Ladyshore Little Lever 26 Jun 14

On one of my many wanders around the internet I came upon a video on  fishing north country spiders. I have read about people fishing with them without really knowing anything about them or how to do it.
The video is on a site called Fishing with Style  http://www.fishingwithstyle.co.uk/northcountry.htm North Country Spiders are wet flies and the video is about fishing a team of them without droppers.

Having fished with droppers and had some awful tangles and not caught much, I watched the video with interest and decided to give it a go. Not having any spiders I ordered some but could not wait for them arrive before trying the method at Ladyshore today.

What to use as the spiders, I have some Tenkara flies that don't get used, which look a bit like spiders flies, so I put three on as per the instructions. I used a eight foot rod with a floating line with an extra long leader.

I must admit it did not look that promising, but anyway I cast into the rough water below the broken weir and as the flies hit the water I had a take. And what a take, it took me straight across the fast water and twenty yards of line with it. Fifteen minutes later I landed this fat fifteen inch fighter.

 The first fish that I have caught on a Tenkara fly. It took the point fly.

 

  Got it back into the water and thought, this just might be a good idea after all.

Those that have read my earlier blogs about Ladyshore know that I don't catch many fish there I think 3 or 4 in a day are my best. So I was not counting my chickens when I moved above the weir and tried there. I did not mention that the river is low, no rain for quite a while, so I could wade to places that are usually to deep or to fast. I was just trying out the casting, up and across and them letting it go down and back to my side when I hooked my second fish.

 Not as big as the first one just 13 inches this one

Just having a breather before swimming away.

This was the first time I have ever caught a fish from the spot that this one came from, but not the last.

 Getting smaller.

Got this one further up river, not a good photo of the Tenkara fly.

The next one I hooked was a much better fish, but as happens now and again it came off at the net, and then I caught this one to make up for it, not quite.

I caught  a couple more before moving down to one of my better spots from which I caught not a thing, life's like that sometimes.

All in all I was very pleased with the spider fishing and will most definitely be trying it again when the  new flies arrive.