Don't Let Them Of The Hook!

GAIA instructor and regular river angler Trevor Heyliger explains how to get more fish in your net when out on the river.

- Trevor Heyliger

During my time spent receiving and observing fly fishing tuition, I can recall only one instructor who properly covered hooking and playing a fish before allowing his students to actually start fishing. Most tend to wait until you ‘rather surprisingly’ hook a fish and then try to talk you through the process of playing and landing it. 

My first fly fishing experience was a traumatic one. The instructor was very softly spoken and his mumblings were lost in the commotion caused by my first fish thrashing around on the surface and my blind panic. It wasn’t until I’d yelled: “For god’s sake man, just tell me what to do!” that I got any meaningful assistance.

Eventually, though, more by luck than anything else, a tired fish glided over the rim of the net and I would never be the same again! 

On a recent day trip to the Derbyshire Wye, I lost two very good fish within minutes of each other. A few years ago I would have spent the following week replaying the tragedy over and over again with my head in my hands, wailing: “Why? WHY?”

These days I am less tortured because I know that I was totally at fault and I know exactly why those fish were lost.

As novice flyfishermen, we become obsessed with rods, reels, lines, leaders, casting, presentation, watercraft, fly selection; in fact, anything that we think might help us catch a fish. Then we get to the water and we hook one… now what? It’s been my experience that most novice anglers lose their first few fish because they simply have no idea what’s going to happen next. 

Keep A Bend In The Rod

So what does happen after you first hook a good fish? In short, the fish will go mental! That gentle sipping take or the sight of an indicator simply coming to a halt is in complete contrast to what happens when the fish realises that it can no longer move freely and normally.