Poor Man's BonefishAs we approach the end of my stay in Denmark, I am trying to squeeze in a couple more fishing outings this week. A couple of days, my friend Thomas informed me that they maybe some good "stalk" fishing to be had so we decided to go out for a few hours this morning.
The target species was ide, or rimte in Danish. It is a carp-like species that is categorized in the minnow family. On my third day in Denmark, I encountered one of these on the beach while casting a spoon. As an ide grows, its diet changes from insect to molluscs or crustaceans to small fish such as roach. Because of the freshness of Danish coastal water, ides can be found in the shallows, not far from the beach. In the spring time they enter the river and spawn, then make their way out of the river and feed along the shoreline. This provides good fishing opportunities for beach anglers.
Beach fishing is fairly popular in the Baltic. People enjoy fishing for sea trout, flat fish, cod, garfish. For some fly anglers, they particularly enjoy fishing for ide and mullet. A mullet, not the hairstyle, is a shy fish species that can be caught with both bait and fly. Back in Australia, we used to catch yelloweye mullet by the buckets but they are usually small. The mullet found in Denmark are similar to the ones that I used to catch in Taiwan. They are big, large scaled, buggy eyes, and STRONG. Despite of their large size, they are extremely sensitive to disturbance so stalking is necessary when fishing for them. Some call this style of fishing in Denmark "bonefishing in the north" as the technique is fairly similar.
Unfortunately, the season is still a bit early for mullet, so we were only going for ides. I'm not too disappointed, since I have already bagged ten species of fish in the last five weeks, which shows you how diverse fishing can be in Denmark. Originally we had only planned to target five species, but we took advantage when opportunities of other fisheries emerged.
The area where we fished today was only 15 minutes of driving from Downtown Copenhagen. Although we were so close to one of the busiest and most colourful city in Europe, we found ourselves surrounded by miles of empty beach flat with only sea birds hovering by occasionally. Beside attending his cancer research job during the day (or night), Thomas is a local flycasting instructor who is sponsored by Scierra. It is fortunate that I have met several knowledgable Danish locals over the years who are always so eager to show me what this country has to offer.
To get to our fishing spot, Thomas and I first waded for 0.5km out to another mud flat in the middle of the ocean. The wade was not tricky, but just tiring. My feet sank into the soft algal substrate everytime I stepped forward. Thomas had it easy since he is taller. Unlike him, water reached up to my waist.
After ten minutes of walking/bathing, we finally arrived at the flat. We allowed the water to rest for a few minutes before walking slowly along the flat while watching any movement in the water. The bottom is a mixture of olive algal flat and yellow sandbed. Thomas informed me that we had to look for cruising fish under the surface or any finning action above the surface. Within minutes, I spotted several fins dancing directly in front of us! I let Thomas to make the first cast so I would know what to do. No takers but we did see a couple of fish taht followed the fly.
The fly used today was a size 12 nymph that immitates a small sand flea or shrimp. I guess ide likes to feed on these as they dart from one algae patch to another.
Once I was a bit familiar with what to do, I proceeded to walk and observe. We spotted another school of fish, sitting a bit over 20 meters in front of us. Thomas said I should make a cast, I said that was not possible as I cannot cast that far.
I casted anyways, just to prove my point.
Immediately after that display, a large ide exploded on the surface around ten feet in front of us. Most likely it was spooked by my fly line.
Another hour went by and still no hook-ups after seeing numerous signs of fish. We slowly seperated and worked in two different pieces of water as both had fish finning around it. Just after Thomas indicated that he missed a fish, I felt a light tug while stripping. I picked the rod up quickly and only to find it being pulled down hard. A few big kicks later, the line went completely slacked.
That has always been a problem with fishing for minnows, I find it hard to embed that hook into the tough lip at times. The hook-up certainly picked my spirit right up and I was eager to find another one. Unfortunately we did not spot that many fish after that.
Thomas suggested that we did not find that many fish (and I actually thought we saw quite a few) because of the overcast weather condition. If it was sunny, we would have been able to see more fish. He also believes that the fish are more active when it is sunny. Just to prove his point, he told me that yesterday he and his friend Henrik were out and both had five fish each. The largest one was 4lb, putting up an incredible fight on the 3wt. Here are two photographs of yesterday that he emailed me, if only I was there.
I hope you enjoyed this one. Personally, I like a change of pace when it comes to fishing. Exploring different fisheries and species is more exciting than constantly focusing on salmonids. Out of all the fisheries that I have been introduced to in the last two months, this has to be on the top favorite list. We may go out again tomorrow, I shall report if something happens.
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Topic: 2006 Summer Danish Journal (Read 30945 times)