When we started Ahrex we were of course painfully aware of the hooks that needed to be in our program. Salmon hooks were of course among them and since the beginning in 2016, we’ve been expanding the range and we’re not done yet. I’ll present a new hook at the end of this blog, so please read along.
Continue reading “Our salmon hooks”
Do salmon eat nymphs? Yes, at least as younglings in the river, before they enter the sea, they do. But I think it’s common knowledge that once they enter the rivers, they stop eating. How they manage to survive for several months and not least why they take our flies is a subject for another blog. However, it’s clear that salmon do take flies that imitate large stoneflies nymphs and even ones fished upstream and dead drifted past their lies.
Shrimp flies have always been popular for fly fishermen and especially for saltwater fly fishermen they are a “must-have” in the box. The Scandinavian coastal fishing for sea run brown trouts is now one of the cornerstones of Danish fly fishing and the Danish sea trout love shrimp flies. In this week’s blog, we’ll focus on a new pattern that has gone from strength to strength and proven its effectiveness to coastal sea run brown trout.
Continue reading “Høtyven”
Fishing for migratory fish – anadromous species – such as salmon, sea trout, steelhead or rainbows and trout both from the sea and the great lakes on their way to the spawning banks has been the purpose of this new hook that we have been looking forward to introducing to you.
Continue reading “New hook – Anadromous Nymph HR416”
Many, if not most, of the Irish salmon-. And sea trout patterns include two or three hackles and no wings. They are tied on all styles of hooks – singles, doubles and trebles and on tubes. They do well tied and fished both small and large and some of the patterns are even popular flies for loch-style fishing for salmon. Their history is a subject for another blog – here I’ll take a look at the basics of tying them. They look deceptively simple, but there are a few pit falls to avoid.
Continue reading “Irish Style Shrimp Flies”
The Norwegian salmon season is coming to a close, so I’ll round things off in this blog, covering a few tips and tricks on how to fool the sometimes very difficult, late summer salmon. The river holds more salmon now. It’s usually a good mix between the now old salmon that entered the river early in the season and the late runners, which are usually the so-called grilse. Grilse are small, male atlantic salmon, still bright silver, but smaller. There are different opinions when a grilse can be called a salmon – some say over 5kg. I say three, because then I catch more salmon.
Continue reading “Closing the season”
Not quite, but if Barnaby was as good as catching sea trout as he is catching murderers, he’d be an excellent fly fisherman. In Denmark tradition has always been that the big upstream migration of sea trout to our larger and smaller rivers being at midsummer. They do arrive earlier, the first ones, but it’s true that by midsummer, it pays off to intensify efforts.
Continue reading “Midsummer Murders?”
All season openings are exciting. The longer the closed season is, the more excited we are just to get back to, in this case, the big, Norwegian rivers. As the clock nears midnight on May 31st, the first fly fishers are at the ready, river side, the long rods strung up with heavy sinking lines, short, stout leaders and big flies. Hoping for one of the big, silvery unicorns many of us have been dreaming about since last season – or maybe since the last trip to Norway, maybe years ago. But always just happy to cast a line, feel the force of the river on both the line and the legs as you wade.
Continue reading “June 1st”
There are many fly fishers and many have different tastes and preferences. Salmon on the hitch, grayling on a deep nymph, trout on streamers and so on. But I think all fly fishers enjoy visible, vicious takes on the surface, whether on a foam beetle or a popper. Right now is perfect pop-pop-pop-time.
Continue reading “Pop-pop-pop”
The classic Spey flies are beautiful flies, and one could point to several flies, but among the most classic of the classics is The Lady Caroline. As stunning and beautiful as the “fancy flies” are, I find the Spey flies as beautiful in their simplicity and subtle nuances.
Continue reading “The Lady Caroline”