Hatches April 2009

I can take plenty more days like yesterday, gentle breeze, warm sunshine and fly fishing or at least teaching people how to. Does life get any better?

Yes is the answer, fly life is bursting forth, bringing increasing opportunities for imitative fishing. To celebrate this we start a new monthly series, "Hatches" as a practical anglers guide to some key fly species trout will find at the surface during the year.

Yesterday we were treated to sporadic midge hatches through the day at Loynton Fisheries and while most action occurred subsurface to midge pupa, sufficient surface activity was apparent for sport with emmergers.

I even noticed a single lonely hawthorn fly, the first of the year. On stillwaters during April, look out for increasing midge hatches and later the month, numbers of hawthorn flies, plus pond and lake olives.

On rivers the main interest for trout at the surface comes from larger dark olives, with some stone flies and later in the month medium olives. Once trout get back into the swing of surface feeding they will often also rise during the hatches of tiny midge and terrestrials such as beetles and again hawthorns.

Have some major hatches on your waters not noted above? Let everyone know in comments!

Happy Fishing

Steve