Signs of Change

Well that's another Trout season over.  The fish below was my last fish of the season .  A decent enough stock fish that  has been in the river a while .  I am sure I will be catching a few more by accident when Grayling fishing but they won't be photographed for posterity. I try and release them without taking them out of the water .  Despite the low water its been a decent season with a lot of fish on the bank.  But that's the trout season done it always passes far to quickly.

The little ladies  below are however another story .  We are very lucky in that most of our local rivers hold decent stocks of Grayling.  This little one is my first deliberate catch of the season . I have had a few already this  year but this is the first since the end of the trout season.   I think as a species in some ways  I appreciate them more than trout .  A beautiful native species that provide great sport  right through the winter .  The only down side for me is that really nymph fishing is the way to go for these.  They do rise but they are predominately bottom feeders .  But in terms of there ability to extend my fly fishing season right through till the new year the are superb.  This one fell to a little pink nymph fished short line a rods length away 

 The signs of Autumn are starting to show in plenty now , the mushrooms are showing in the grass at the edge of the lane where I walk the dog on a morning ,and the woods are full of all varieties of fungi, Wish I knew more about them generally I love the taste of mushrooms and wish I had the knowledge to forage some wild ones . I'm OK with the occasional chicken of the woods which is hard to mistake , but as for the rest I am pretty clueless.

I have been looking forward to the last weekend for ages ,  there is a friendly competition run in the Yorkshire dales .  Organised by the Dales river trust and the salmon and trout association for Sunday . Well as might be expected following the driest summer for 25 years the weather decided to change just in time to cause the competition to be cancelled for the second time in its over 50 yr history.  Sods law at its finest ,  as the website screen shot below shows the river went from summer low to a 2 metre spate in less than a day. Anglers well and truly blown of the water.  The salmon anglers on the river will be loving that big lift of water but it ruined my day for sure,  Another really annoying fact as well is that my local Salmon river missed all the rain and remained on its bones.