No need to cast. I let the shrimp fall into the water, wriggle a couple of yards of line out through the top ring and let the current to my right carry them downstream behind me. Then I bring the rod forward, the leader straightens over the fish – and the wind blasts it to one side.
The trout does nothing. I flick the shrimp again and the same thing happens, but this time the trout turns a fraction towards it before resuming its line. It may have seen the fly, the leader going down, a herringbone of drag, I don’t know what. But it certainly saw something. I change pattern, put on a little black-hackled beetle with a little more lead in it. The lead, if I get the cast right and the wind plays the game, will help the leader straighten and give me the entry I want. I pause for a while, waiting for a break between the gusts. My leader puts a crack in the mirror again. Another troupe of minnows. The buzzards and the rooks are back. Again, somewhere, the coot creaks. Creak on, coot.
This time as I cast, I check the line as the leader straightens and the momentum of the weighted nymph loops it suddenly forward and down. The little fly makes a hole in the water and it sinks at once, taking a foot of leader straight down with it. Perfect. A fast sink entry, right for line, right for depth. As the fly’s about to pass the fish I move the rod six inches and the nymph rises as though alive and trying to get away.
Again, the inexplicable. The moment I move the nymph the trout hurls itself forward, smacking the fly so hard that the fish comes clean through the surface. I glimpse its head clearly, glimpse its open mouth and its eye, see the leader stab and I tighten. No contact. Nothing at all. How? How? More questions. No more answers than before. Take my weight on my left foot, lift my right, push against the weight of the weed and the water. Move on.
Move on some more. Now I’m 20 yards from the end of the fishable water, the place where it becomes too deep to wade and where the sedges crowd in and make casting impossible. I’m also standing on a hump on the stream bed, which gives me more height and alters the angle of my view. I can see further from here.
Upstream a couple of bushes and a tree are cutting out the surface glare and there, to the right, there’s a long patch of open water, really long, the biggest clear area I’ve seen all morning. It’s maybe eight or 10 yards long and a couple wide. A shaft of sunlight, the first of the day, lights it up as if an inspiration.
Half way up, a shadow’s sidling sideways over the bottom. That’s a fish. So is that sepia brush-stroke to the right of it. Further over still, near the ranunculus, there’s a steady throb and pulse. A trout’s tail. Three fish together. Riches.
The closest fish is the biggest, maybe a pounder and he’s in a crease on the bottom, a fast little run. I’ll aim to put the fly two or three yards beyond him and on his line. First, I’ll let it sink and trundle loosely back along the bottom. If he ignores that I’ll cast again and try inducement.
I snip off the little beetle, knot on a size 12 shrimp tied with orange silk – my colour-code for eight turns of lead under the dressing – look up at the fish, look back at the shrimp and re-read the current. Hmmm. I snip the fly off again, fish a spool of nylon out and add two more feet to the leader. Now it’s maybe 11 feet long. Eight or nine have been tricky enough so far, but instinct and experience tell me this is what I need.
Left foot planted and comfortable, right foot likewise. Stay still. Don’t take my eyes off the fish. Wait for a pause in the wind. Wait. Wait. The old world creeps up again, the forest’s silence enfolds. Any second now. Now! I slow the line as it zips through my left hand and the leader begins to unfurl. The heavy nymph straightens it, dives vertically over and goes in cleanly, right again for line, right again for depth.
The trout scarcely moves. One moment he’s riding the water like a slim, tethered kite, the next he’s drifting marginally to one side, the next he’s back on line. It’s a subtle movement, scarcely perceptible, but I’m not fooled. I’ve seen that a thousand times. I didn’t see his mouth open but I know he has it, I know he has to have it and I tighten. The rod goes down, there’s a moment’s thrashing and splashing then he’s charging upstream, doubling back downstream and lodged deep in the weed to my right.
Damn. It all happened in a flash. The only fish of the day and I could lose him in seconds. I wind down, lock tight and the little rod hoops. The weed surges and heaves but he won’t come clear.
An old trick. I edge a little nearer, wind in as I go – and then let everything go slack. Sometimes, if you let everything go slack on a weeded fish, it will start to make its own way out. One minute. Two minutes. Three minutes and then, suddenly, from directly behind him, I put maximum pressure on again. The rod jags, jags again, the starwort surges and he’s out, weed on the leader, weed over his head and eyes. He stops struggling, drifts towards me on the current, heavy and limp the way an unsighted fish always does. I bend, slip my hand under him and turn him upside down as I lift. Another old trick. He lies perfectly still the moment he’s belly-up, again as they so often do. Then I peel away the weed, slip out the barbless hook and look at him.
He’s the colour of light honey and pure-white bellied. Red spots and black spots freckle his sides. Each fin is clean-edged and sun-shot and perfect. His pectoral fins are as big as paddles. His tail, for his size, is huge.
What a privilege. Here I am alone in this wild, wonderful place, holding this wonderful wild creature in my hand. I’m conscious I’m maybe the first human to touch him, conscious in that moment that in that touch, I’m taking something from him that can never be replaced.
Time to put him back. I take a last look, lower him upright into the water and little by little loosen my fingers. I watch as his gills slowly open and close, feel the steel start to come back into him and the first, faint shrug. Another shrug or two and I let go completely and he slowly slides away. I watch him going, going, going.
How marvellous. I’m thrilled to have got him in this place, in these conditions, and doubly thrilled to see him go. I feel replete and calm. I’ve tapped into my roots again, trodden that ancient way again, swum again in those womb-waters dimly remembered.
I bite off the fly, reel the line in and turn to climb out. It’s been a long, long morning. Three hours long, 300 yards long, maybe three million years long. Ask me now why I go fishing, ask me now.
THE flies I use now are very different from the flies I used when I first started out. Indeed, they are unrecognisable from those early patterns. There are also far fewer of them.
I was idly musing on this one day when I realised that my entire fly-fishing career could be plotted through this transition: through my choice of flies as an out-and-out beginner, to those I tied in the middle years, to the sparse collection in which I place all hope, now. Also, I realised, something else could be plotted: not just evolving choices of flies and ways of fishing them, but changes in fishing philosophy and even ultimate goals. Many others will be able to do likewise, for themselves.
In my case, frustration was the catalyst.
ALTHOUGH I had been an angler since childhood, I did not take up fly fishing until I was in my twenties – and did not take it up seriously until I reached my thirties. As a consequence, I found myself in much the same position as others who discover this wonderful activity at the time of life when they are at their busiest.
Life was so hectic that all time for fly fishing (though, naturally, not all time for gardening, washing up, interior decorating, exterior decorating, undertaking minor structural repairs, taking toddlers for walks, helping with the shopping and the school run and earning a living – there seems always time aplenty available for these other delights) had to be squeezed in. Whenever