Fly Fishing

Marcel_Karssies · Location: Enschede - The Netherlands

Yesterday we made another visit to the Möhne river in Germany to see if there where any fish around.
Well, to be to the point the fish where there but we got the feeling that the general size of the fish is going down from what we where used to in the past.
With a hefty price tag for the fishing permit we had expected something more.
Since this particular river is the first nearby real trout stream for us we still are stupid enough to shell out the money every time.

We started the day at the senior citizen stretch aptly named fort he easy access and the always present fish.
The stretch is a canalized part of the river in front of a Watermill, it looks more like a canal than a river.
I did see fish there but somehow I could not stomach fishing there so I left into the forest to see if anything was going on in the more natural stretches of the stream.
Since part of the river was diverted to provide power to a stone quarry and it was high summer there was not much water left in the original river bed.
I spotted a trout rising in a fast run, since I saw no insects flying around I tossed a nymph into the water and hooked a small brown trout right away.

The rest of the river was so shallow that I decided to check out the weir at the stone quarry.
In hindsight I should not have taken the route through the fields since the stinging nettles had grown man high – it was like a jungle out there.
When I finally arrived at the weir I was sweating like a pig.
The weir itself was pretty dead – no flow below it and no fish above.
I decided to fish the turbine channel to the stone quarry and was right into a fish.
A rainbow trout had taken a small streamer.
A few minutes later I hooked a brook trout but that fish managed to throw the hook.

The time flew and since it was almost noon I decided to check up on my buddies because they would surely wanted to get something to eat.
We decided to visit the beergarden at the restaurant of the Niederbergheimer hof.
Since the beergarden was adjacent to the stream we could get something to eat and drink and checkout the trout at the same time
There was actually a rising fish when we at there and I vowed get that fish when we where done.

So in the afternoon I went to the river at the beergarden and launched a nymph in the water.
It was an immediate hook-up but once again the fish came off.
I spotted another rise so it seemed to me like the place was loaded with fish.
The second attempt yielded yet another rainbow trout.
I spend the whole afternoon fishing a short section of the stream there and had hooked
many fish but only one more stayed on.

In the evening I checked out the other guys that where still fishing the rather boring senior citizen stretch.
They had caught their share of trout on dries and nymphs.
I tried in vain to catch some of the trout that where rising like crazy in the shallow bypass of the watermill.

At first I was fishing a common dry fly pattern but that was totally ignored.
When I fished with an emerger I got takes.
It was fun fishing the dry fly but somehow I could not stay connect to the few fish that I actually hooked.
The spot had potential but I only managed a little chub from that place while the trout
where rising all around me.

Around eight o clock in the evening we called it a day.
The fishing was good on this day but with the high ticket prices we might have to look
for an alternative place to fish in the future.