I thought I’d be the first down there because Nick and Ian, my two partners on the pool that September night, were still to leave London as I made it to the motorway for the mad Thursday night dash to Hampshire’s Southampton Water and the estuary of the world famous River Itchen.
Justifiably ranked as one of the world’s premier and beautiful chalkstream fisheries, the Itchen has a less than picture book ending as it pours out into the Solent just down from Southampton docks. Here the river is tidal and it was not the mottled brown trout of the upper reaches I was hoping to meet that night but their cousins, the large population of Sea Trout and occasional Salmon that run the lower river during the summer months.
There are several places that one can hope to connect with these urban sea trout both on the Test and the Itchen but one of the best is Woodmill Pool, my destination that evening. Woodmill was built by monks in the 13th century to provide fish for the abbey nearby; nowadays it can provide fabulous if you are lucky to get on it and the fish are running.
Effectively a bowl, it fills and drains with the tide and high tide was due around 1am that night.
The pool fishes best when there is plenty of flow draining the river and the tide is on the make creating a meeting of two opposite forces in the pool and plenty of oxygenated water. We’d had plenty of rain in southern England all the way through the year and the tides were building to a spring, so from that perspective I was confident. I’d also fished the pool in late June that season and although the water was an absolute maelstrom of tide, river debris and wind, I was rewarded with a beautiful tide fresh bar of silver that ran to 7.5 lbs. I’d had fish of this calibre from Woodmill before but was still after that elusive fly fisher’s target, a 10lb Sea Trout…..
As dusk was turning, low tide still allowed me to wade the pool. At this point you can get to the darker corners, out of reach when the tide floods and you are restricted to the banks. I’d been fishing like this an hour or so when Nick arrived and he was excited to see a couple of sea trout in the 2-3lb range already landed. These were taken on a floating line and simple streamer patterns such as stoat’s tails and Butchers tied with plenty of wing.
As the tide floods and pool fills I tend to use bigger flies, ending up at high tide with anything up to 4 inch silver body snake flies which are as effective as anything for fresh run fish. I got out of the water to say hello to Nick and tell him it all looked good when my phone rang and it was Ian - huge crash on the M3, been stationery for hours, might as well still come down but won’t be with us a long time…
Poor guy I thought – hope he manages to get some fishing in after that nightmare journey.
As the night wore on we managed a further small Sea Trout each until the tide came racing in and we both made smart exits as to be caught wading during this very fast flooding period could be deadly.
I generally change lines to a fast sinker at this point as the currents will not allow any fly control on the surface and the flies need to be fished at around 1-2 feet down to be effective in the swirling currents.
I found a spot close to the river’s entry to the pool and cast out the big snake fly and almost immediately there was a solid thump and a fish was on. Now normally the Itchen Sea Trout are very acrobatic but this was more of a boring, head shaking fight and as I slipped the net under the fish I could immediately see that I was right to question the fight – a beautiful 4lb Bass lay on the grass. Quickly I dispatched the fish as this was truly a bonus and one for supper the following evening. Bass, flounders, eels and even dogfish are taken reasonably regularly on flies throughout the season, just underlining the excitement of fishing a true sea pool.
Ian had finally arrived and it was now past midnight, the pool full and taking on the quiet, glassy characteristics of an evening high tide. The fishing had gone very quiet as it often does at slack tide, but from experience I knew that, as if some light switch is flicked on, there can be a magic 30 minutes around now with fish crashing around the pool like someone throwing boulders into the water.
I made another cast towards the opposite bank, gave it a few seconds for the fly to sink and started a slow figure of eight retrieve across the pool. There was no warning, just a feeling of everything going solid liked locked machinery then an explosive release as the big fish ripped the retrieved line through my fingers and didn’t stop until well down into my backing. The reel’s clutch had been singing but I hadn’t dared look down, intent as I was on keeping the rod tip high and stopping the fish from going back to sea.
The others had now come to my side having heard the reel and we all tried to get a sight of the fish as I slowly reeled in. We didn’t have to wait that long as the fish acrobatically turned in the air and made another, but shorter run against the clutch. “Salmon?” said Ian looking at the size and silhouette of the fish against the moonlight, “not sure” was the general consensus but I was secretly hoping sea trout as it looked to be huge in the semi darkness.
Finally after several further runs, the magnificent fish was ready to be netted and as I finally looked down at the prize on the bank I admit to performing a little dance of delight as we all stared down at the beautiful Sea Trout lying on the grass.
Nick’s scales went to 10lb 5oz, I’d achieved my first double figure sea trout on the fly, on one of those nights that was almost perfect, what a feeling….
Not that surprisingly, the long drive home seemed to fly by.
Jeremy Bourke March ‘08
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