Twilight casting
Neil Collins
I'm standing plumb in the middle of the river; to be more precise, in one of the 'carriers', the result of decades of chalkstream management, channels which run alongside the main river before rejoining it. It's just before seven o'clock on a late September evening, and I'm quite alone. There's no wind and, after such a long drought, not much water, either. Indeed, where I'm standing, the water barely reaches my ankles. Upstream, there's a deep pool below a sluicegate, and I'm casting into it, using my favourite little 8ft four-weight rod.
I know there are fish there, since they have been forced into the few places where there is both depth and flow. The nipping little rings on the pool's surface betray the presence of dace, typically about 4 oz in weight, pure silver and lightning-fast. They are a good indicator of water quality, since they can't take much pollution, and there are lots of them about.
Catching them is hard: you usually have only one chance, and you have to strike almost before the fish takes the fly. It's excellent practice to test reactions. However, I'm not practising now, because I've also seen several rises which are obviously trout. One in particular looks promising; even though I haven't seen anything, the swirl of disturbance as something is taken from below the surface, just before the something emerges and breaks the film, betrays the presence of quite a decent fish.
The light is starting to fade, and I've swapped my Polaroid glasses for clear. I have quite a lumpy Klinkhamer thy fly on, a pattern which is designed to mimic an insect as it reaches the surface and tries to break free of its larval skin to take flight. I cast. The fly catches on the join between my line and the leader, that transparent three yards of (nowadays) fluorocarbon, which is designed to be invisible to the fish.
I bring the fly in, and try to tease it out, but end up with an ugly knot in the tippet, the couple of feet of fine, 4 lb-breaking strain material to which the fly is attached. At this time on the last day of the season, can I really be bothered to break the tippet at the knot (a swift tug, much less than 4 lb, will do it) and then attempt to re-tie the fly in the gathering gloom?
Silly question. It's almost time to go anyway, so I cast with careless ease, unworried about catching trees or losing the fly, and, of course, the line goes out perfectly. The fly drops delicately on to the water almost under the sluicegate, right at the top edge of the pool, some 15 yards distant. There's a noise that sounds like a smack, and the fly is gone. It's obvious from the bend in the rod and the sizzle from the reel that it's a fair-sized fish. I'm immediately thinking about that knot in the tippet, and how one jerk would separate him from the other.
He doesn't jump, but alternately bores down into the bottom of the pool and dashes about from side to side. I'm just about able to stop him getting into the reeds at the side, which would surely mean the end of our beautiful relationship. After what seems like an age, but is probably no more than a minute, I've got him to my side of the pool so I see him for the first time. He's far too grey to be a brown trout, and for a moment the thought occurs that I might have hooked a salmon. This is not entirely fanciful, since the Thames now has salmon ladders round every lock, allowing (theoretical) access to all its tributaries.
Then the fish turns, and the flash of pink on the side confirms it as a big rainbow trout. It's two years since any rainbows were put into this part of the river. Since it must have overwintered at least once, it's hardly surprising that it's strong, and putting up such stiff resistance.
Still standing in the river, I snap open the collapsible net; the fish sees it, and immediately powers back up the pool, for the process to start again. By the time I've got him down again, he's visibly tiring and rolling over in the shallows. I bring the net round, but it's not big enough to get him in sideways, and, as I try to get his head round, he slips below me in the stream, getting a fresh lease of life as he goes.
I haul, but remembering the wretched knot, run round and in a panic try to pick him out of the water. This is hopeless, since he's slippery as — well, as a fish. In desperation. I dig the head of the net into the gravel, and in he slides. Weighed down by fish, stones, exhaustion and equipment, I stagger to the bank, heaving everything up on to it. I give the tippet a gentle tug, and it snaps. The fish, fully finned and superbly fit, weighs in at 4i/Abs — not a monster by the standards of some of today's factory-farm fisheries, but for the last cast of the season, a not-so-little piece of heaven.
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