Fly fishing & photography magazine
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Nยบ 7 June 2011
1
YEAR
We are celebrating our first anniversary. Flymage began in June 2010 and has now reached more than 90 countries, all sharing a common passion: fly fishing. In the last issue, we received 100,000 visits to our website and thus attained a new target, thanks to each and every one of you. Thank you very much and Tight Lines!
José H. Weigand, angler, photographer and TV fishing editor at Caza y Pesca channel on Digital+. Contributor to some international magazines, blogs and forums.
Antonio Goñi, fishing video producer, photographer and angler. Currently producing fly tying series “Thread corner” at Caza y Pesca channel on Digital+.
Revista de pesca a mosca y fotografía
Oman and the fishing along its vast coast is on the cover of this issue. Thousands of kilometers of coast in a very attractive country for the fly fisherman and the traveller. Photo: Ray Montoya Contributors: Austen Goldsmith, Ray Montoya, Tomás Gil, Althea Vermaas, Mikel Elexpuru, José Luís García, Juan Urán, John Langridge.
www.flymage.net
Nº 7 Junio 2011
CONTENTS One of the most loved fish by fly fisherman in the European coasts, sea bass, seen by a lover of its fishing.
4
Los Gallos de León. We visited the birthplace of such legendary cockerels and one of the most important breeders.
34
The Oman Diaries. Fly fishing in its purest form in one of the most attractive countries in the world.
62
Can a fly tied on a #26 hook win a fly tying contest? Mikel Elexpuru just got in Slovenia.
100
Bass fishing By Austen Goldsmith
Euro style
W
hen JosÊ asked me to contribute to Flymage, I pondered as to what he would ask me send into the magazine. Would it be Tarpon from Belize or Bonefish from Mexico or GT’s from the Seychelles? I am glad that I was asked to send in a piece on European Bass.
The fishing can be bad. The scenery is always great in Cornwall
The first good bass of a season always makes you grin like a cat!
I can say with my hand on my heart that I think the European Bass is the most magnificent fish I have ever hunted. I have landed thousands of these silver eating machines on fly and yet for some reason the love of this species just seems to deepen with time. The European Bass is the sport fishing love of my life. I may travel to other worlds and have short exotic affairs with other Silver ladies but I always come home to Cornwall and await the arrival of the European Bass after they have spawned.
Say no more!
Cornish Creek at Dusk
A small Bass at sunset.
Commercial bass fishermen beach the boat retrieving Gillnets (Terrible shame!)
Garfish on a DNA clouser
Skateboard Dave at Sunset
The Killer Bass Fly This is the fly that I have fished for around 5 years. The fly has been tweaked and fine tuned over the years. Once you have seen the fly swim you will know why I named it the live bait fly. I’m so bored of fishing with this fly and yet I
will soon be sitting down and tying a few hundred ready for the Stripers in America and the Bass in Ireland and the UK. It is tied with DNA frosty fish fibre Olive over Ashwood. Hook Size 2. Eyes red. Trust me it works !
The bigger the boulders, the bigger the bass.
The mid day sun does not end the bassfishing you just need to work harder.
Cornish Ale at lunchbreak
A Happy client with his first ever Bass
An early morning shower
These fish are yours ! Im afraid that as sport fishermen in Europe we have to face the fact that we are all fishing for the remains (the ones that have slipped through the nets). As European sport fishermen we also need to face the fact that we are hopeless at fighting for the sport we love. Can you begin to imagine the true value and cash generated by all the recreation Bass anglers in Europe? France, Portugal, Spain, Ireland, UK, Holland. The list goes on from here. Peace and Love throughout Europe If you are fly fishing for Bass in Europe please get in touch. I would love to hear from you. Cheers Austen Goldsmith www.uksaltwaterflies.com www.ukbassfishing.com
AMAZING SHOTS Taken in August 2010, while fishing for pink salmon on Northern Vancouver Island. Was low tide so was out fishing the river mouth with about 10 other fishermen. We could hear the whales blowing for some time, but all of a sudden 3 groups of about 12 - 15 in total showed up. This bull was the last one through, and came the closest, probably 30 feet away from the guy in the photo, Bill Ratcliff (didn't know him before we connected through the photo). Someone finally yelled 'cameras', and I grabbed mine - was the only photo I got! Althea Vermaas
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ArtĂculos de pesca a mosca/Fly fishing products www.urruzuno.com
Kings of Le贸n
The first written reference to the use of León cockrel feathers for fly tying is the Manuscript of Astorga, by Juan de Bergara, dated 1624. The book begins: “In the name of God and Our Lady. This is a book on dressing and tying feathers for fishing for trout in certain months of the year, particularly January, February, March, April and May until St John’s day.”
The most popular Spanish pattern tied with these feathers is the traditional Le贸n wet fly.
To find where the Le贸n cockrel comes from, you need to travel to a valley in the Cantabrian Mountains, the Valley of Curue帽o.
Much has been written about the quality of the feathers that occur only in this area. It seems that the composition of the terrain, rich in iron, is one of the factors responsible for a brightness and tonality that differs from all others.
Gallo Indio Rubi贸n
Tests have been done on breeding these cockrels in other parts of the world but never getting the same results, the color and brightness of the feathers are never the same as when the bird comes from the Curue帽o Valley.
Gallo Pardo Flor de Escoba Encendido
Gallo Pardo Corzuno
The cockrels are “plucked� four times a year, every three months. The process begins when the bird is six months old and ends at about five years old. It is carried out only during the waning moon.
Selecting the feathers.
Tomas Gil, one of the main breeders of Le贸n cockrels.
After plucking, a mixture of olive oil and tree ash is applied as an irritation relief and antiseptic.
A “Mazo” (12 feathers) from the flank of ‘Flor de Escoba.’
Current production is about 100,000 “mazos” a year.
Neck and saddle feathers are also used for fly tying.
Curue単o river
Olive ephemera tied exclusively with Le贸n cockrel feathers.
There are currently around 2,200 cockrels and hens in the valley, 1,300 of them are in the village of La Cándana, the only place in which all the varieties are kept. The “Indio” variety does not occur in the rest of the villages.
There are two races of Le贸n cockrel, the Pardo (spotted) and the Indio, and within these, many sub-varieties, forty types of Pardo and twenty of the Indio
Leon feathers have no boundaries, the biggest purchasers are in the USA, France, Japan and Switzerland.
Thomas Gil is a breeder of León cockrels, professional fly tyer, a fishing guide and the owner of a guest house close to the river. He has been one of the leaders of the Breeders Union of gallos de León, fishing guides trainer and fly tyers union. He also edits the magazine Ninfa (Nymph) and organizes an annual fishing and rural tourism conference. More info at: www.artesanosdelacandana.com
The breeders’ association currently has five members: Tomás Gil, Chema González, Joaquín Díaz, María Tascóm y Mª Rosario Díaz.
www.pescamosca.com
T H E
O M A N
By Ray Montoya Photos: Ray Montoya y Kamal Busaidi
D I A R I E S
O
man’s modernization did not begin until 1970, when Sultan Qaaboos bin Sa’id, a Sandhurst-trained officer staged a successful coup against his father. After taking power, Sultan Qaaboos used his country’s oil wealth to bring it into the 21st century. However, outside the populated areas, Oman remained undeveloped, and thus a prime destination for adventure travelers, and for me, a saltwater fly fishing paradise.
There were few roads south of the capital when I first arrived in Oman in 2002, but today thin strips of new asphalt, petrol stations and cell phone towers line the coast between Muscat, and Salalah. The new roads have not altered the landscape or changed much for the Bedouin, as it’s still a formidable journey across vast stretches of empty desert.
Pound for pound, some of the toughest fighting fish I’ve encountered in Oman are the beautifully colored Spangled Emperors, or sharry in Arabic. On an eight weight, my success rate for landing these brutes is less than fifty percent-they have the annoying habit of taking refuge under rocks. Probing around structure with a sinking line or slow drifting a heavy Clouser from a kayak is the most productive way to find sharry, but I strongly suggest using a heavy 30-40 pound fluorocarbon tippet and cranking down the drag to keep these guys off the bottom.
When conditions are right, the most productive way to target sharry is from a kayak. Adding a kayak to the fly rod game is like cranking it to level ten in Space Invaders-sorry I’m old school. Kamal and I regularly use our sit-upons to reach inaccessible flats or sight fish around structure.
Clouser Minnow
One fish that has saved many a fruitless day stalking permit has been the prolific and most accommodating, black and silver Saunter bream. While they don’t tend to make long runs, these brutes possess a bulldog tenacity and are not the least bit shy about pouncing on a well presented fly.
Bream are often found schooled up around structure in early September through October, a time when fat, double digit females can be targeted from rocky outcrops. By November the bream have spread out, but can still be sight fished along beaches, channels and flats where they behave very much like a bonefish-I love the way their fins prick up when they spot a crab fly. Bream are basically the blue collar, working class fish of Oman, not all that stylish with their fat Jolie lips and crooked, conical crushers, but they’re great on an eight weight.
Ray Montoya and his friend Kamal Busaidi with breams.
If you’re looking for more of an aerial performer, then it’s got to be bluefish or Taqua in Arabic. Here in Oman they run upwards of twenty pounds and are often sighted in wave faces along south facing beaches. Bluefish often appear in massive schools pushing baitfish right up onto the beach, thus putting them selves within easy casting range-be sure to bring a casting basket. If you have a willing partner, Bluefish can also be teased in with a hook-less popper using a spin caster. Omani bluefish begin to follow the large shoals of Indian sardines that migrate up the coast from Salalah in late November and December. Like their Atlantic cousins, these guys can really tear it up. When the bite is on, it can be total pandemonium and last for hours. Currently, bluefish seem to be the most popular inshore game fish in Oman and we’ve taken many fish over twenty pounds on the fly. Over the years, I’ve guided several fishing photographers/writers from Poland, Denmark and South Africa who’ve come specifically for this species. Keep in mind; I’m using the term guide loosely as I don’t charge a fee and my efforts typically involve driving fishermen to a remote beach and pointing out the thick dark patch of fish suspended in the surf.
The interior people still move their goats and camels accordingly, following the seasonal patters of limited rainfall and grazing, but now they coordinate these migrations with the help of Landcruiser trucks and cell phones.
The coastal Bedouins who once fished purely for subsistence, netting sardines and mullet, or hand lining yellow fin, now fish commercially, and it’s big business. In fact, there are probably more ice plants in southern Oman than petrol stations. It used to be one family, one boat, but now local fisherman employ several boats each, often crewed with cheap Bengali labor. This practice has impacted seriously the fishing and trashed out some of my favorite beaches, but with 1700 kilometers of coastline, there remains plenty of undiscovered water for those who have the time and means to venture off the beaten track.
Local market
Some of the sportfish from Oman´s coast. Left: Black Skipjack Spangled Emperor Right: Black spot yellow snapper Golden Trevally
The adjustment one has to make from a kayak aside from the fact that you’re almost eye level with the fish and have 360 degree platform, is casting from a sitting position. Add that to compensation for drift and swell, and like I said, you’ve got a whole new game. Another difficulty with fishing from a yak is that they can be too stealthy. More often than not, you’ll find yourself right on top of a fish before you see it, which translates into either, damn, that was a nice fish, or a frantic switch-off between paddle and rod. Over the years, Kamal and I have developed a variety of techniques for quick casting from a kayak-some effective, and some down right comical. Though it is probably the best way to target species like sharry, it’s not conducive to landing them. Without a static platform to apply the break from, sharry, trigger fish, and groupers will simply pull you into structure. At this point, one’s only option is to hold the rod in your teeth, pick up the paddle and back stroke out of trouble.
There are at least a dozen species one can target from a kayak, but the most surprising are the permit. I’ve landed several, including fish that were literally timing swell to get up on exposed rocks so they could snatch a crab. Indo-Pacific permit seem to have developed a variety of feeding strategies here in Oman. I sometimes find permit suspended just below the surface, facing into the current, their erect dorsal fins beckoning. Like trout in a feeding lane, they’ll hold their position within a few feet, snatching tid-bits of floating debris-shrimp, crabs, and small baitfish. My mate Peter Morse sent me some floating crab patterns with reports of similar feeding behavior in Australia. The fish here seem to take a lightly weight pattern just fine, so I’ve not tried Peter’s flies. I tend not to use flies gifted to me-I’m a tad sentimental that way.
By far the most amazing permit shots I’ve had in recent years have been at surf feeders. These are permit that literally turn on their sides and feed in the few inches of foamy wash that runs up the beach when a wave breaks. Fishing choppy beachside flats is not for the faint of heart. Often a permit will appear and disappear before you can get a line out, and if you do manage a shot, most often it will be just one. Unlike the tranquil lagoons of Ascension Bay, here on the beach, flies will not stay put or visible for more than a few seconds. Currents, wind chop, surf and shifting sand will foil perfect presentations, making an already challenging situation seem impossible.
I’ve recently taken to sight fishing for permit directly from my Nissan Patrol. There’s an irritating sting that tends to accumulate on the north facing beaches in Oman. Sometimes it gets so bad one can barely stand to walk on it. Booties only make it worse, even with gators. I think the sting is the result radial diatoms, but that’s just my own armchair Attenborough. Anyway, I fish barefoot, so normally, the sting doesn’t bother me. I’ve grown accustom to the pricking sensation between my toes which often lasts well into the work week. To avoid the sting and cover as much beach as possible, I’ve recently taken to polaroiding from my 4WD-crazy, huh? Okay, so far I’ve only done this a few times by myself because, well, it’s embarrassing. But then, it’s sort of like fishing for rooster fish from quad bikes in Baja. Basically it involves driving up and down the beach with a prerigged eight weight and a pair of binoculars. I typically fish the last hour of outgoing and the first hour of incoming, which are the best tides for permit and getting my Patrol close to the water’s edge. Upon spotting a permit, the drill usually goes like this: turn down the music, swerve away from the fish and continue driving well past it, grab the rod (sitting on the passenger seat), and double back towards the fish, staying high up on the beach while stripping line along the way. Advantages to this system are many: it provides a higher vantage point, you can cover more beach, you’re out of sun (windows down and the aircon blasting), you’ve got all your kit on the front passenger seat-cameras, water, forceps, clippers, fly boxes, snacks, you can fish in a t-shirt, or shirtless for that matter, and get this, you can listen to your favorite music or podcasts while you fish, which for me means lots of Chili Peppers. Well, you get the picture.
There’s an Arabic saying that you’ll hear throughout the Middle East, Insha’Allah, which literally translates into God willing. It pretty much sums up the Omani attitude, but also can be used to console the permit fisherman. Insha’Allah, there will be another.
Ray Montoya has taught creative writing and visual art for past 28 years, but most enjoys teaching printmaking and poetry. Originally from New Mexico, in 1994 he moved his family overseas teach at International Schools in West Papua, the Philippines Islands and for the past nine years, Oman. He purchased his first fly rod in 1972 and has traveled and fished in over twenty countries. Ray has published numerous fly fishing articles and short stories, including the first account of bonefish on Tangareva, the most remote atoll of the Cook Islands. http:// www.flylife.com.au/library/articles/34/34.html When not chasing permit, Ray enjoys power napping and making tamales.
Competition Flies
Spent chironomid emerger, hook #26
1st Place Dry Fly Category Author: Mikel Elexpuru 24th Fly Tying Contest Slovenian Open 2011
6th Place Nymph Category Author: Mikel Elexpuru 24th Fly Tying Contest Slovenian Open 2011
Amber mayfly emerger
Mikel Elexpuru, a regular contributor to Flymage magazine, has just won two major awards in an open fly tying competition in Slovenia. The reputation that precedes Mikel is reinforced once again with these awards. Mikel took weeks preparing and testing a new collection of flies exclusively for us, and which we will offer for sale in the near future. His dedication to his work led him to try out each and every one of the fly patterns prior to marketing. The Flymage Collection rose to the occasion and we accompanied Mikel on one of his test sessions, nowhere less than the waters of the Bidasoa, where we made a brief but thrilling video that you can see below. www.mikelfly.com
Bidasoa trout
Play
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