‘The winter winds and rains buffet and swell the stream and the inevitable erosion of bends or blockages from fallen trees necessitate our intervention. Our small syndicate enjoys the camaraderie of getting together again through the months of January and February‘
April is a fickle month weather-wise. One moment we bask in the joyous foretaste of warm summer sunshine, the next we relapse into wintry conditions and, even in Southern England, we now frequently experience sleet, snow and low overnight temperatures as they suddenly return to frustrate.
April also sees the start of my trout-fishing season and, following the habitat restoration work our little club puts in over the late winter, I am always eager to get out once again with a fly rod. The water we are fortunate to lease is approximately one mile of wild narrow stream, running over greensand and clay not far from the Surrey-Sussex border. We have not stocked it for nearly ten years now but instead it thrives with a healthy population of wild brown trout, alongside an increasing showing of dace, chub and even tiny perch. A good brownie here might just make six inches but the occasional red-letter day will throw up a veritable monster of twice that.
The winter winds and rains buffet and swell the stream and the inevitable erosion of bends or blockages from fallen trees necessitate our intervention. Our small syndicate enjoys the camaraderie of getting together again through the months of January and February, where we make repairs such as narrowing the widened stretches by building berms and backfilling with twiggy, brash faggots or ‘witches brooms’. These structures help to capture the loose sediment while also providing shelter for recently hatched fingerlings from predators and the heavier flows. Over time, this sediment will build up sufficiently in the brash, such that plants eventually find a foothold or can be planted, and the bankside naturally extends once again.
The narrowed stream now increases the flow and cleans the underlying gravels for future spawning opportunities. If additional assistance is necessary, we may install deflectors at forty-five degrees to the bank, and these push the flow away from one over-eroded area and the ‘back eddy’ downstream of the deflector captures sediment build up naturally and rather more quickly. This sediment provides a perfect habitat for mayfly nymphs, which spend the best part of two years living below the surface. Our monthly fly sampling through a four-minute kick-test regularly throws up healthy numbers as well as myriad shrimps, olives, caddis and damsel nymphs and other curiosities such as bullheads and once we found a brook lamprey in our net!
April allows us to get the rustiness out of our casting arms once again and, while there will not be much of a hatch, one cannot help but prospect the still frigid surface water with a dry fly. Something dark and bushy seen around noon might look suspiciously like a large dark olive to me but many of our wild brownies will still be looking downwards for another six weeks or so.
My ideal set up here is a rod somewhere between 6 ½ and 8 feet, loaded with a three-weight line. There is little room once the umbels of hemlock water dropwort appear on the margins for conventional casting. Instead, I will roll cast a distance of fifteen feet, or less, and make the minimum of disturbance as I quietly wade in-stream. Invariably a nymph will go on the tippet at some point and I will focus my efforts on the slightest ‘jag’ of the fly line (or wool indicator, if I add one).
Some anglers fish a ‘klink and dink’ combination of a dry fly that doubles as an indicator with a small nymph suspended off a short link from the bend of the dry: a bet on both red and black! I prefer the traditional one-fly approach, being happy to swap methods when I feel it merits. That said, some of my best catches to a dry fly have come during heavy downpours, when everything tells me to go deep – perhaps other readers may have experienced this too?
The stream runs for much of its length between ancient woodland and farmers’ fields; livestock grazing to my right beyond the electric fence, while wood anemones and sunshine-yellow celandines pin prick the greening banks to my left before the nettles inevitably overtake. Also making an appearance will be true English bluebells, primroses, and the star-light white of the greater stitchwort and dog’s mercury. Later, the foxgloves thread through the woodland, attracting myriad bees and butterflies.
Well worn pathways indicate the natural animal highways of a badger clan from the beech and oak slopes, and there is an infamous bend on the stream where a kingfisher makes its home in the high bank upon which the badgers made their latrine. I once happened to be in-stream when a parent bird emerged at my eye-line. We immediately made the correct decision to exit the water downstream of this little bird for the rest of the season and rejoin it well above.
If I’m lucky enough to contact a sprightly opponent, it will be a beautiful buttery yellow creature, a white tummy and its flanksspotted with crimson and obsidian black, ferocious little needle teeth and a glaring eye at one end, and a soft, translucent tail blushed pink-red at the other. I will release it wherever possible with a quick twist of the barbless fly without removing from the water, and watch the fish flash away downstream where it will take up a temporary new station. No doubt we’ll both reflect upon the previous few moments, each of us a little wiser for the six months ahead.
Writing & Images – David Chalcraft (Late Winter 2026)
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