Fly fishing
salmonidae
Trout 'N' About
Created by Joshua Maitland
T 'N' A
Entomology
In a nutshell,Entomology is the study of insects- water born and terrestrial land born. Entomology can also relate to earth worms, spiders, snails etc which trout and grayling also feed on. If you have a good grasp on insect life cycles, and when they are most likely to be at their pinical hatch this will aid you when matching a hatch and picking off the selective feeding fish. What is selcetive feeding you may ask? selective feeding is where a trout or grayling will only target a specific species of fly coming off the water. I.e on the Irish loughs there are prolific hatches of mayflys, trout for the duration of the hatch, will selectively feed on predominantly the mayfly and will refuse other flies. Some individual fish will be so picky they will only take flies with broken wings, flies that are spent,flies that have drowned. flies that are hatching from the nymphal shuck. In a word there difficult.
Sedge(Caddis) Fly
The caddis fly like most other water born flies- lives most of their days as nymphs living on the underside of rocks and boulders. Case Caddis build a protective 'case' using gravel shardes and small sticks- this enables them to camouflage into their surroundings at the vulnerable stages of their life. Trout will feed on the case caddis but more notably on the adult insect when they rise through the water columns to hatch.
Caddis flies belong to the roof wing Trichoptera family.
Stone Fly
The stone fly lives most of its life as a nymph, an immature fly. Stone flys range from 6mm to over 25mm (1inch long). There are approximately 1,550 species of stone fly throughout the globe- 33 species are found in Britain. As the name suggests, stone flys can be located in well oxygenated, stony rivers. Stone flys belong to the Plecoptera family
CRIMP
Trout 'N' About now work along with the Clyde River fly monitoring Partnership (CRIMP) which involves river monitoring and sampling of water born inverterbrates. This helps determine the general health and richness of the insect life of the river.( entomology) Josh Maitland is the River Calder monitor.
" Riverfly monitoring can help protect the quality of our rivers, increase our knowledge and understanding of invertebrate populations and promote the conservation of their habitats".
"CRIMP provides an additional tool to inform management of the fishery and freshwater ecosystem".
May Fly
The may fly, like most flies, lives most of its life underwater- feeding on miniscule inverterbrates , algae and plant material. The nymphal stage lasts 1-2 years, they can grow to 1 inch in length.The may fly is especially significant to anglers as we depend on their mass flurry hatches to bring trout on the rise. The may fly hatches are the pinnacle of Trout Fly Fishing throughout the world. The may fly lives a short life as an adult- some species only living for 24 hours, some shorter if a trout catches sight of them! The may fly is a member of the Ephemeroptera family. The may fly's wings are described as 'upwing'.
Crane Fly( Daddy Long Legs)
The Crane Fly is a land born insect( terrestrial fly) and belongs to the Diptera family. The crane fly is famous during the later months september' harvest time'. The Crane Fly is a stable diet for the Trout, the wind blows 'Daddy's' onto the water surface where trout gorge themselves on the protein rich flies. The Crane fly can grow to 3-3.5 inches long with a wing span of roughly the same size
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Here you will see pictures of common insect life found in freshwater rivers and loch's in Scotland
For a thriving abundance of fly life you need a high water quality and clean and well oxygenated substrate(gravel) for nymphs to hatch in. This will provide excellent feeding for Trout and Grayling which are totally reliant upon the health and the ecostatus of the River inwhich they inhabit. If there is a poor water quality there will be few or very little fly-life, and so only small numbers of fish will be able to survive and those that do will be small and malnurished. On Rivers and Loch's that have a good ecological status with pure and clean water there will be many flies and nymphs- supporting a large number of fish and allowing them to reach great sizes very quickly. Always check for indicator species such as mayfly nymphs on the underside of rocks, if these are present then your river- as long as sutiable habitat, should in theory be able to sustain species of game fish. Grayling are an example of a fish that indicate whether a river is healthy or not as Grayling require very pure and well oxygenated water for spawning and feeding.
Example shown above, the River Avon in Scotland