Thanks Paul--I did. The ravens were croaking, the woodpeckers drumming, and the cock pheasants calling each other out.Dry Fly, Large Dark Olive version of my Kiss my Cul, floating tippet all day, 18 trout and one very small grayling. Waded up 1 mile of limpid chalk stream, walked a mile back, enough...

Absolutely Paul, but I'm off to exercise it--it's opening day on the Wilton Fly Fishing Club's little winterbourne river, the Till!
I'll be back later...

It would be very interesting to try fishing with the tackle they used in those times. I'm quite sure it's perfect for nymphing! When I was French Nymphing in Bosnia on the Ribnic I overhead one guy tell another that I wasn't "fly fishing" - in fact he obviously wanted me to know :cool: I'...

Did many ordinary flyfishermen tie their own flys back in the day or were they for the most part reliant on commercial production. What unusual materials were used that would no longer be available or considered ?......John Well we don't really know John, but I think tying your own will have been t...

An aside, but many people don't get the double entendre there: a fly was a fast two-wheeled carriage, and people used this expression to refer to carriage driving skill being more important than having the best carriage--which of course is equally true of fly fishing !

That's great Peter :) I will try floating tippets in rivers this year. So tell us about your latest book? It sounds entriguing. :cool: Cheers Paul Well if you're curious about how the good old boys got started into what we now consider to be developed imitative flyfishing, but when you look inside ...

Do you fish floating tippets on slow calm stretches of river, Peter? I don't want to get into this discussion too much because while I think you are wrong in this regards, I have learned a great deal from your book in many ways!! Much much more so than this one error (IMO). Personally i really like...

That's really interesting Peter, hadn't thought of it like that. I spend a lot of time fishing for selective trout . Agree with your point about Bob Wyatt's book , but I don't think he was talking about trout feeding in fairly intense hatches which is what I happily spend most of my time doing. I fi...

Blue Jay is used in some traditional Irish Lough flys . eg various Bumbles. Of course these are moving wet flys and the Bumbles work well at times when dragged through the surface film.Don't know of any dry versions that use blue. Why blue works at all is a mystery to me. Maybe those Bumbles would ...

I'm just soaking this stuff up Chaps.
I have plenty of blue macaw and could send you some if you're interested (we used to have one!)
Best, Peter