The winter having been so mild virtually passed us by this year

I have been very busy these past couple of weeks, with fly tying, planning and checking over old diary entries. The winter having been so mild virtually passed us by this year. The level of the lakes is at its greatest, and even the birds are well advanced in their year.So what happened this week? The rain started falling – nothing too serious at first, but then it gathered in strength, and around here we had stair-rods. BUT then, the temperature plummeted. April the third gave us our second snowfall of the winter – just a shame that British Summer Time had started a week earlier!How has all of this affected the fishing? I spoke to fisheries manager, Bob Handford, who told me that after a brilliant first week at Blagdon, things have really slowed down. He said that it was difficult to work out whether the fishing was poorer, or whether it was purely down to lack of anglers going out in such poor conditions. The Barrow Tanks have produced fish in good numbers to the anglers who have attended – that bodes well for the season. Tuesday saw the first day of fishing on Chew Valley this season. It was the customary pre-season day for season ticket holders. Bob told me that even though it sleeted, snowed or rained all day, there were plenty of limits caught from the North Shore. One brave (solitary) angler even opted to fish most of the day on the spit at Nunnery, in spite of the very strong wind pushing into him all day. Bob has yet to find out whom it was fishing there, or if they caught anything. I hope that they did, as it must have taken a good few layers of thermal clothing to enable that angler to stick it out.Once I have finished this piece, I will be packing my bag for tomorrow’s first trip of the season. I think that I could be tempted to top up my hip flask! I have already found where I had hidden my old “long-johns”. At this time of the year it doesn’t usually pay to stay too late in the day. Keep yourself on the move – unless you find a concentration of fish. I am not a great fan of anchoring, but early season demands that it usually the most sensible option. I won’t be changing the flies that I put on my cast at the start of the day – unless my boat partner starts catching on something drastically different. I think that I will be fishing pretty slowly too. I will update on this next week.Tight lines.

Martin Cottis