Summer hatch 

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We arrive at the creek in the middle of the afternoon, sun still high, car's thermometer showing 29 Celsius. Good that this part of the stream is already in the shadows. We see some sparse large Mayflies (E.danica), that sporadically pop out of the surface. They drift and flutter, to then hover in reach of shelter among the leaves of the highest trees.


We mount respectively a mayfly emerger and a dun and we have immediately a good response to our choices by catching the first trouts, with both emerger and dun imitations. While slowly moving upstream we succeed on more small brown trouts, that apparently cannot resist the yellowish dainty.


It is a nice and relaxed fishing, even in absence of clear rings or rise, guessing the right a spot between the water-weeds returns almost mathematically a sure trout. No big ones but here the creek is not very large and at this time of the day we already are quite happy not to have to blank while waiting for cooler hours. Hey, we're catching all on dry flies on hot summer mid afternoon!


After a couple of hours, we get downstream where the stream is wider. Fish are rising here, beside some riffles, in the strong sunlight. We try several dry flies, scaling down the hook size to the smallest patterns but ain't nothing that seems to convince them. Then my mate is able to catch several of them with a heavy nymph. I decide to leave him in such good company and after walking a half kilometer I reach a deeper stretch with uniform current. Almost the all stretch lies in shadows and big rings enlarge under the branches that reach out to water on the opposite bank. I get some nice trouts on a small deer-hair sedge, before walking back to my mate to tell him about and wait together for the "coup de soir".


And here it comes eventually the dusk. The number of flying critters increases every minute. There is a mixed hatch: tiny mayflies, small and large sedges share the air-space with mid-sized yellow upright mating spinners, large white Mayfly spinners and various sorts of egg-laying caddis. It seems impossible that there is not a single fish rising now. Our fly patches fill up but there is nothing that can bring a fish to rise. We are now trying different sizes of emerging caddis pupa but nothing and even the wighted nymph is not working.


We walk upstream in search of some fish action. We make our way through literal clouds of little grannoms, trying not to breathe them as we go along the bank and spitting out of the mouth the ones that get inhalated by mistake.
This orgy of pulsating life is inversely proportional to the surface fish activity. Incredibly, where fish were rising during the afternoon there is no sign, no matter if we use emerger or nymph. As we reach a flat with slow current and it is too dark to try to change the fly, a couple of solitary rings give us the final challenge. There is one ring for each one of us, with a tiny deer-hair sedge I release a nice grayling that was sipping emergers. The last impression of the day is its flank twinkling under the moonlight while I set him back free to return into his element. Have a nice summer !


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