This subjest always crops up at this time of year as the vast shoals of fry in the lakes get corralled by hungry trout. Most lakes have some coarse fish in them and by late September into October the roach and rudd fry can reach up to 3 inches in lenght. The trout hunt the fry as insect life diminishes as the fry are a great source of protein for the fish as the trout need to pack on the weight for the lean months ahead.
But on other lakes coarse fish are not as prevalent and are a little harder to catch than the humble stickleback. Sticklebacks are not talked about much when fishing for fry feeders. The sticklebacks are slower and seem to be easier for the trout to hunt, on some of the midland Lakes of Ireland there are vast quantitys of sticklebacks and the fishing can be great.
There are a number of ways to target these fry feeders , but there is none more exciting than fishing floating fry patterns
When looking for fry feeders there are a few main things i look for, drop offs or ledges and weed, If you get the two combined, the stickleback will be present and the trout will not be too far behind.
All through September and into October the trout will hunt the sticklebacks, but this year the trout in my local lakes went on the fry mid July. Fish would pitch several times in the one spot, crashing through the fry and stunning them. These fish would then slowly swim around taking stunned stickleback as they went.
On windy days the trout would herd the stickleback onto the top of the shelves or onto the top of isolated weed beds in deep water where they would commence their assault. But on calmer days the trout would force the prey into balls anywhere out in the lake and then attack them. Just like Tuna and Marlin do on the wild life programs that we all look at.
I prefer fishing the former as you can repeat drifts you know are right as you can line the structure up to drift onto. When the trout are bashing fry in deep water, once they attack a shoal they will disperse the rest of the shoal and after feeding on the stunned fish they will have to ball the sticklebacks up again. This could take place a 100 yards or more from the previous attack. You always have to watch for trout pitching out of the water and then drive the boat towards the commotion, hopefully reaching them befores the onslaught ends.
If the fish are actively feeding i will set up a cast with two popper fry on a floating line as described in the photo above. Casting towards the feeding fish i let the flys rest on the water and then pop them a few times with a couple of quick pulls on the floating line. The flies causes quite a disturbance on the water and will get any trout in the vicinity to investigate the easy meal. If a fish does not investigate after 20 seconds i will repaet the process , but i will only do that on windy days. If it is calm i will cast out and pop the flies twice and leave them sit as the fish are much slower gathering up the fry in calm conditions.
Unfortunately the trout do not feed at the surface all day . The best top of the water action is either early in the morning or in the evening. But the fish will accept fry patterns throughout the day using sinking lines, the sport can be great too, but not as exciting taking fish off the top.
During quiet spells of surface activity, fishing a three fly cast with two boobys , top and tail with a fry pattern like a 12 silver dabbler, cormorant or diawl bach in the middle on a slow intermediate to a di 5 can work wonders.
Fishing drop offs and deep water with weed present are the areas i like to fish. But fishing slowly is the key for the fishing i do. Casting out, two quick strips to starighten the line, to make sure your in contact with you flies before a slow figutre of eight is employed. The takes can be out of the world. Complete rod wrenchers. Please dont forget the hang at the end of every cast, as the trout will follow all the way to the boat before deciding to take your fly.
As i said earlier, from July till the end of the season Lough Lene gave great sport to fry patterns, unfortunately i was away fishing other competitions at the time. But i did get in some stickleback fishing right at the end of the season. Fry feeders come in all sizes and shapes, from recently stocked fish to overwintered fully finned specimens.
Two competitions at the end of the season prooved that this was the method of finding the bigger overwintered fish, yes you had to go through a few fish to the get the specimens but you will get them. John Maguire and i fished the Chairmans Pairs competition on Lough Lene, John caught a lovely Rainbow of nearly 6lb that took a Booby off the top to win the competition for us as it was heaviest fish weigh in. The following week i was with Peter Doherty in the North Kildare Competition again on Lough lene. Employing similar tactics we came out 1st and 2nd and had the largest fish of the day too. A lovely way to end a season.
Boobys are not just for rainbows, for years now Boobys have been employed to catch browns and quite big ones at that. But they are definately a fly at the fore front of my armoury when the trout are on fry at the back end of the season.
If you dont tie you can get all the patterns mentioned in the article from Fario Flys. And if you do tie, you could get a few of the patterns and copy them.
Winter is approaching and with it the AWOL Winter league.An experience in itself.
Till next time take care and tight lines.
Latest comments
19.05 | 05:47
Hi Denis
Good meeting last night, and enjoyed reading your blog. Felt I was on the lake with you. Great work
02.05 | 20:42
Hi Dennis loved the article straight to the point .just wondered will the trout feed on the small buzzers all year ?
06.04 | 11:57
Cant wait to read this
01.03 | 03:03
glad u enjoy, ty, will be back when the fishing returns
AND SO IT BEGINS.
After fishing from the bank all winter long, I was looking forward to getting back in the boat. Normally I would wait for the first hatch of the year and travel down to the west of Ireland or not go at all until the Duckfly appears in the midlands. But after not fishing for 3 weeks I was starting to loose the plot. So with limited time I opted for Lough Owel and maybe chance to see the first hatch of the year, which is a small buzzer about half the size of the Duckfly which hatches just before the Duckfly itself. The weather looked good enough in the days before my trip, but as always the weather turned. A South wind but 19 to 24km which isn’t really what I was hoping for.
Arriving early at Lough Owel I was greeted with a bare pin ripple on the lee shoreline and a balmy 10c, but as I fitted the boat out I could feel the breeze building. Two 10ft ever reliable 7 weight RS Wychwood Competition rods were both adorned with floating lines, a straight buzzer set up on one and a bung on the other.
As I travelled down the lake it was lovely to hear the hum of my 15hp Johnson, I checked every bay and reed bed but more in hope, for any sign of buzzer. The wind was picking up all the time and after an hour or so I resigned myself to defeat and out came the di3. Fishing at this time of year in my opinion is normally shallow for hoglouse and snail feeders, whilst drifting in 10 to 20 ft of water you would be after fry feeders on the drop off with di5s and di7s depending on the wind.
The greater the wind the heavier the sinking line. At this stage I had travelled as far as the cornfield and I drifted off the shelf in nice conditions pulling dabblers and fry patterns. A three fly 16ft cast of 8lb strong leader, 6ft to first fly and then 5ft between with flys .
Just coming off the shelf I got my first fish, a lovely marked but thin overwintered Triploid Brown of about 2lb. Working up the shoreline to the neck I got two more on Black Dabblers and a big white Hummungous.
Stomach pumping the fish is a must when fishing in my opinion, you don’t need to go mad emptying the fishes stomach, a brief pump will tell you what the fish are on. In this case snail and hoglouse were high on the menu.
HE WHO DARES WINS....
I worked along the lee shorelines as it was getting very blustery picking up a fish here and there. I changed flys a few times, but it seemed whatever I put on the top dropper the fish took. The top dropper is the first fly the fish sees as you pull it by him, typical early season fishing. All fish were in the 1.5lb to 2.5lb bracket. Its been years since I fished Owel on a regular basis, so this year I have decided to fish it a lot more and re-learn the lake. With this in mind, I kept moving, instead of repeating drifts.
About lunch time I decided to head to deep water and see if I could contact some of the larger trout Lough Owel has know become known for.
I put up the di-5, but after one drift I felt I was not staying in contact with the line or getting deep enough due to the wind. So the dreaded di-7 was taken out of the box and the cobwebs blown off it. It took me 5 or so minutes to get the feel for the line as I hadn’t fished it from a boat in what seemed like an age.
But sure enough 10 minutes later after a count to 35, followed by a long slow retrieve the first marker went through the rod rings and I hung the flys, I thought I got slight knock, I waited and waited, nothing, continuing my long slow retrieve I barely got three more long pulls before the rod hooped over and the tip of the rod buried into the lake as line peeled off the floor then off the reel. Playing a fish alone out in the middle of the lake on a blustery day will certainly get your heart thumping. Anything and everything can go wrong , so that’s why I keep a tidy boat( stop laughing) when fishing alone. Regaining half the line onto the reel, I began to drag the fish from the depths. At times it just hung beneath the boat and there was nothing I could do. The wind was pushing the boat along too quickly.
Eventually the fish came to the surface and at over 4lb I was gobsmacked and puzzled at its strength. Lying on its side one second, then it vanished, the penny dropped, I had two on. Now it got messy, eventually I guided the first one into the net, unhooked it, then netted the fish on the tail fly with the first fish in the net. The tail fish was about 3.5lb and the fish on the top dropper was over 4lb, they certainly stretch the di7. Both released back to their watery homes, after a little rest in my net.
I fished all the way back to the moorings, catching an odd fish and I had another double hook up of newly introduced fish but it was pleasant. Just as I packed up the redundant Bung Rod, a fish rose in front of me. As a wise man once said “never pass up a willing fish”. Out with the di- 3 and 3 casts later the line went tight, fish number 13 was landed. Enough was enough and in I went.
Lough Owel was kind to me on a not so kind day. It was great to be back out on the lake and I hope to be back out again next week, hopefully there will be Duckfly !!!. But knowing my luck , the wind will be howling and the rain will be coming down sideways.
But as Anglers we Live in Hope.