Fernworthy, Roadford and the Exe

Now back from a three day fishathon in Devon, I thought I'd blog our success, or lack thereof, as a couple of the waters we tried get little mention.

First of all we fished Fernworthy, up on Dartmoor. Whilst the rain mostly stayed off for the day, there was a ferocious wind, which even coming over your left shoulder, made casting very difficult and accurate casting an impossibility. Apart from the slightly cold wind, it was an overcast day and there was a good foot of wave.

Given the conditions, muddlers formed the basis of our attack, with a couple of hawthorn fly imitations and the usual small black stuff thrown in for good measure. Despite two of us fishing hard for the whole day and the third member of the team for a half day - we only had one fish to show for our efforts, a brownie of just under a pound which took a gold bodied, clipped deer hair muddler I was fishing on the bob. Apart from a couple of plucks a few casts earlier, I only had one other take, again on a big black deer hair muddler. Between us we fished various wet flies, some small dries and even a couple of dry daddy long legs to no avail. We did move a couple of decent fish on the surface, but there was little other action. A disappointing but puzzling day all in all, I think the wind was just too strong to fish it effectively and certainly to fish a hatch.

Having planned to visit Roadford the next day, conditions on the Exe looked very good and we were able to get on. We took spinning and fly gear, fishing salmon flies on the point and a trout fly on the dropper, to hedge our bets... Despite conditions looking good, spinning produced nothing at all, but we were at least able to land a couple of brownies on the fly. We later investigated that one of them was crammed full of beetles and a few small slugs. We also saw a chap lose a circa 10lb salmon at the net on the next beat down...

Finally, we took the trip to Roadford, having never fished there before. The day dawned grey and windy, but cleared and calmed so we had almost perfect conditions when we got there, it getting a little too bright later on. An oversight meant we were without an electric motor, and Roadford is nay a place for oars....

We battled our way out, being overtaken by a few cheery dinghy sailors in the middle of a race on the way. The first bay on the left was as far as we could realistically go, so that was it. The water was gin clear with visibility to nearly 10 ft. The first drift through produced nothing on teams of wets and no sign of movement, yet it felt fishy. A few fish started to then move on the surface, but we couldn't see what to. After a further couple of hours with no action on dries or wets, I was fishing a drift down the bank only about 20 yds out from the bank and there was a vicious swirl in front of me.

Nothing happened for a second then there was solid pull and what at 20 yds looked like a rainbow went airborne in front of me, we were in business. Ten minutes later and after a very hard fight of aerobatics and boring to the bottom, I was very pleased to land an absolutely pristine 3lb 1oz brown trout. These fish are stocked as fingerlings and it was in perfect condition, fat and well fed, much like a limestone loch trout. It had taken a black and peacock spider I had on the middle dropper, fished with a floating line. Apart from that, we could conjure nothing else save for a couple of swirls, but we did see more fish of similar size moving. They are definitely there, but it's a very hard venue.  

Why do they always look smaller in the photo...

This is compounded by it being hard work walking round the bank and too big really even for an electric motor to get everywhere. If it were possible to hire proper outboards it would really open up the place - there is some absolutely first class fishing to be had for very good sized, near wild, brown trout in peak condition. We shall definitely return, perhaps it would fish  well on the evening rise.

So, a tough weekend all in all, not helped by the weather conditions at Fernworthy, but much was learnt and there's no question these little fished reservoirs offer the chance for some first class brown trout fishing.

River Kennet - Barton Court

I haven't posted for a while and my resurgent interest in coarse fishing has since subsided, mainly because the FAS waters are so crowded with carpers, but it's a cheap club ticket so you get what you pay for. I'll make more of an effort to find some less pressured day ticket waters.

Meanwhile I've got back to my primary interest and have been doing a lot more trout fishing, most recently on the Kennet in the middle of the (late) mayfly hatch. Its a pleasant environment and much effort has been put into improving the water habitat. Comprising lots of feeder streams it's a little hard to gauge where you can and can't fish initially, but it didn't take too long to get to know the place. Stocking is mainly browns of about 1.5lbs as far as I could see, plus a few rainbows. There were also some roach feeding on the mayfly (of which I caught two), and I also noted a number of large, black, bream sculling about in the smaller pieces of water.

It was a foul day but we got a few hours dry weather in the morning, following by persistent showers for the rest of the day. I only had one mayfly on me (a green drake), which they didn't seem to be confident with, lots of missed splashes and fish turning away. They were not very interested in the Mayfly nymph either and I'd had one pluck on a pheasants tail.

The mayfly hatch started to come on better after lunch and after about five hours with no fish but plenty rising, I caught my Mayfly in a tree. In retrieving it, I found another one up there which I was also able to rescue. I put it on and immediately caught the fish that had been refusing everything else - it was child's play. So I finished with three brown trout and a rainbow to 2lbs, plus a couple of roach. The mayfly I found was actually a wet french partridge mayfly, designed to be pulled through lochs, but I got it to float with liberal dosings of Gink.


A good fun day all in all if very wet, I'm not sure if I enjoyed it more than a good day on a loch, especially with sea trout, but I'll probably go again. The Test is next on the list, perhaps later in the season.