Early season fishing

Winter is taking a firm grip of Sweden and even in Göteborg we got a few moments of snowfall the past days, but every snowflake seems to melt away as soon as it touch ground.
Spring feels far far away. But first fishing could bee closer than one might think. Most water open in April but there is a few streams in the south of Sweden opening in January!

I do however wonder a bit about it.
In the streams that open in April or May the fish who has been up spawning has had time to move out at sea again, undisturbed.
The sea trout does have some difficulty to cope in salt and cold water and might stay in the river for a bit longer... which means that early fishing is mostly aimed at those over wintered fish. Fish that should bee moving out to sea at soon as the water temperature is rising. Fish who have been spawning, have already made the journey from egg to fully grown. they found their way back to a stream and found a mate... those fish has a very good chance to return for spawning yet another time, much better chance than the fertilized eggs down in the river bed waiting to hatch.

But on the other hand, fresh fish is rising in the rivers as well

Wrapped expectations

As Christmas is closing in one always hope that something new and fantastic is waiting under the tree. Last Christmas was a really good one! My girlfriend had found the perfect gift, actually two.

She had found a fly box (hand made in veneer) and also managed to find a signed copy of a book called Advanced salmon fishing, a book i had been looking forward to.
Written by a really good flyfisher and fantastic writer called Pelle Klippinge.

The book was better than I anticipated and the fly box is always close to heart while going out fishing. And it is not hard to appreciate gifts as fantastic as those, but what to find for my girlfriend this year, she is not that into fishing, yet...

Lady Mary enter the flybox

As a flyfisher i have probably spent as much time tying flies as a have been fishing them.
All this time has been spent (with few exceptions) on my own. A few weeks ago me and two friends set a date to get together.
Yesterday was the day when anticipation was high and the day moved on slowly, early morning Benny called and had to pass since his wife and son got sick and he had to stay home instead.

Finally time past and i turned up at Andreas apartment, we started the evening by looking at his emourmous cases of material, it seems as if he got at least one of everything...
We orderd food, poured the wine and decided which fishing film we just had to see while eating and later on while tying.

Soon enough plates where replaced with fur and feather, wine became whisky and the kitchen almost turned into a pet shop.
When it comes to fishing for trout and salmon Andreas is the most experienced angler and tyer I know.

In the wintertime when i have plenty of time to tie flyes my inspiration is kind of low... I tie most of my fishing flies the day before I set foot in the stream, that is the time when I am the most inspired. I also have issues with tying excisting patterns, those patterns is no more than just inspiration for my flies.
I get the most satisfaction building and fishing my own patterns and even more when they turn out to catch fish!
For salmon none of my ideas so far has turned out to bee great, getting there i suppose.
Spending the evening with someone who has gotten quite a bit further in those thoughts does however inspire me. Tying new things helps me to understand tying and movement better.
For the first time ever I tied a Spey hackle fly, I also tied my tirst on treble.
Later on the treble got its baptism by a short swim in whisky, and is now called Lady Mary!

Big screen fly fishing

Yesterday was a new experience for me !
I visited “Rise - Fly Fishing Film Festival” that has been touring Europe this fall and came to Göteborg yesterday.
It was a theatre full off fly fishing nerds like myself, people you don´t expect to meet as civilians.
Who, like myself usually is found alongside a stream or a shoreline.
I rearly meet anybody while fishing for trout but I might see traces of someone, as a footprint, a broken twig or a fly caught by a tree. These small traces of fellow fly fishers is always interesting to stumble across, and the person that left the trace is a illusive but good fly fisher who seems too return his catches and leave the stream almost untouched. Yesterday I meet a few of them, the illusive once... we were shown a teaser of a trout fishing film made by two really good troutfishers, fishing in one of my own “special streams” the film seems to bee a very good film (In Swedish) and is called Mayfly madness.
Next time I find a footprint of the illusive one walking the path before me I know who it might bee and I know he left the stream the way its supposed to bee, carefully fished and I have the same chance as he did.

A new season is coming

The past years I have been trying to take notes from my fishing trips.
This has resulted in three good beginnings but somehow no more than about two months of fishing managed to bee recorded...

Putting this online is my next attempt to record a whole season of fantastic and sometimes disappointing fishing in mostly Sweden.
I usually fish for trout but this season I have also been trying for salmon and seatrout,
those has been a struggle and catches has bees sparse, nothing at all actually.
During the darker months I will bee planning for the next season and some of those thought will bee put on this blog.

Perhaps my thoughts will help someone and if not I do hope it will help me.
Attempting to write in English is also making it harder, but as well as improving my double hand, being better in English takes a lot of practice.

So those who will pop in to this site will have to put up with a lot of bad spelling and probably terrible sentences.
However if you do put up with it, I hope you will find a new thing or two.