Great Fish River Yellows!

[chris williams]

Excellent, with your enthusiasm and obvious 'fish-sense' you should do very well! From what you say of the state of your Montanas even more reason to start tying if you havn't already! Another couple of ideas, your black dragon nymph sounds good, also SJ worm - maybe also try black buzzer pupae? I also tie black pheasant tail nymphs try sizes 14 or 16 forstarters, which work well in 'dim' water to imitate the various mayfly and smaller nymphs. If you water is clean you may have stonefly nymphs of which Montanas are a great representation. Ask your Rhodes mates or check for yourself if any caddis flies are around. That's another story.
Also check out your books, friends and guys on this site for Czech nymphing techniques. In case you hadn't tried it, inshorthand it involves a floating line, very short leader about half the rod's length or so depending on the depth/speed of the current, and using a heavily leaded fly to get down to the bottom presto, and oneor more flies attached either above or below as droppers. You simply lob this a rod's length upstream and to the right of you (if you're right-handed) and keep a constant check onthe flies as they bump on the bottom. If you do this stealthily (you don't use an indicator even) I reckon you'll be even more successful. It's strange but exhilarating fishing fishing and after a day of this which is intensive stuff, I like to head off to the beach or a dam to cast a decent long line for anything! There are various threads on this site on this topic by our expert members

Alla best, Chris

[krokenosterfant]

Howz this sound for my fly selection for yellows in the Fish for this weekend:

Small Nymphs/Flies

Lime Green Caddis Larve (no bead)
Some type of Cream Caddis Pupae
Black Zak nymphs
Micro Olive Buggers
Red San Jaun Worms (some have red glass beads)
Black Flashbacks
Blue Flashbacks
Cream GRHE
Olive Beaded Flashbacks
Tadpole imitations
Brassies

I'll use split to aid in getting the flies down

Larger Flies

Montanas
Walker Killers
Mrs Simpsons
Black Dragonfly Nymphs (some of my patterns have alot of flash in them)
Olive Dragon Buggers
Hansens Dragon Nymphs
Aggravators
Red Eyed Damsels
Some realistic damsel patterns
Wooly buggers
Wooly worms

I can't give you hook size, as I'm a saltwater oke... so all I can say is that they are tiny... haha... then again a lot of flies are small compared to 4/0 kingie popper!

Another tactic I want to try... for the larger Yellows and maybe some Barbel is using #4 Mud Charlies (dark brown crazy charlie with hackle wings) and crab patterns. The way I want to fish them is with an intermediate line, send out a long cast directly downstream towards some rocks or where the riffles end and then slowly jerk them along the bottom all the way back upstream. Basically imitating crabs moving along the bottom! Think it will work?

If anyone has any suggestion please swing them!

Tight lines!

[chris williams]

Howz this sound for my fly selection for yellows in the Fish for this weekend:

Small Nymphs/Flies

Lime Green Caddis Larve (no bead)
Some type of Cream Caddis Pupae
Black Zak nymphs
Micro Olive Buggers
Red San Jaun Worms (some have red glass beads)
Black Flashbacks
Blue Flashbacks
Cream GRHE
Olive Beaded Flashbacks
Tadpole imitations
Brassies

I'll use split to aid in getting the flies down

Larger Flies

Montanas
Walker Killers
Mrs Simpsons
Black Dragonfly Nymphs (some of my patterns have alot of flash in them)
Olive Dragon Buggers
Hansens Dragon Nymphs
Aggravators
Red Eyed Damsels
Some realistic damsel patterns
Wooly buggers
Wooly worms

I can't give you hook size, as I'm a saltwater oke... so all I can say is that they are tiny... haha... then again a lot of flies are small compared to 4/0 kingie popper!

Another tactic I want to try... for the larger Yellows and maybe some Barbel is using #4 Mud Charlies (dark brown crazy charlie with hackle wings) and crab patterns. The way I want to fish them is with an intermediate line, send out a long cast directly downstream towards some rocks or where the riffles end and then slowly jerk them along the bottom all the way back upstream. Basically imitating crabs moving along the bottom! Think it will work?

If anyone has any suggestion please swing them!

Tight lines!

I'm hoping you'll have time for fishing in between your fly selections?

[Gerrit Viljoen]

No man,get 5 patterns,gain confidance and fish those religiously.Ur just gonna confuse urself.

Its nice having all those though

[krokenosterfant]

haha... so true mate! oh well got 3 days on the water... and enough unfished water to go through... So I'll sift through all the flies and then i'll report back on what Fish River yellows like!

[chris williams]

Seriously though,as they say 'Keep It Simple'. Work out where the fish are and get an appropriatly weighted (generally small and unadulteed fly) down 'thar doon among em' (Sorry, USA twang from the Civil War). All the fancy fly stuff to me is generally a waste of time.

You still havn't answered - have you started to tie your own flies? It really is the way to go - then you know what you are really fishing with

Apologies to all, I was off unwell today so I had more time than usual to 'contribute' - but, as always, I've enjoyed it and hopefully can add my tickey's worth on the Vaal spawning stuff

[krokenosterfant]

Ja Chris I tie my own flies... but I only tie flies for what i mainly target... bass, saltwater and tigers... never had the knack for tying small patterns... and I've never had the material to tie trout/yellow flies! But I'm over all these flies you buy in shops today... it's all a rush job, so most of the flies you buy end up unraveling during the first cast or after the first fish (If a really dumb fish actually eats some of the bought flies)... but for now I'm stuck with bought "flies" for Yellows. keen to get started on basic patterns... oh ja... I can tie a San Jaun Worm... but then again, who can't! lol!

Ja I'm gonna mainly use the flies I have confidence in... thats why I think I'm gonna nail the Yellows on some of my smaller saltwater patterns like Mud Charlies... but I'm gonna try nymphs etc. as well... after I take a look under some rocks in the rapids to see what is actually crawling around and then I'll match the hatch as close as possible! My last mission I found loads of those little red river worms... or whatever a San Jaun is supposed to imitate. So I'm also keen to swim out 3 SJ Worms on a cast with the middle one acting as a dropper... with split shot!

Anyways... I'm off bassing tomorrow, my mate caught a 4.5kg bass at one of our local dams last week thursday, so tomorrow me and him are taking the boat and gonna see if we can find another leviathan! Then I'm off Yellowing early friday morning for the weekend... so people cheers for now, thanks for the advice and help and check this space next week monday! Got the faint feeling I'm gonna have a good match report!

Later days and tight lines

[chris williams]

3 SJ worms (most likely chironomid 'bloodworm' larvae - alternatively they could be baby leeches but they generally hang around in the mud like my old ladyfriends) and split shot - now you're thinking, man!

Good luck!

[chris williams]

PS - factory-tied flies - I couldn't agree more. I last bought one of those about three decades ago. They're amorphous, characterless and lack fibre - rather like the sports teams I support...

Cheers

[krokenosterfant]

Howzit all! I'm back from my second exploration mission to my mate's farm along the Great Fish River!

Unfortunately my plan to go solely fishing was changed into a hunting trip as my dad wanted to do more hunting than fishing... but we did manage to book in about 4 hours overall on this untouched river! The water was extremely dirty and flowing a lot stronger and higher, compared to my first mission there 4 weeks ago. I did try with the fly in all the fishy looking spots, but I received no reward for my efforts. On the second day a cold front moved in and this just further shot down my goal to catch Yellows on fly. The other "fishermen" that fished with us stuck to the hook, sinker and earth worm approach... so after fruitlessly eating up most of my fishing time with fly I decided to join them. Even the always effect earthworms weren't getting all the attention that they usually received from the Yellows. The tally for the end of the day was 1 big river Carp for my dad, an eel for my mate, 3 Yellows for my mate's Dad and 11 Yellows for me. I also caught the biggest Yellow of the trip which tipped the scale at just over 2kg.

Even though I didn't achieve my goal at catching another Yellow on the fly... I still learn't a lot more about the river on my mate's farm. And I've found several very promising looking pieces of water that I have jotted down in memory for me to fish when I go back.

I saw several strecthes of river that looked absolutely perfect for Large Mouth Yellows and I'm 100% sure that if there are Largies in the Fish, they are holding up in those waters... so another life long goal for me.

I already have plans for a solely fishing trip there for a weekend with a fishing friend of mine, so this time there won't be temptations like hunting to distract us from catching Yellows on fly in the Fish.

But my 3rd exploration mission might not happen for a while as I have exams this upcoming term... and I hate to say this, but my life (aka fishing and the outdoors) while have to take the back seat for the next few months!

Later days and tight lines