Viking Lars | Saturday, 28 October 2023
It’s now good and well officially autumn and that means the water is cooling down. That in turn means that most predatory fish now feed more and feed actively, building up reserves for the winter. The water isn’t particularly cool as such, but at a, for the fish, very comfortable temperature, where their metabolism is firing on all cylinders. After the summer, where lakes warm up considerably, it’s now time to turn the attention to the pike.
First of all, pike have really low survival rates when released in warm water, where as their survival rate is very high, when the water cools down - as it has done now. There a little exclusive pike lake, not particularly far from where I live, that I sometimes get an invitation to fish. It’s not that there are huge amounts of pike or that they’re exceptionally big, but the fishing is good and there are good chances of 90-100cm of big, bad eating machines.
The last time we were there, the pike were clearly feeding on quite small prey, maybe 5-10cm big (small?) roach.
Pike have distinct periods of activity. You’re never in doubt when they pick up the pace, because you’ll experience significantly increased activity from one minute to the next. Often you’ll get 2-3 pike within a short period and ,maybe see several pushing up bait.
When they’re feeding on smaller bait, the strike period is extended, which of course is quite optimal for the fly fisher. So I’m tying a handful of smaller flies and experimenting a little with the tying technique.
The one in the PoD has several issues as far as the specific goal is. 1. It’s too big. 2. The head is a little too dense. 3. The hooks gape is a little on the small side. 4. There is no 4. 5. It uses too much material, which will be corrected when I tie them smaller and with a less dense head. 6. I cut the profile too round. I want it higher and a bit more narrow.
I find yellow/chartreuse over white to be an excellent colour combination, so I’ll stick to that and also tie some grey over white to more accurately imitate the roach.
If you ever fish for pike and have a sense that they are active, maybe you have missed strikes, try a small(er) fly, It often works.
Have a great weekend!
Lars