Salford Friendly Anglers Society

Some days are special, and today certainly is. It's not every day you get a note from the oldest angling society in the world! We received a photo from Mr. Duddy of The Salford Friendly Anglers Society (instituted on the 2nd of April 1817). They are the protectors of the River Irwell, which flows through the Irwell Valley in Lancashire and Greater Manchester, in North West England. I don't know how long our club will exist, but when I read through the history of The Salford Friendly Anglers Society, it makes me think about what kind of club we want to be. 

Check out more at:
http://www.salfordfriendlyanglers.co.uk/

 

season is here

With the vacationers starting to leave the creeks, the season in here.  Dr Shin went out for a morning and did pretty good.

Still Water

I visited a still water fishing pond for some Korean native carp fishing.  Sitting back and watching the indicator rise is hypnotic. 

친구 성욱이와 붕어 낚시를 경험했습니다.  고요한 물과, 찌를 바라보고 있는것에 매력이 뭔지 알것 같습니다. 친구는 4 마리, 나는 작은녀석 한마리를 만났습니다. 다시 도전해보고 싶습니다.

 

 

Chill Out Time.

Got together with the Seoul fishing buddies last night for some heavy soju.  I don't even know how I got home but I got home. I especially loved the small bar where 5 people can barely fit, with two guys playing the guitar and singing.  I didn't know such a place existed in the heart of downtown Seoul.

오랜만에 배고문님, 신박사님, 허교수님, 송선배님, 그리고 동자님과 소주와 맥주를 들이켰다. 오랜만에 뵈서 너무 반가웠고, 오랜만에 뵈서 너무 과음했다. 라이브로 불러주는 작은 바 (작은 = 5명 앉는 바) 인상깊었다.

Some photos recovered from wet phone

ready

IFTD

Jonathan, have a safe trip and bring some good stuff back!

Cast, swing, boom.

The heavy rains and winds that passed through the central region in held up till the late afternoon in the area where we fished.  I fished for NunBulGae (literally means Red Eyed Fish) for the first time today and I can now fully understand why people get hooked onto this.  I think this is the closest thing to bonefish fly fishing in fresh waters.  Fished on ankle to knee high waters and these fish run.  They take flies off top waters like a bass.  Cast, swing, boom.  They take off and do a pretty impressive run, fast and powerful.  They will run 3-5 times before coming to hand.  They are not big fish, but they can swim fast and hard.  I wished I had shock leaders today after they ripped off the fly several times.  On the average, it takes about 2-3 minutes to land one and that's if you pull in hard.  I was onto the fish on the second cast of the day and it continued into the late afternoon.  In all that excitement, I reached down to pick up a fish that came to my feet and then the inevitable happened.  I watched my phone drop into the water then immediately get covered by weed (which made me fumble through the weed to pick it up - delaying the pickup).  I am trying to dry this phone out and if it all works out, I'll post some photos.  I can't say I'll give up trout fishing for this, but I do expect to be out fishing for NunBulGae during the late summer/ fall seasons.  BTW - they can be fished all year round.

Mr. Choi, the owner of Spider Fly Shop did manage to get some video footage on his new gopro camera so he'll post that up.  A NunBulGae looks like this.

Here is the link to some of the videos Mr. Choi captured.

http://www.spiderfly.co.kr/bbs/board.php?bo_table=johwang&wr_id=6365

GonDolMaegi Char in Korea

I was happy to hear that people have been catching GonDolMaegi (Salvelinus malma/ aka Dolley Varden Trout) in fresh waters in Korea.  This one was caught under the SoYang Dam in ChunCheon.  I saw this post on the Spider Fly website:

(http://www.spiderfly.co.kr/bbs/board.php?bo_table=joheng&wr_id=21341) 

With the lenok out of reach, this is pretty good news for a fisherman like me.  I know where I am soon headed with my two hand rod.  Dolly Varden here I come!

*I am uncertain about the accuracy of the trout classification, I took bits and pieces I can find from the web. If you have better information, please let us know.

Getting down to business.

I blasted down to the familiar creek alone this morning.  As much as I love fishing with my friends, I also completely appreciate some alone time fishing.  I get utilitarian when I fish alone, no shame in casting to every pool that looks good.  I skipped breakfast, wanting to keep myself hungry, like a cougar ready to pounce (or cast) at the first sight of any fishy looking water.  I passed by the KEEP OUT sign with ease... I basically bribed the keeper last time I was here.  I know that the bribe will last me till late fall, so no worries about the guy yelling behind my back as I make a fast dash upstream.  I arrived a little later than I wanted to, the sun was already up.  The fish here stop biting early during this summer season, I know I have a couple of hours of good fishing left.  I brought with me my 3wt 6ft ultra light White River rod.  It ain't nothing fancy but I consider this the best thing that White River (Bass Pro) ever made.  They call it a 3wt but it feels more like a 2wt or less.  It's the rod I bought many years ago, when I went fishing with Charles in the driftless area.  It's been a long while since I took this rod fishing, but I still like it a lot.

I made my way through the small creek, leader line short so I can 'machine gun' cast to each pocket as I climbed into the creek.  Not far from where I started a healthy cherry trout accepts my poorly tied fly.  I am happy.  I feel at ease.  I sat there and prayed a thank you prayer.  I am thankful that I am here, that a fish came to the end of my line, and thankful that there are many good looking pools ahead of me.  I love the feeling of wet wading in the summer, the cool water between my toes.  I keep a good pace, but I don't have anywhere specific I am headed to... just heading upstream.  There are sections of the creek that are populated with cherry trout and there are others with rainbows.  I don't know if it's my own imagination but they don't seem to mix.  It also seems like there are sections in between that seem to hold no fish.  Maybe it's the trout's keep out zone they have agreed to.  The cherry trout are smaller fish so I'm not sure how the hierarchy works here but there seems to some sort of order to it.

I caught plenty of fish...well maybe not plenty but enough.  A mixed bag of rainbows and cherry trout.  Believe it or not, I hooked the largest rainbow I have ever seen here today, even landed it in the net.  But while I was fumbling to get my phone out to take a photo, it slipped out of the net that was too small for it.  I tried to grab it with my hands but it slipped away and the trout was already in deep waters swimming away with ease.  And this was the trout I caught by making a long cast to a still pool.  My casting isn't great and so it's pretty rare I catch trout in calm pools (my excuse for liking fast pocket waters)  I didn't expect anything when I made the cast, but just as I was about the pick up the line, it took the fly.  It jumped in the pool at least three times and it was like I was watching someone else catch this fish.  I had that "damn it" face for a long time after it slipped away.  I didn't mind it slipping away, but I would have liked to seen the photo... so I can compare my impression of the fish to the actual size that it was.  Maybe it's better this way, now I can tell that story to my friends and say... "the fish was thiiiis big".  The fish wasn't steelhead size or nothing, but it was bigger than you would expect in a creek like this.  I guess these biggies do live here. 

I got back on the road to head home by 10:30am, and was stuck in traffic for 5 hours (double the normal time).  Traffic sucks but that encounter with the big trout made it better and worthwhile.  Man I love fishing.

healthy cherry trout

mix of rainbow

I could sit here for hours



the calm pool where I caught the bigger fish



the "dman it" face

driving in traffic sucks

Dragon Valley creek chubs

Creeks around Dragon Valley in Kangwon...they look beautiful but seems to hold only creek chubs.  I spoke with some locals and they say they catch catfish at night but agree that creek chubs are the majority (or maybe there is creek around the corner that hold trout but they don't want to tell me - I surely wouldn't tell if I were them).  Still, them creek chubs are better than nothing and watching them aggressively take the fly is a great way to pass some time. I also know for a fact they grow to become twice the size of the second picture below. 



this is an older photo but this about how big these chubs become.

WY/MT Trip Day 3: Slough Creek

 Our daily routine for two weeks had been wake up early and fish then start all over again the next day.  I was concerned about Patty getting so sick of this to the point that she will never want to fish again. Au contraire, fueled by gorgeous views, she couldn't wait to get out there and fish.  Sort to speak....

 
On our way to the Slough creek.

Lone bison appeared and gave us a glance before passed us by.

At the entrance of the creek

We've decided to fish lower meadow as some heavy clouds started to form and dumped a good amount of rain water on us later on.

 

Patty's lesson continues on.

We didn't get to see large cutts in the lower meadow.  It was mostly small rainbows and cuttbows.

The bison bull on the right was getting annoyed so we moved out of there at heart beat.

One of larger rainbow.

Found this antler by the creek. Hope he had lived freely.