One of the toughest things about fishing in NZ, is that you have to hold back setting the hook if a big trout takes your dry fly. A big fish needs time to close his large jaw...set the hook too soon, and you just pull it away from him. So you're taught to delay, say "God Save the Queen", before striking.
But coming from the east coast of the US, we generally try to strike as quickly as possible, making it hard to hold back. Generally, everyone loses one or two big fish early in the trip, until you learn to control yourself. On the other hand, if a trout takes a nymph...you have to set the hook right away, before it spits the fly. (You can probably guess where this is going).
We were fishing the Ahurrihi - a gold medal stream not far from Mt. Cook. It's one of the valleys where Lord of the Rings was filmed, and is about the most beautiful spot in the world.
There was an 9 lbs. brownie holding in an undercut, slamming Cicaidas. I had to pull off a 25 foot, backhanded cast against a steady 20 mph headwind, into a feeding lane about 8 inches wide, about a foot off the bank. Luckily the fish was in a very secure lie, and almost impossible to spook, because it took me about 30 attempts to get the cast right.
Finally I did, and had the pleasure of seeing this enormous fish explode onto my fly (from a lie about 5 foot deep). If you've never seen one...a 9 lbs trout has a very broad back. I started to say, "God save....", but reflexes took over, and I saw the fly arcing back into my face (driven by the wind), even as the fish was still splashing water everywhere. I had struck too soon, and pulled my fly right out of its mouth!
Flash to a couple of hours later. We're fishing a dry and dropper rig on those huge bend pools you see in the photo. The dropper was perhaps 18"...but those bend pools were 20-30' deep, with some of the clearest water you can imagine. So even when the fish takes the dropper, it LOOKS like it's come all the way to the surface.
A 7 lbs. rainbow takes my dropper fly (but I think it's got the dry). My guide is screaming, "Set the hook!" but I'm calmly saying, "God save the queeen", and then strike. Once again my flies come arcing back at me...this time because I struck too late.
An hour later, a 3rd fish, another 7 lbs bow, takes my dry...of course I figure it's taken the dropper, and I pull the fly out its mouth.
And that's it. Another 3 or 4 hours, but no more hits. I get skunked on the most beautiful trout stream in the world!
So, excuse me if I hate fishing that da** rig.
Maybe I'm just rationalizing it...but I do think that even in the US (where you rarely have the big trout/wait to close mouth problem)...it's still hard to react properly to two such different strike scenarios.
No comments:
Post a Comment