20 June 2016
Tips, Theories and pointers My friend Wayne Stegen made a valid observation the other day. He was advocating the use of an anchor when float tubing, especially when imitating naturals. As he put it, when you are dragging around a large woolly bugger due to un-noticed drift, it doesn’t really matter. But when you are trying to inch along a tiny damsel, or dead drift a snail, and your retrieve is being accelerated without your knowledge by your drifting tube, you are not applying the formula you thought you were. Do you know whether you are drifting or not? I
Since I am more interested in rivers than history, I have yet to establish whether the original farms “Manor Farm” and “Brigadoon” actually share a common boundary or not. I have been busy working on a river instead of pouring over old surveyor general maps, which I would also like to do, if I could just find some time. What I can tell you is that you can see one farm from the other, and that the Umgeni River flows first through Brigadoon and then Manor farm. Brigadoon being on the southern bank, and Manor Farm on the northern one.
I am going to make a giant assumption, that having read part 1 of this story , you are in agreement with me that bass are a problem in the Trout areas here in KZN , and that something needs to be done about them. If you haven’t already agreed with the above, then you probably won’t be reading this anyway. The biggest issue here, is that nobody knows how bass spread. There are however some theories. I will list those here, and then alongside each theory, suggest an appropriate measure to stop the spread. Theory no 1: Bass eggs
Because Trout and bass are being labeled as “alien invasive” by authorities in South Africa, they are together on the same side of the battle lines. That is perhaps the reason that little is being said by Trout fishermen about the bass problem. But a more likely reason is apathy, or some other failure on the part of us fly-fishermen to galvanise into action. I say that, because the unwanted, unchecked spread of bass in the uplands of KZN has been going on for thirty years. Those, by the way, are 30 years in which Trout have not “invaded”
For a while now, I have been telling my fishing buddies my clever trick. “When you get back from fishing, hang your waders on a coat hangar, behind the fridge”. The slow release of dry heat, gently dries them, and it is so much better than putting them in the sun. By morning they are generally dry, and you can roll them up and put them away. Or just leave them until you are ready …like next Friday when you get around to it. In fact I have a chest freezer in front of a window, and it is perfect.
As a youngster, I was conditioned to hate Indian Mynah birds. They were an alien species, made a horrible noise and were often seen chasing other birds away from food. I once witnessed the neighbouring farmer’s wife shooting an Indian Mynah through the sash window , from well within the master bedroom, with a 12 gauge shotgun! KABOOM! I was not yet a teenager. That’s got to leave an impression! But then I noticed the bird appeared in the Roberts Bird book. That was puzzling, because it is not indigenous. And then Mynah bird’s range appeared to retract a bit,