Danes , gimps, and whimsical theories

We think our Great Dane rather dim, and more than a little quirky, when the only way he will cross the dining room, is in reverse with my daughter’s shirt in his mouth. 

But that is nothing. Let me tell you some crazy stuff about us fly-fishermen!

I quite recently listened with care and respect, while a hatchery man told me that he doesn’t breed Brown Trout, because the Rainbow alevins, just gobble up all the Brown alevins within days of hatching.

I have also heard it said, (More than once) that a float tube has an advantage over a kick boat, because your profile is lower, and that the Trout are therefore less likely to see you. Think about that one………..

Another beaut is the guys who will tell you that in a tube or kick boat, you can turn around and fish through 360 degrees of undisturbed water. …Uh….hum.  Back cast…?

You would think that most of these gems would be gleaned from pubs, which might I say, is where they belong. But no, they are just as often delivered on a fresh sunny, sober morning!

Then there was a mate of mine, since deceased, who insisted that his woolen jersey kept him warm despite the fact that it was raining hard. He would sit out there in his boat, soaked to the skin, and weighed down in sodden wool, while I watched him through the mist from the relative comfort of a rain jacket.

One mate who was fearful of over-inflating his float tube,  fished in what looked like an under-filled shopping bag, with the waves occasionally breaking into his waders. I reckon he hung in the balance between floating and sinking to the bottom of the lake for good. We have since talked some sense into him!

The other twisted one which one often encounters is “all Browns only feed at night”. Which has me puzzled as to how I catch all my daytime browns.

Another beaut is the story of what happened “just the other day”.  A member of the local fishing club was caught with an entire boot-load/coolbox-full of Trout(the story varies) on a water in the Kamberg. The story repeats itself every three years , and has done ever since the event actually did occur in the nineteen seventies!

Speaking of madness:  I was recently at Highmoor with my friend Graeme. We were both on the upper lake where things were rather slow, I said to Graeme that I was nipping to the lower water, to feel a tug on the end of my line, since fishing has been more of a sure thing down there lately. Upon arriving I noticed a woman, hiking in a long skirt and boots. She walked up onto the hillside, where she then proceeded to walk back and forth, occasionally waving her arms in the air, and intermittently throwing herself on the ground. When the breeze abated, I heard her shouting at the top of her voice. While she was doing this, the point fly I was fishing, inexplicably came off. I reeled in to tie on a new one, and so as not to be outdone I cursed and swore into the wind as well.  This either offended her, or she didn’t like the competition , or perhaps it was that her voodoo fly –removing  magic was done, because by the time I looked up from tying on a new fly, she had disappeared into the hills.

She actually re-appeared later at the top dam, and upon noticing Graeme out on the water in his float tube, she shouted out a sort of nautical “Ahoy there” into the wind. She tried several times, each time waving her hands theatrically as though to a departing ship. Graeme did what I would have done, and ignored her, and after a while she threw it in and returned to wherever she had come from.

Another crazy one doing the rounds is a completely absurd story that involves my friends and I. Apparently, or so the story goes, years ago we requested a student’s discount on a group fishing week-end. Having been granted some relief from the burden of the accommodation bill, we allegedly arrived in a Mercedes and a four wheel drive, with a case of beer each, and to eat, just half a tomato between us.

How absurd!  It just goes to show: you cant believe any of this stuff.