England win Gold at the Youth Flyfishing International 2012, Lough Owel

Over the last few months, the England Youth Flyfishing Team have been training for the Youth International Flyfishing Championships. This year it was to be hosted by Ireland on Lough Owel. We were unsure of what we'd be up against as the match was being held on a water quite different to reservoirs stocked with triploid rainbows, which is what most of us are used to here in England. In Ireland we would be targeting small browns, with a mix of wild and stocked fish - but we were still all looking forward to a different challenge.

On the 29th July my Mum, Dad and I left home to meet with most of the England Team at Holyhead Port, before sailing to Dublin. Once landing in Ireland we then drove an hour and a quarter to the Bloomfield House Hotel, situated on the banks of Lough Ennell, where all teams would be staying for the week. On the evening of arrival, all the anglers were welcomed and briefed about the forthcoming 3 days at a dinner. Later that evening, England had our first of many team talks, discussing the areas that each England boat would practice the next day, as well as tactics to try.

That same evening Paul Gillies drove our team, in the minibus, to Lough Owel so we could have our first look at the lake. It was enormous - we couldn't even see the other end from where we were standing!

The next morning we returned to the 3000 acre lough ready for the first practice of two. My boat partner was Fen Oakley, who set up with a team of dabblers on a slow glass line, whilst I opted to fish deeper on a Wet Cel II line fishing small nymphs, seeing as it was quite bright. We were told to cover the area between the Pumphouse Reeds round to the Ash Ditch.

On our first drift I bumped off two fish right outside the pumphouse. It was then to be another 4 hours before we had any more interest. The lough was flat calm and the skies were almost cloudless, and we could see the bottom of, what must have been, 25ft of water. I asked our boatman to move us further out until we couldn't see the bottom anymore, and first cast I caught my first Lough Owel brownie. Spooning the fish after I killed it proved interesting as we found it stuffed full of Sticklebacks.

I also landed another two before heading in for dinner and a team discussion. Talking between us, some had done well and some hadn't, but it was all about gathering as much information as possible.

The second practice day saw a complete change in the weather. A strong southerly wind and heavy rain had moved in, which were better conditions for fishing. Fishing with Dom Sheratte in the morning, we found a small shoal of fish around Lady's Island - Dom had 2 and I had 1.

We came in at lunchtime and after another team talk I headed out with Gary Owen for the afternoon to the small pump house and Brabazon's. Here, I caught another 5 fish, using a midge tip with an Irish stimulator on the top dropper, a diawl bach in the middle and a double olive on the point.

By the evening our team felt that we'd figured out where most of the fish were, and it was now a case of fine-tuning what tactics we'd use on match day. Carl Malpass, one of our team coaches, had done well catching 9 fish, all on dabblers. Others, like myself, were getting plenty of interest to red-arsed Irish Stimulators or Green Peters. After a comprehensive team talk, we were all happy with what areas and methods to use on the day of the match.

At the boat draw following dinner, I was paired with new Irish cap Colin O'Reilley, and our boatman was Carl Owens, who fished last year for Ireland at the International on Menteith. Some of the team tied a few flies before going to bed, but it was the committee and the coaches who stayed up most of the night tying essential patterns for the crucial day. Thank you to all of them!

After a hearty breakfast, the teams made the 20 minute drive from the hotel to the fishing lodge at Owel - match day had arrived. It was incredibly windy, with gusts well over 25mph - if this match was held on Rutland or Grafham, there was no way the boats would have been allowed out! Most of us set up with slow or fast glass lines. I opted for the slow glass, using an Irish Stimulator, (that we nicknamed the BBD) and Dabblers to start with.

Before the match started, all the teams paraded behind two bagpipers, marching down to the lake from the fishing lodge. It was an amazing experience, with all the parents and spectators cheering us on and waving flags.

 

 

Very soon after that, the horn was blown and the match began!

As I had first priority on the motor, I asked our boatman to head to the small pump house, where I'd caught the day before. When we got there though, the waves were dangerously high, and the heavens opened with torrential rain. After half an hour I had my first fish to the boat. Unfortunately, there was a size limit and this was only a fingerling, so it couldn't be counted!

It took about 3 hours before we found some fish, which I cast to and after 2 strips landed my first and biggest fish of the day, a brownie of 1lb 11oz, which had taken a claret dabbler. We covered the pod again and I landed another in quick succession.

Unfortunately, it was then my boat partner's turn on the motor and he wanted to move to the other side of the lake where it was calmer. Here, I landed another fish around the 1lb 8oz mark. Colin also caught a fish there too.

We didn't have any more and before we knew it it was nearly 5pm - time to go back in. Arriving back at the dock and talking to some of my team-mates, it sounded like we'd done well as no-one had blanked in our team. We also heard a couple of boats from the other teams had come in early as they didn't like the rough conditions. A nervous and tense weigh in followed...

 

 

Afterwards, it was clarified that England had won for only the second time EVER in Ireland, the last time being in 1996, which was also at Lough Owel. We'd also won by the biggest margin ever in an International in Ireland, with a combined total of 38 fish, followed by Ireland's 28, Scotland's 24, and Wales' 12.  When we heard the news, we all agreed to celebrate by jumping in the Lough!!

 

It was then back to the hotel for a quick shower and change in to our England suits before our second parade of the day, again behind the bagpiper, to the presentation room for the Gala dinner. Everyone was presented with their medals and trophies, including James Atkinson with the biggest overall bag of 7 fish and Adam Worker with the biggest English fish. England then received the Bob Church International Trophy. It was a moment we all will never forget.

Our team captain, Kieran Bonas, collected the trophy and did a great speech thanking everyone. A bottle of champagne was popped open which soon disappeared!!

After Phil Longstaff, our manager, said thank you to everyone, he'd agreed before the match that if England won, we could shave his head! We asked him if we could, and he said "let's get this over and done with!!" The whole team dived on top of him and put an apple in his mouth while Gary Owen, one of his best mates, shaved lines through his hair!

Then he said "Now this is where the match really begins!" He wanted a Cheesy Puff Competition between himself, Gary Owen and Dom Sheratte, our vice captain!

One of the best parts of the evening was the four teams getting together and having a good laugh. The banter continued well in to the early hours of the morning - we were in stitches all night.

At breakfast the following morning, everyone was a bit hung over, but the biggest shock was when Phil turned up - with no hair, as Gary had shaved the rest of it off!

After everyone said their farewells and left for home, the hotel seemed really quiet. Mum, Dad and I had decided to stay on for a couple more days just to chill out and have a day fishing somewhere. In the end we decided to have a trip to Galway, which has a beautiful coastline. We fished for a few hours in a small harbour near Keeraunnagark, flyfishing and lure fishing. Dad caught 3 species on the fly - Corkwing Wrasse, Pollack, and even a Blenny, while I caught the same, including a Mackerel, on lures.

That was the last time we fished in Ireland. It had been my first ever visit to the Emerald Isle, and the experience had been fantastic. The Irish were very friendly and the countryside was beautiful.  I'm really looking forward to going back there one day as there's so much fishing to do out there. I'd like to end by saying thank you to everyone that helped out with the team, including the Committee and all of the parents, plus a massive well done to Phil Longstaff and his coaching team of Gary Owen, Carl Malpass and Ryan Worker. I am proud to have been part of such a great team, and I wish them all the best of luck for next year, as I'm too old for the team now!

You can see more photos of the Youth International in Ireland in my Flickr library by clicking here

From one fishing extreme to the other

Not all fishing trips go to plan. A year or so ago, a week's Carp fishing in France was organised as a get-together to celebrate my Dad's 50th birthday, along with his long-time fishing friends Paul Henson, Nick Upton and Andy Anastasiou, who were also 50 this year, as well as my Mum. Andy's son, Elliott, his partner, Katherine, Paul's partner, Claire and friends, Ian Pullinger and his Dad John also came along.

Although Dad and I didn't fish the first night, as we were too tired, Nick and Paul did, and both landed a nice Catfish each. So things were looking good and we were confident more fish would be banked. But after a couple of nights, and no more runs, something didn't seem quite right, especially when, one by one, fish were starting to appear on the surface, distressed or dead. It wasn't until the fourth day that the first and only Carp of the trip was caught by Paul, weighing 34lb 4oz, and even this fish didn't look well. At the start of the week Elliot and I caught quite a few small Pike and one Perch on lures, but basically, by the end of the week, there were fish of all species and sizes laying dead on the surface. We all couldn't believe it - we're not 100% sure what the problem was but it was probably to do with a massive oxygen depletion due to dying weed. It was a terrible shame to see so many fantastic fish die.

Despite the fishing, we had a good laugh and enjoyed Andy and Katherine's fantastic barbecues.

Whilst I was in France the Angling Times kindly published a feature I'd written about a great session my Dad and I had lure fishing for Chub a few weeks ago, just after the season opened.

Three weeks ago I fished in the Airflo International Midlands Final, representing the England Youth Anglian Team, on Grafham. Despite returning from France late Saturday night, just a few hours later I was afloat in the middle of Grafham, practising for the match, along with my boat partner - my Mum! My Dad was too tired to fish as he had driven for 11 hours virtually non-stop the day before. The fishing wasn't easy but I managed to catch a few, whilst my Mum sat through the rain reading soggy OK! magazines, and by the evening I had a good idea of what patterns, tactics and locations to try across the lake on match day.

My boat partner the next day was Phil Shaw-Browne, a member of the Hanningfield team. I opted to fish the washing line on a slow-glass, with two Diawl Bachs on the droppers and an olive booby on the point, whilst Phil started with a Di5 sweep and two blobs on a short leader. The fish seemed to be feeding heavily on pin fry from Gaynes, all along the Dam, right up to the Willows, as well as a few other spots along the North Shore. After a good start, the fishing seemed to get much tougher, especially as the day went on, and I lost a few fish too, some frustratingly close to the net. I caught 6 fish for 16lb 5oz. Phil also caught 6 too. Unfortunately, our team was well out of range from qualification, but well done to those teams that did qualify, including Hanningfield! Well done to Adam Worker from our team too for catching the biggest fish of the match, weighing 6lb 2oz.

A few days later I returned to Grafham with my Dad hoping to fly fish for Zander. When we arrived, the rain was almost horizontal in our faces as the wind hacked in to the harbour. We sat in the car for about half an hour unsure about whether to go out or not, but seeing as we were already there it would be pointless not to give it a try. Even John Mees, the head warden at Grafham, suggested we shouldn't bother!

Putting up with the weather turned out to be the right decision. Dad caught a fish of around 7lbs on his very first cast of the day. His second resulted in another of a similar size. I then caught 3 quickly up to around 9lbs. We gave it about an hour until the bites dried up, then moved on.

Nearly every area we tried resulted in some action. The Zander were in a greedy mood, whacking our flies as if they hadn't eaten for a while.

After trying many areas, by the end of the day, we'd boated 41 Zander to 12lb 4oz, plus we also hooked and lost a few. My Dad caught the biggest fish of the day, as well as a nice Rainbow of around 4lbs. It had been an unbelieveable session, catching fish from the very start right up until the very end of the day.

For many years, even before I caught my first Zander, my Dad had talked about flyfishing for them to a long time friend that he'd known since he was a young boy - Jack Simpson, owner of Simpson's of Turnford tackle shop and top worldwide flyfishing guide. So it seemed like the ideal time to go with him!

About a week later we were back on Grafham, hoping Jack would catch his first Zander on the fly. My Dad and I shared a rod, taking it in turns to fish, as casting heavy lines with big flies can be quite hazardous. My Dad was the first to hook up and catch a Zed, but it wasn't long after that Jack hooked and caught what he'd come for - a nice Zander of around 7lb 8oz.

We tried many spots throughout the day, and although it hadn't fished nowhere near the same as the previous trip, we still had a great day's fishing, landing 13 Zander and losing a few between us.

My Dad caught the biggest fish of the day, weighing 10lb exactly, plus a long, lean Rainbow, which if it had some weight to it probably would have weighed over 6lbs.

Jack was also unlucky as he had an enormous Brownie, that we estimated well over 10lbs follow him right to the boat! My Dad and I sometimes get follows from big Browns when using Zander flies, but they're not stupid and turn away at the last minute!

It had been my first time fishing with Jack and we'd had a great time, lots of banter plus some great fishing stories, especially about the Florida Keys and Cuba.

The following morning, it was back in the car for a trip to Ravensthorpe for the England Youth Flyfishing Team's last training session before next week's International on Lough Owel in Ireland. The conditions couldn't have been much worse being so bright and calm and because of this, the fishing was very hard. I stuck it out for most of the day trying to catch fish on dries, as there were plenty moving on top, but I only caught 3 on CDC Shuttlecock Buzzers. The best method though seemed to be pulling tequila blobs, cat boobies and woofta boobies, especially around the boils. We had a great barbecue and Phil Longstaff gave us our last briefing before heading off to Ireland, which I'm now really looking forward to. Come on England!!

June 16th - Lovely Chubbly!

Since returning from the World Catfish Classics, the weather seems to have been very unpredictable and it's made deciding when and where to fish quite difficult. Before that though, whilst I was away, England did have a great spell of hot weather, perfect for flyfishing for Carp. So my Dad took advantage of the conditions and had a couple of trips flyfishing for them locally. He did very well too, landing 18 Carp to 19lb - great fun on fly gear.

The day after I got back from Spain, I also had my first session of the year flyfishing for Carp. Although we came close to catching them on fly gear, unfortunately most of the fish were too far out to be able to reach with a fly rod. I did manage to hook one on the fly but it slipped the hook as I was about to net it. Luckily, we had a backup plan and took one of my Dad's old KM carp rods. The fish were a bit finicky, but in the end my Dad managed to land 3 and lost one of around 30lbs - which was a bit of a gutter! I managed to catch one - all the fish we caught were good doubles though.

About three weeks ago I wrote an article that was published in the Angling Times about a great spell my Dad and I had flyfishing for Carp last year, which I've pasted below:

 A week or so later we decided to flyfish for the Zander on Grafham. The weather looked great - nice and calm for a change and no rain - so we were really looking forward to it. About 20 minutes in to our journey to Grafham we were cut up by a van on a roundabout which resulted in a bad crash. We couldn't believe it - it happened so fast and left us very shook up. After all the swapping of the details with the driver and trying to calm down, we continued our journey to Grafham, determined not to let it spoil our day.

It was hard trying not to think about the state of the car, but we fished on, and caught 13 Zander to 9lb 1oz, plus a near double-figure Bream my Dad caught.

We saw quite a few trout rising whilst fishing for Zander which was a bit of a distraction! But you can't do it all...

I can't believe we're already 2 weeks in to the new river season - it's really caught us by surprise and because we've had so much going on, it's been hard to get out, which has been very frustrating! We did manage a session the day after June 16th and decided to take our jigging rods exploring some of our local rivers, hoping to catch a few Chub. My first fish of the season though was a Perch of around 1lb I caught on a crankbait. My Dad then frustratingly lost a very good Chub on a jig!

The rivers were still coloured after all the rain, but chopping and changing between jigs and plugs, we ended up having an action-packed trip. I love this type of fishing - exploring miles of riverbank that hasn't been touched for months.

By the end of the day, although we were completely cream crackered, we had banked over 40 fish between us - a mixture of Chub, Pike, and Perch. The biggest surprise though was catching a lovely Perch from a tiny river, which weighed 3lb 6oz!

The best Chub was just over 4lbs - these fight really well on a 7ft lure rod!

Apart from that trip we've only managed to have a couple of hours here and there locally, which haven't been as productive as that first day. We've still caught quite a few Pike and Perch though, as well as 2 Chub around the 4lb mark - plus a couple of Dace, believe it or not, caught on tiny Crickhopper plugs fished across the surface!

 

That could be it now for a couple of weeks on the rivers for us, as we've got a fishing trip to France planned with a group of friends - that's if we get our car back from being repaired!

World Catfish Classic 2012

This month has been extremely busy. So much so, that I ran out of time to write my monthly blog just before heading out to Spain with a small group from the Shuttleworth and Sparsholt Colleges, to help marshall the World Catfish Classic 2012. So there are two blogs below as there was so much to write about.

Two Sundays ago I had a very hectic day. After dropping my Dad off to fish in a flyfishing match called the Airflo World Bank Masters Final in the morning at Elinor Trout fishery, and watching for a couple of hours, my Mum then gave me a lift to College where 6 of us met before getting a minibus to Stansted and flying to Zaragoza later that afternoon. Once we arrived, Steve Waters, our teacher, and Rob Nunn, a head marshall, had hire cars ready to drive us the 1 hour journey to the quaint village of Chiprana. When we arrived we had tea in the sports hall that would be the central focal point of the World Catfish Classic, before finally arriving on the banks of the mighty River Ebro at around 1am and setting up camp. It seemed weird that only a few hours earlier I was watching one World Championship in England and was now about to watch another in Spain!

The first two days involved the Shuttleworth boys (Richard Allen, Jason Mackie, Matt Bedding, Joel Scrivener, Brandon Sharp and myself) and some Sparsholt students decorating the presentation hall with banners and flags, pegging swims and giving boat checks to arriving anglers and their teams, making sure all their equipment was safe.

Much of our work was also spent picking up litter and tidying up the river banks around the A, B and C sections where it was pegged. The amount of rubbish left by some visitors was astonishing - and apparently the litter we removed this year wasn't half as much as the year before! Last year, a whopping 25 tonnes of rubbish was collected by the Friends of the Ebro charity. I even picked up an empty beer can and a snake slithered out, as well as finding massive Centipedes and Praying Mantis in amongst the rubbish.

By the Tuesday evening, everything was ready to rock and roll. Flags from the nationalities of all the anglers and event organisers were paraded from the ancient church at the top of the hill in Chiprana, right down to the hall where the opening ceremony would take place. It was an amazing atmosphere, with the beating of the drums and all the locals from this sleepy Spanish village cheering and getting involved in the parade too. Later on that evening, anglers drew their peg scheme at the opening ceremony and returned to their bases before they were allowed to visit their swims at 7am the following morning, ready for the 9am start. The link to the parade is here.

I arrived at Section A, the area I was marshalling, early the next morning. This 2 mile stretch was meant to be notoriously hard for catfishing. With temperatures exceeding 41°C over the three days, it was quite challenging for everybody! As the first day progressed, Section A was living up to it's reputation, as the anglers struggled for bites. This area of the Ebro, a few miles downstream of sections B and C, is renowned for its Carp fishing and last year it held the Spanish Carp qualifier. There were literally hundreds of Carp on the surface all day, and swimming so close in the margins I even managed to stroke one!

In this section I was lucky enough to be marshalling the Spanish Carp fishing champion, Barry Wilson, in the same swim that he won it in, only this time he had to catch Catfish! It was his team-mate, Steve Howard of England that finally broke the deadlock right at the end of the day with a 55kg fish - his first over 100lbs.

 They were the only two cats caught in Section A that day, but B and C had fished their socks off, with loads of cats landed and tagged, the biggest being 71kg! Luckily for the anglers in Section A, they were to rotate to Section B for the following day, where their chances of landing fish would be much greater. I was still to marshal Section A with the anglers who had previously fished Section C.

Just half an hour after playing that cat I was drafted down to play in a friendly football match. Our team, the WCC All Stars, were to play Chiprana FC's Youth academy. To put it simply, we got absolutely thrashed, the final score - 9 -1. Despite their average age of around 15 I've never played against such a good team!

The second day was another challenging one, with only two fish caught again on Section A. Both were from the same swim by the same angler, Gary Sheridan, of team USA who had one of 23.5kg and another fish at the last minute of 11kg. Daniel Tomi also caught a 12kg Common Carp in the swim next door - caught on Squid! Unfortunately, carp don't count though, neither did a cat of around 30kg that was within reaching distance of one angler before it threw the hook.

The 3rd and final day of the match was very tense. I was again marshalling Section A, but this time it was the turn of last year's winners Arnout, Ron and Lee to fish this area. At this point they were in the lead with a weight of 594.90kg. Ahead of Alexander Knittel, Huber Andreas and Florian Riedl of Germany, who were two swims along with a weight of 307.25kg. Only one fish was caught from Section A on the day, by Paul Fagan of England at 14kg, and all other teams blanked, but after having a bumper catch from Section B on the first day, that was enough to take Ron, Arnout and Lee to a 2nd WCC title. As I blew the final whistle, bottles of champagne were opened and sprayed in celebration and the Dutch flag was flown proudly high.

The presentation back at the sports hall took place after a fantastic Paella cooked by the Chiprana locals. All the anglers in my section that caught over the 3 days secured a top 10 finish. The Dutch team (Ron Beugelink, Arnout Terlouw and Lee Carpenter) came first with 594.90kg - a fantastic achievement. Germany's team of Alexander Knittel, Huber Andreas and Florian Riedl came 2nd with 307.25kg. Steve Howard, Alina Padurean and Tracey Lewis Wilson's England team came 3rd with 268.50kg and Beverley Clifford and Jason Ingley, another England Team came 4th with 261.70kg. The biggest fish caught during the match went to Sebastien Francois from France with an 82kg whopper!

After a long night of celebrations, Saturday morning was spent clearing up and by lunchtime we were done. The marshalls were then given time to do what they wanted, and there was only one thing on our minds... fishing!

A couple of us got a lift down to a tackle shop in Caspe and I bought a cheap spinning rod and reel loaded with 10lb line for 11 euros (as we weren't allowed to bring any tackle out with us). I also picked up a collection of shads and curltails, as well as jig heads, before we began fishing at the bridge at Chiprana and headed downriver. At 42°C the fishing was very tough with a bright sun glaring onto the water. We were based far away from the top areas for lure fishing for Zander, Perch and Largemouth Bass on the Ebro, which I heard was from the Dam at Caspe down to Mequinenza.

I fished until about 5pm as the river became busy with Carp and Catfish anglers. I hadn't caught anything, however, I had located some decent shoals of bleak in some areas and thought if the other anglers weren't fishing the whole night, I could get up early and fish these spots when there were less lines in the water.

Whilst everyone was asleep after another celebratory dinner that went on well in to the night, I had just 4 hours sleep before waking up at 5.30am. With jig rod in hand, climbing down the cliffs to the areas where I'd found the bleak shoals, I went fishing! The bleak were already being chased by some type of predator and were jumping out of the water - a very encouraging sign. It only took me about 20 minutes to bank my first Ebro Perch, all 8oz of it! I caught, and lost, a few more too, before it was time to head back for breakfast. All the fish were around the same size - nothing big, but good fun, especially on a light 11euro rod!

That was the last time I was able to fish before we set off on our journey home the same day. I wasn't sure what to expect when heading out to Spain but what a fantastic experience the World Catfish Classic turned out to be. It was a great laugh being with the lads from Shuttleworth College and meeting the guys from Sparsholt too. Some of the anglers in the match were fantastic company and I certainly learned a great deal from them when it comes to targeting Ebro Cats. I can only thank Steve and Chris at Shuttleworth College, Ross Honey and his fantastic team of organisers for inviting me to take part in an awesome match. All in all - an amazing experience!