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End of June

It has been a very hard few days, a lot of ‘stuff’ has been going on, things which have drained me to the point of exhaustion. I needed some time to myself so I made the effort to take my old boat out for a couple of hours on lough Conn. Heavy rain over the […]

The International Dabbler

A very popular fly over here, this variation on the dabbler theme has been working well of late on lough Mask. You can find the pattern easily online but here is my take on the fly. Apologies for the flies in the accompanying photos, they have been well chewed by the trout and I have […]

On the oars

It’s a strange game which lacks even a definitive name. Boatman, ghillie or guide, take your pick. All those titles are in common usage across Ireland. I do a bit of it, helping anglers here in the west of Ireland to try and catch a few fish, handling a boat for them on the big […]

Holiday Monday

I had hoped to fish on Sunday but in truth I was exhausted so took some time out to rest and gather my strength. Ghillieing on Saturday followed by a couple of drinks that night proved to be too much for my covid damaged body and so I made flies and drank coffee while listening […]

PC fishing

In this case ‘PC’ stands for ‘post Covid’. I contracted the dreaded lurgy last week. Thursday was the day it played its hand and I became quite ill that night, forcing the cancellation of two days on the loughs which I had been so looking forward to. Sleep was impossible, uncontrollable shakes were followed by […]

Hold your horses

The trend these days is for more and more synthetics in fly tying. While I use a wide range of these wonders of the chemical industry I still fall back on more natural materials for most of my tying. Let’s take a look at a very old material which has fallen out of favour, hair […]

The trouble with work

This has been a terrible year so far for me when it comes to fishing. As you can tell by the dearth of posts I simply have not had the opportunity to get out and spend time on the loughs and rivers. Work has been busy and even when I have sneaked away from the […]

All quiet on the western lakes

Sunday was a fishing day. Thick clouds scurried across the sky, driven by a strong south-westerly. The air was warm and moist. There had been rain last week and the ground was still damp. Yes, Sunday was most definitely a fishing day. The only trouble is that nobody had explained this to the fish. […]

Sea trout flies for Beltra

Work has bottled me up for much of the year so far and there is no sign of that changing in the near future. To be honest the recent warm, dry spell all but shut down salmon angling around here with the rivers reduced to mere trickles between the stones. Some thundery rain has fallen […]

The Soldier Palmer

I like old patterns. Something nostalgic is awakened when you tie on one of the classic flies from the last century or the century before. That link with the past offers reassurance and knowledge if a fly has been around for this long it must catch fish. So my fly boxes bulge with old-stagers […]