In article , Lazarus
Cooke writes

"Skill in this fishing has a wider implication than in most others,
and from the very nature of the method there must be difficulties
unkown in either wet or dry fly.

snipped

(from the introduction to ' Clear-water trout fishing with worm' by
Sidney Spencer, 1935)


It was a pleasure to try out an old skill in the appropriate place and
time (it is not often I am on a water that allows worming, see below).
Whether in clear or heavy water the preferred style of fishing with very
little weight and a hopefully wide awake angler does not in my, perhaps
hazy, memory result in more engorged hooks than (say) wet fly fishing. I
believe that it is not the method of fishing that damages fish and
fisheries, it is rather behaviour of anglers, fishery managers and
non-anglers that can do harm. I urge you to keep an open mind about
worming and if you are ever around this part of the world to take a trip
to (say) Wales to watch and talk to exponents of the art, which is still
practised and appropriate in the right place and time.

Last year I fished a river with a worm for the first time in about forty
years. It was the river Teifi on the last weekend in July and we stayed
in a house that overlooked the beginning of the gorge in Llandysul. When
I arrived on Saturday morning the river was several feet above average,
not unlike milky coffee, and just beginning to fall. On Saturday
afternoon I fished a worm getting a couple of pulls, but no hook ups.
About half the anglers we met were using worms, the others were spinning
with tobies (mostly visitors like me). The wormers were mostly locals
who reported catching only eels, the spinners were hooking sewin (sea
trout = sea run brown trout) but landing many fewer than they hooked. By
Sunday morning I was fishing a meps, hooking fewer than the toby users
but landing as many. By the afternoon I was fishing a team of wet flies,
to the amusement of my spinning companions, but I was having as much fun
as them and enough success too. By the time I left the water on Monday
afternoon I was fishing upstream dries for brown trout. The Teifi is a
spate (freestone ?) river but it has Tregaron bogs in its head waters,
they can store a lot of water which damps down the spates compared to
other rivers. It was pretty much down to normal when I left, and it was
interesting to visit the places I had fished in the flood and see what
where I had been trying to put my worm.

The rules of the water are "fly only at night" and we did indeed try for
some sewin on Sunday night, the conditions were far from perfect, we did
have some excitement but no real success. We came back the following
month and were able to capitalise on the earlier practice.

I have since discovered by reading in "Successful Sea Trout Angling" by
Graeme Harris and Moc Morgan that, in the opinion of local anglers: (1)
tobies are better attractors in heavy water but meps are better hookers
- so change earlier rather than later; (2) Anglers often continue
spinning long after they would to better to change to flies. If you can
see your fly when it is six inches under the water at your feet, then it
should be the preferred method.



--
Ellis Morgan