Spring Time is the best time for Stillwater fishing in the big lakes in the west of Ireland. But saying that I don't mean mayfly time. My friends and I head for the big Lough Mask in the end of April for the last fifteen years. At this time billions of chironomids hatch and also a lot of small olives. Wet fly fishing has a strong tradition in Ireland, but we do something different. We target the individual rising fish in the shallow bays of the big lake, were most of the hatches occur. Here in the sheltered waters you can see the fish rising, provided there is not too much wind. A flat calm is very difficult, a small ripple on the water is perfect. Most of the time we have the lake to ourselves as the wet fly fisherman need more wind.
Our fishing is exclusively done with a dry fly and a small chironomid pupa or olive nymph hanging some 20 to 40 cm below it. I prefer the short nymph leader tied to the bend of the dry fly which must be a bit bigger because it has to act as a strike indicator and has to carry the nymph. In this case most of the trout fall to the nymph. If I feel the fish prefer dry flies I cut off the nymph and switch to a smaller dry fly either midge or olive depending on the hatch which occurs presently. All of this is a very exciting and demanding fishing style as the wild shy creatures are not easy to catch.
Light tackle can improve results under such difficult calm conditions and as I came across the French nymph 3-10.0 rod (Hanak Competition) at the EWF in Fürstenfeldbruck this year I had a feeling that its lightness combined with its length could do the job. To cut the story short, the idea worked out beautifully as I caught four nice trout in a weeks fishing with it. Now, some might say four trout is not much, but on Lough Mask and for this type of fishing for the wildest of trout it is not too bad a result. Two of my friends caught only one fish each, the third one none. My biggest fish was 1,3 kg and fought like hell but didn+t succeed against the smooth action of this fabulous rod. I made only one alteration:Instead of the recommended line # 3 I fish a # 4 which works absolutely fine with the rod and helps a bit with longer casts.
