where within easy reach yeasterday! Apparently water was a bit colored too. Two hours of fishing with out any takes and even any sign of fish led us to decition – we should move on and check the closer coastal line! Just to look for another spots and to learn this area better. At the evening, when it was allready quite dark, we where trying our luck in the perspective spot full with large boulders in sothtern part of our reagion. Wind was down a bit so we faced not so strong waves and it was possible to settle down on the large boulders closer to the shore. Meanwhile wind still was unpleasant for casting, and because of that, Ansis, a newcommer to our team, moved a bit north to the spot where he was able to cast over the right shoulder. The place was perfect for fishing too – large quiet pools in between big boulders was hiding apparently some deeper holes. After half an hour another newcommer, Eriks, a great gentlmen by the way , brought some fast food for us, so it was time for a break befor finnal battle. Ansis – who was still in the water, refused to come out and Eriks told that he’s enough… Hmmm, it was quite a surprice, because we had nothing during the day time. Only after an hour we realised that Ansis was showning that he is standing to deep to get out fast, and that’s actuaslly the only reasson why we finished his burger too.  „He will have a fish“ , I stated. By the way Ansis was quite ill at that time: high temperature, strong cough cured with the Latvian balsam, strong cigarettes and temperature killing Coldrex was his halmarks during the whole trip. When we where comming back for last half an hour to the sea, I recognized that Ansis forgot his landing net on the bank! „It will be tricky“, I thought at that time. And it was not log after…

86 and Ansis

Heyyyyyyy! Heeeyyyyy! Youhoooooo! I turned around and recognizd, that his rod had a deep bend and I was shure that fish is above average. Kristaps, who was standing closer, immediattelly jumped off his boulder and was in the rush to help Ansis with his monster of the dark. Yep, it was not easy to see anything at that time at all! I only recognize that Kristaps was down to elbow in the water, and it took some 10 minutes to land this sea trout. To me honest not to land, but to squeeze in betwwen landing net and chest – yest, the fish was much larger than Kristaps landing net! First sea trout for Ansis and 86 cm – isn‘t bad, even if it is a kelt. If I remember correctly it was arround 4 kilos! Such a long salmo trutta should weight around 7 or even 8 kilos before spawning. It is interesting, that Ansis had a shrimp pattern on the other end of the line, while we where fishing with sand eels at that time. Also the retriewe was slower, and who knows, may be this was the kee to success. One can always say that it is luck, but in this case Ansis was pushing hard, and sooner ore later it shoud pay off.

Kristaps and his 1st!

During the last day weather was a bit better so where the results. At the morning Ansis landed another one, yet bit smaller, but still beautifull kelt (you can watch how he releases it in video part), and during the afternoon I had a fish on for few minutes, but lost it and finally Kristaps landed his first sea trout in the sea! Congrats – he deserved it also because he helped a lot with landing yesterday!

Of course, after all, this was not the trip we where dreeming about in terms of fish landed, especially for me, but I know that 2 local groups blanked during the same week in the Danmark. And there where goood fishermen with the best local guides… So, maybe, and most propobblly, low water temperature was the reason for such a low fish activity, but anyway we had a lot of fun and some experience two.  My conclusions from this trip:

1. I will never use thinner tippet as 2x or 1x for spring seatrouting.
2. We should not miss a chance if we have one.
3. Never give up!

We will be back!

Delights...

Sea "trouted"

So, last few days together with Lithuanian friends I was back in Sweden – this time to chase see trout or Havsöring as they name it. Besides main mission – this fishing story was also filmed for Lithuanian TV. Originally we were planning to visit Swedish cost early at April, but, because of several obstacles, dates where changed. Little bit too late one may say. Yes, but better late than never. Last year, in mid April, there was quite a nice fishes landed in region we where visiting, so the hopes was quite high… 5 kilo is a some kind of a dream, but 3 kilo sounds little bit more realistic. Before the trip I have prepared some versions of famous Grey Frede, also I tied different Sand Eel imitations with and without epoxy heads. Yeaah, there was a psycho type fly`s and classical Magnus too. So, a few reasons to expect a nice takes…

In general, fishing was quite tough in terms of casts needed to get the take and this story is about fishing impressions and conclusions. One is for sure – I will be back again.

King of the nets

Before we started our friends from Scandinavia mentioned that sea trout fishing at coast in this season was not so good. A good sign, especially if you keep in mind that you must succeed, because otherwise weekly TV fishing story will be about… Hmmm, about how good is to fish with the fly rod even if there is no fish landed. Quite wearily…

At the first evening, when we where looking for the possible places, I noticed that sea is quite warm and it was a disappointment. In other terms it means that fish can also find food far from shore and we can’t expect a lot of takes. On the other hand, there was good news too – amount of net fishing was decreased this season, at least I heard such a rumor, that may be can be proved with a bulky net collection that we founded all around the coast we where fishing. And only one net in the sea – usually it is opposite.

Recovered sea trout kelt

First few days I was fishing mainly with famous Grey Frede size 4 and 6. Because of the fact that this part of shore was new for as, it was necessary to move all the time to find a perfect spot – so this fly was a nice choice – you can fish it in shallower waters with immediate retrieve after presentation. If you fish a little bit deeper spot – just wait a while when fly sunk and retrieve a little slower. In terms of weather first day was the best one – a little wind from sea and cloudy fogy conditions where perfect for fish to come closer to shore. I noticed that in the small bay there was a quite high concentration of baby sea trout feeding at the surface, and almost immediately landed two of them – so if there is good food source there must be bigger ones too. Around 12 I felt sudden take and first sea trout around 1 kilo jumped out of the water. Almost 20 minutes later I landed another one – this time it was recovered kelt silver yet slim one. Not a bad start – all the fish was cought with Grey Frede – the classical sea trout fly. Evening was even better – landed only one, but hooked another that escaped almost at my knees and had another two ore three nice takes.

Coast during the daytime

So in spite of the fact that size was 1-2 kilos we expected that following days fishing would be even better. But, the weather changed into the Palm Beach style – bright sun during the morning and daytime, with a chance to land a sea trout only at the late evening or at early morning. In all following days I had a fish but not a lot more than one. Besides sea trout there were countless garfish takes – some times these fishes was so many, that more less all the casts resulted in a take. Of course after landing we released all of them because they where here for spawning.

Garfish

At the end I had a feeling, that sea trout shamed to come closer to the shore, and all the takes was in deeper spots than before. My opinion is, that in these deeper spots classical Grey Fred is good yet not the best choice – especially if there is bigger waves. In such a conditions I had a success with orange legged fredy that was equipped with heavy eyes. Next evening because of the even bigger waves, I turned to sand eel imitation with a massive head to penetrate the water surface immediately. Fortunately after few casts I hooked a nice seatrout around 3 kilos that escaped close to my knees. Even more after some half an hour I landed a small cod around 1 kilo on the same fly. During the trip our TV friend spin fishermen Paulius all five fishes landed on 20 gram Toby`s and it seems that bigger flies would be my choice next year. At least I will use them more frequent than this year. Sea trout are avid hunters and are not suffering from shame to eat a bigger sand eel if they see one.

Handsome evening

Few words about tackle. Nice stripping basket is a must as well as wading stuff – stones are slippery and waves are strong. Prepare same flies in different weight range. Use 6 or 7 weight 9-10 ft fast action fly rod equipped with floating shooting head. In this trip I was using LOOP Opti Coast 6-93` – a new rod that was suiting the situation and my casting style perfectly. It is strong rod yet with a good feeling in it. I would recommend to use big large arbor reels for fast line retrieving – after the strike you must spool all the line from your basket meanwhile controlling the fish– time here is everything. And of course polarizing glasses and landing net are necessary too.

So about conclusions?

#1 It is better to come earlier – let say in middle of April.

#2 I would use bigger flies more often – especially in deeper spots.

#3 Use as long leaders as possible – sea trout are spooky; I was using 9,5 to 11 ft fluorocarbon leaders all the time in spite of windy conditions.

#4 Find a place where wind is blowing to the shore – it means higher water temperatures and more food at this time.

#5 Spots where are stones and sudden depth changes are best ones – especially good close to horns.

#6 Be patient and trust your fly .

#7 Play with different retrieve speeds and types until you find one that works. Maybe that was the reason why I was more successful this year than others.

Here are some pictures from described flies and whole trip,

hope to see you in Ogre,

Reinis

Magnus variant

Flashy

Orange legged Grey Frede

Sand eel

Cod

Lithuanian friends

During filming

Another one

Laimonas in action

Garfish on

My basket