BUG STYLE

Source: Fly Fishing and Fly Tying (November 2003 pp. 32-34)

November is a strange month is it late autumn or early winter? Well both! The birds of summer are now gone for another year and winter visitors are beginning to arrive. First in dribs and drabs, then, as the weather starts to break over in Scandinavia and we get the first easterly winds, the numbers of visitors soar. Redwings and fieldfares roam the hedgerows making the most of the hawthorn and holly berries, while our resident woodpigeons, jays and squirrels feast on beechnuts and acorns.

By the river we can hear a bird singing in November? There must be some mistake; birds sing in the spring not the winter, don't they? There its goes again, a complex striking song - of course it's a dipper, one of those chubby, brown birds which we've all seen on steams and rivers throughout upland Britain. Dipper behaviour makes sense if you think about it: get the territorial battles sorted and pairings done before spring; then when spring arrives concentrate on rearing a family - while other species are still fighting over where to build a nest.

Normally at this point we give the giss for our bugs of the month but this time is different. An old rhyme sets the scene for November:

• No sun,
• No moon,
• No stars,
• No birds,
• No bees,
• No fish,
• November.

To which we would add - No Giss, Fish Bugs. (All a bit dismal, and rather unfair.)

If you arrive at the river to find no rising fish, your fingertips are cold and your nose is dribbling - then there is a good chance there will be no winged insects about. Moreover, when you look into the water there is no sign of insect life and therefore no giss to observe. What do you do? Go home? Go to the pub? Go shopping with the wife? No! - stay at the river and fish Bugs!

What is Bugging? Czech nymphing, short-line nymphing, call it what you will, basically they are all the same method. In short, Bugging is where two or three weighted Nymphs (which can be of any type, Czech, woven Polish style, shrimp patterns, bead heads etc.) are fished on a short line, with a about a metre of fly line out of the tip ring. The flies are usually pitched (to say `cast' would be a gross exaggeration) upstream and allowed to drift downstream while the angler keeps his rod high so his fly line is off the water. Only the leader and the flies drift down the river and the angler is in perfect control as he tracks the path of the drift with his rod tip. Any take is immediately obvious as the leader jags forward. Takes can come any time from the moment the flies hit the surface and start dropping to depth, through when the flies dead drift with the current to when the flies slow and lift at the end of the drift. This last part of the presentation can be particularly deadly!

The safety aspect of casting with a Bug rig deserves serious consideration. Do not attempt normal false-casting and fly delivery - to do so will risk you and your rod tip. Rather - pay out a short length of fly line and then simply pitch or lob your weighted rig to the target area in a wide arc: giving both yourself and your rod tip the widest possible berth with your heavy flies. If you are new to this style of fishing begin by practising with lead shot pinched on your line rather than sharp hooks.

Bugs and fishing

When we are out on the river guiding we are often asked about Bug fishing, the most common questions are, (a) what magic flies do we use, and (b) to which brand of leader material are they tied. If you are a regular reader you will already know we don't believe in magic - we rely on sound, simple ideas and principles to catch fish.

So let's start with the basics. Firstly, get to know and understand your quarry; at this time of year you will be fishing for grayling because trout are out of season. We know of only ten books published in English on Grayling, starting with Pritt, 1888, to Roberts, 1999. Study any you can get your hands on. Grayling feed no matter how cold the water and this means they are catchable. Location is key - in cooler months and water there is a good chance grayling will be in deeper, faster runs and pots whereas in summer they may favour thinner riffles. In fast, deep runs the water near the river bed is significantly slower flowing than the water in mid-stream or at the surface and it's in this slower `comfort zone' that the grayling lie - often just behind a rock. Also, in cooler water grayling tend to shoal, so catch one and several more could - and often do - follow.

Presentation problems

• Problem 1 - getting our flies to the correct depth.

  Grayling will often be feeding very close to the bottom and will not rise up very far to intercept a bug no matter how appetising or realistic it looks.

  Solution: Use slim leaded patterns. The faster and deeper the run or pot then the heavier the fly will need to be to sink to where the fish are lying.

• Problem 2 - knowing heavy flies from lighter ones.

  We need to be able tell at a glance which flies in our boxes are lighter or heavier than the others. This is important when, for instance, you are constantly getting hung up on the bottom because your flies are too heavy. On the other hand if your flies never get hung up (and you're not getting takes) they may well not be going deep enough and so are passing over the top of the fish.

  Solution: Weight different size hooks with different amounts of lead wire - therefore the bigger the hook, the more lead wire and hence the heavier the fly. The flies in our armoury are in just three sizes: #10, 8 and 6. If you have access to miniature weighing scales then you can weigh these yourself but don't worry if not, with a little trial and error you will soon work out which sizes best suit your water.

  By adopting a simple system like this you can make and re-make batches of flies to your own specifications, you are in control and therefore your flies will be where the fish want them more often that's the important bit! We cannot overemphasise this point - the flies must be in the place as required by the fish. In constantly trying to achieve this goal you will lose a lot of flies, but by employing a system, batches of flies can be tied quickly and with ease, its also cheap. You would be amazed at how often we see good looking Bugs in anglers fly boxes. Then when we ask when and where they work the answer is "I don't really know, it took 20 minutes to make and I don't want to lose it," or "I don't really know, its full of tungsten beads and they're too expensive to lose." The best patterns are quick and easy to tie and cheap to replace.

• Problem 3 - knowing which pattern is going to be best on a particular day?

  The simple answer is we don't - and nor does anyone else!

  Solution: But, we do know that by using a series of differently weighted patterns we will be able to fish the right depth. Taking this one stage further, again sticking to a simple system, we can quickly assess which Bug colour will work on a given day. Keeping to our simple approach we use just three basic patterns which major on three different colour themes and which we have found to be very successful on our rivers. Colour combinations are not cast in stone and the fish in your rivers may respond to other dominant colours, for instance on the Welsh Dee we know anglers who swear by very dark, even black Bugs.

  By employing just three patterns, in different weights and different colour combinations on your cast you can soon fish a run thoroughly and will be rewarded with a few fish before moving on to the next bit of fishy looking water.

Tackle

We do not use a special bugging rod.

You can fish Bugs very effectively with any normal fly rod - we tend to stick to our 9ft or 10ft 6-weight rods. You can use a longer rod, the advantage is slightly better water coverage, the disadvantage is they tend to be heavier and you will tire more quickly. It follows that if your arm starts to ache then you lose effectiveness and after all we fish for fun! Added to which we often want to switch to a spell of dry fly fishing as the day unfolds and a longer, heavier rod is a real pain for that.

A floating line is fine. Our leaders are made up of a single length of Bayer Perlon, say 4.41b, about a rod length long, with droppers formed using a simple water knot, droppers are about 6" long and about 20" apart.

If fishing very snaggy water we tie tiny rings into the leader and attach the droppers to the rings, so when only one fly gets lost on a snag - we hate to lose three at time! (Roman Moser 1mm rings are the smallest and lightest we've found. And it can be a good idea to use a slightly thinner line for the droppers.)

Bug order

Where to put the heaviest fly on the cast is a common question. Some people swear by putting the heaviest Bug on the middle dropper, others have it on the point, yet others recommend the top dropper. We don't have a set pattern because we don't use the same rig every time. We prefer to adapt the presentation depending on what we are trying to achieve.

There is little doubt that casting is much more trouble free with the heaviest Bug on the point. This gives three flies fishing in a vertical line at three different depths, with the top two lighter flies fishing higher in the water.

Putting the heaviest fly on the top dropper requires more casting care. This rig tends to put all three flies in a horizontal line nearer to the river bed - good in the depths of winter when grayling are `nailed' to the river-bed.

Moving the heaviest Bug to the middle position splits the options and can be a good search presentation to start with.

Of course the fish have no rule which prevents all the flies on your cast being of similar weight, although to hear so of the dogma written on this subject you'd be forgiven for thinking they had!

(And the authors' preferences?: Stuart favours having his heaviest fly on the point, whilst David often starts with his heaviest in the middle. And at the end of the day we catch similar numbers of fish.)