The new coarse fishing season started on 16 June and I spent three days trying to fool spooky carp on Dartmoor. The sun beat down but the wind on the moor kept me cool. Watching a carp circle the bait before gliding away with a look of disgust at such an obvious trap, was amusing but frustrating. Floating Oxo flavoured dog biscuits gave me the edge. I put a fearsome bend into the Mk IV and dragged a big carp from the edge of a lily bed. I must return with a fly rod.

Sitting beside a lake for several hours was in stark contrast to wandering along the banks of a freestone river. I had the urge to pick up a fly rod again. It was very hot and humid with no breeze. I waited until late in the afternoon before leaving home. The grasses and wild flowers brushed the wing mirrors on both sides of the Defender and the track down to the river gave the springs and shocks a good workout.

I met another member on the river bank, the first time in five seasons that I had encountered another angler. We agreed on opposite ends of the Beat and I walked upstream to the Dead Tree. To my delight the tree had sprouted new foliage, it was not dead, just resting.

I had a plan. I started higher up the Beat than usual and warmed up at a big wide pool below fast water. Having developed muscle memory, I wandered down to the long deep run along the far bank. Rather than fish the entire pool with a nymph, I planned to swap flies and search the fish-holding scour under the big rock.

Ammo box

For ten minutes I let the weighted GRHE nymph drift deep beside the rock but without a response. I repeated the process with a gaudy sea trout fly, mainly red and black over silver. Again, there was no response. Convinced that a fish hid under the rock, I rolled a heavy Jersey Herd around the base of the rock. Nothing. I gave the nymph another go before leaving the pool for the flat water downstream.

I paddled into the margins of a long bank-to-bank riffle and flicked the nymph into the slack behind a mid-stream rock. A spirited little brownie grabbed the fly and objected to being drawn up through broken water. I slipped the hook out and the trout departed, untouched, none the worse for its adventure.

I met the other member as I was leaving, he’d had a small trout from a midstream run. On the way home I was surprised to see that the pub was open and popped in for a pint and a scotch egg. The plan had failed but it had been a nice evening. Just one fish was better than a nil-nil draw.