Last Sunday I held our River Trout Fishing Course on the Blackwater River. I was joined on this course by fellow Mackenzie Pro Team member Maurice Cahill and our ace photographer Kuba Standera. On the day we met up at Ballyhooly village with all 11 participants for the course. From there we traveled over to the Ballincurrig beat which was our venue for the course. Access to the beat was a short walk from where we parked.
This is one of the nicest stretches of the river I have fished over the years.
I started off the course with a chat about tackle choice for different fishing techniques and also what might be suitable for small and large rivers in Ireland. We had a range of Mackenzie rods to use for demonstration from 9ft 5wt to 11ft3 7/8 switch rods. Maurice did a demo on dry fly fishing and another on wet fly fishing to a captivated audience! As it was still very early in the season there was little chance of anything on dries but he did get a pull on the wets.
After this I went through various nymphing tactics from short lining with heavy nymphs to long lining and using French leaders. Kuba showed everyone a range of “genuine” Polish nymphs and many gasped at the size and weight of some of the flies on display. I demonstrated some nymphing at medium range but it was obvious that this was not going to be productive with the high cold water. So I changed over to short line with heavier nymphs. Everyone was happy to see how the leader was constructed and fished.
I used an indicator and had a take within a few casts that everyone managed to see. It was a small trout but it showed how a change in tactics can produce a trout from a spot that appeared fishless shortly before this.
Once the nymph fishing was explained I then did a demo on streamer fishing. I used a 10ft 7wt Mackenzie and streamer line for this. This is an awesome rod that I often use for big lures at stillwaters so fishing a large streamer on a specialist streamer line was no problem.
One of the things that often happens with streamer fishing is that some really good locations do not allow room for a good backcast so double hauling a large streamer is out of the question. Roll casting streamers on fast sinking shooting heads is not so easy either! So I also showed everyone where a switch rod with a compact switch line with a sinking head is really useful here. I simply spey cast the streamer across using this Kit and the evidence was there for all to see.
I had one hook up on the streamer during the demo but mentioned to the participants that there was a really good piece of streamer water further up that I was leaving unfished for later. Cal headed up there after lunch with the Mackenzie outfit and sure enough he had his first ever streamer caught wild brown trout. Result. Everyone fished different techniques for the evening and there were hook ups, lost fish and one or two landed on nymphs and wets.
The weather on the day had started cold but the sun shone for the afternoon and everyone seemed to have a great time. We took a little group photo in the evening and there were lots of smiling faces. Our next course on the Blackwater will be a salmon fishing course in May. There will be tips on casting and fishing, and we also have a top Irish Pro Fly Tyer to tie a few fish catchers!
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