By Karel Křivanec
I left the aforementioned Mr. Feuerstein´s article in my archive for more than two years. Thus today I publish his challenge which slightly reminds me of activities of our southern neighbours against the nuclear power plant in Temelin. However, I do not want to offend any of my Austrian friends, because there are also individuals using a common sense and there are plenty of them. And now I would comment Günter´s mistakes.
1. Mistakes in historical dating
a) Czechs firstly participated in the World Championship in Poland (1985), 1st Poland, 2nd Czechoslovakia and 3rd France
b) In 1986 the World Champion at the World Championship in Belgium was Czech Slavoj Svoboda, 1st Italy, 2nd Poland and 3rd CZ
c) The team of Czechoslovakia became the World Champion first time in Wales (1990), 2nd Poland, 3rd Belgium.
d) Second time the Czech team became the World Champion at the World Championship in Norway in 1994, 2nd Italy and 3rd England.
e) Third time the Czech team became the World Champion at the World Championship in Český Krumlov /CZ/ (1996), 2nd France and 3rd Poland
After this success the term “Czech nymph” started to be used and Czechs did not name this method - it was named by an Englishman Oliver Edwards. It is not true that Czechs would be boasting with their method in magazines – others did so. These mistakes can be easily forgiven to Mr. Feuerstein, because he acquired them from some pub talks or so, because Austrians are not much experienced in the World Championships. As far as I know they took part twice and always finished as the last, while the Czechs have won the World Championship eight times.
2. Tyrolean stick and bubble
The use of these methods in salmonid waters was prohibited in South Bohemia shortly after when the first Austrians appeared in the Vltava river in Vyšší Brod sometimes at the end of the 1980s, thus in this respect we are more than 20-year long ahead.
3. How heavy are Czech nymphs ?
And here is the biggest Mr. Feuerstein´s mistake, because 10g is a total nonsense. I weighted my patterns and the smallest nymphs weighted only 0.10g and those heaviest ones on hook #8 did not exceed 0.3 gram. When I found the heaviest gold-head nymph with tungsten bead of diameter 4.6 mm, this weighted 0.86 g and the heaviest competition gold-head nymphs with allowed diameter 4,0 mm weight less than 0.60 gram. The heaviest classic Czech nymphs were more than 30 times lighter than Mr. Feuerstein thinks and the heaviest gold-head ones were 12 times lighter. When we look into the G. Feurstein´ s book “Erfolgreich Nymphenfischen auf Salmoniden” (2010) we can see his nymphs literally stuffed with lead weight which we have never seen, as well as fly fishing with a float and the end of the line a huge lead weight and a nymph between. The location of a weight outside the fly´s body has been prohibited in our country for more than 20 years.
What shall we think about other Mr. Feuerstein´s arguments? It´s simply imagining and nothing else. But it is sad that these arguments are heard at FIPS-Mouche which set the limit of 2g per fly at the Youth World Championship in France last year. In so small streams it absolutely made no sense. I also love dry fly, but when the fish is not rising, I have to think about using a nymph. No matter the French one or the Czech one. It is interesting how the term French nymph started being used worldwide and definitely we will not suspect French to name it alone. They simply called it a nymph and the attribute French was added by me after the World Championship in Spain (2003), when I was lying in grass behind them and observed them how they were fishing. I should correctly call it French nymphing style, when their trick was a matter of the length of the leader.
I understand why Mr. Günther would like to ban Czech nymphing, but the core of this problem is elsewhere. Fish protection must be understood by restricting the possibility of taking killed fish home and this can be easily prevented by the minimum size of the fish or limiting the number fish taken or the implementation of the “Catch and Release” system. In South Bohemia we managed to arrange it by general increase of the minimum size of grayling to 40 cm ten years ago and at the best salmonid fisheries the minimum size of brown trout was increased to 45 cm, thus both original fish species are sufficiently protected and fishermen can take home rainbow trout which is widely caught from 25 cm. Voluntary release of fish in Bohemia is much more rooted than in Austria which is full of beautiful trout and grayling waters.