Blog — fly fishing Rutland water

Bonkers On Zonka's At Rutland !

Posted by Craig Barr on

Bonkers On Zonka's At Rutland !

A back to back visit to Rutland, as so many times it can, showed once more how you can have a serious love hate relationship with the place - Like it or Loathe it, its sheer size brings the best out of "fishing" and puts you the angler, to the test ! On Friday I shared a boat with a Phil Calvert, and our mission was to locate, and catch a Rutland "biggie" hopefully a brown. At this time of year, with so much fry in the water, the bigger fish certainly become more active, thus more vulnerable to capture....

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The Beauty & The Beast Of Rutland Water

Posted by Craig Barr on

Having fished Rutland Water now for over 38 years, I sure know how moody the place can be, and how the slightest change in wind direction, cloud cover, and temperature change, can have you in heaven one minute, then what feels like hell the next !  On Wednesday, conditions were perfect, overcast, 21 degrees, and an 8mph wind, and as the book tells us, the fish were on song too, and plenty of them. We started our drift, just down from X Buoy, with our set ups being pretty similar. I was using a Flash Attack Tequila booby, and Tequila Fab(both...

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Frustrated With Pin Fry Feeders? Two Deadly Tactics Revealed To Snare them.

Posted by Craig Barr on

Frustrated With Pin Fry Feeders? Two Deadly Tactics Revealed To Snare them.

Pin fry feeders can leave many of us frustrated, as they are notoriously difficult to catch. However, I am going to share some tactics I use to catch them, as I have done this last week on Rutland. On Monday Simon Robinson and I headed down to the South side of the dam,(150 yds out) and were greeted with many fish cruising through the surface, often at speed. This is an immediate tell tale sign they are chasing the minute pin fry through the surface. The first thing to note is when these fish are on the pin fry, they...

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