It’s high summer which isn’t ideal for many of the “traditional” species coveted by fly fishers. Salmon, trout, sea trout, grayling, even pike really don’t like sunny, hot weather. Fishing for perch can be really good – they like it hot and sunny. Another fish that like it hot and sunny – and one’s that’s a summer guest in nordic waters, is mackerel. Mackerel is a popular fish, but it is often hard to reach from the shore. Fishing for them from large jetties is very popular and can be very effective.
A school of tricky mackrels in the surface is approaching the flyfisher in the belly boat.
But being able to get out on deeper water, even getting out to fish the jetties “from the other side” is often better. Whether it’s from a boat, a pontoon boat, a kayak or a float tube does’t matter much. Slick water and no wind are perfect conditions anyway.
Here at Ahrex we love fishing from float tubes and pontoon boats – and also for mackerel. Warm water, sun, no wind and sitting as comfortably as in an arm chair and catching fast, strong fish. We don’t complain! Just remember plenty of sun screen and a proper pair of sunglasses.
Mackerel are fun and as such not hard to catch, but they can be hard to find. Lots and lots of searching, but once you find the shoals, they are usually not hard to follow. There are other fish to catch as well. Garfish like hot weather as well and they are still around. If you’re lucky enough to have them around, sea bass as well. On deeper water, even in the shallows for short periods of time, you can of course catch a sea trout as well.
As far as the fishing it self goes, it’s fairly standard. One difference is that it’s a great advantage to be armed with several lines, from floating to fast sinking – very fast sinking. We all agree on that. Søren likes quite light tackle, I like a 5-wt and I think Morten uses the same. We don’t use the same flies, however. We could arm wrestle about which fly is better. We could also let the catches do the talking, which would be some what pointless as Morten seems to come out better than the rest of us.
Nothing is more classic for fishing in the deep than a Clouser-Minnow – this one is tied by Morten “Coastfly” Hansen on the SA210 Bob Clouser Signature
Søren likes shrimp imitations, I like a bait fish imitation and Morten likes a… I don’t know what it is – Peter Alexandersson’s excellent catch-any-fish-in-any-water-fly, Alexis. We have a video of Søren tying the Alexis here:
Here’s the bait fish imitation I like – not only for mackerel, just an all rounder like the rest of the 4729 epoxy-type bait fish out there:
We look forward to getting out – a company outing, so to say. Looking for a mackerel, a garfish or whatever fish that pulls a line.
