Adventures of fly angler in Poland

13 May I attended meeting of "I Love DH" movement enthusiasts. It was on the parking in Nowa Wieś.  There was grill, tables, drinks, and tackle demonstration provided by Maciej Gałgański, owner of the brand Ego. Maciej brought some new rods for the field test. Robert Karlewski, organizer of the meeting, casting Ego Innovative Glass 8'6" 6 class rod with Tactical Skagit head. Here's my attempt, captured on the video: snap-c, snap-t and perry poke. After semi-official part, we went fishing. Robert agreed to be a guide, and shown me some his favorite spots. We drove to the spot, so-called "Straszna góra" (scary mountain).  It's a stretch with fast water, cobblestones, and submerged trees on the other side. It looks very "fishy", but we had no contacts. I found that Skagit line (either with DH or SH rod) is the best for this river. There are many obstacles, bushes, trees, high banks, and wading is very limited, so it'...

12 May I took 430 km trip to the city Toruń on the Northern Poland, to meet with Polish enthusiasts of double hand rods and spey casting. Double handed rods are still exotic in Poland. Not so many fly fishermen practice it. Drwęca is a big tributary to Wisła, and spawning river for baltic sea trout and occasionally, atlantic salmon. Double handed rods traditionally was a standard for fishing anadromous salmonids on all parts of the world, so it's natural choice that Drwęca became a citadel of movement "I Love DH" in Poland. 13 May there was planned demonstration and test-drive of new tackle from Ego Fly Fishing company: new rods, fly lines and other stuff. Particularly, a highlight was new glass rod Ego Innovative Glass 8'6" 6wt, and new shooting head Ego Tactical Skagit 260 grain. I came to the river early, and found a place near A1 autostrade bridge. There's parking in the forest, accessible through "secret" maintenance road (not drawn o...

Wisła is the biggest and longest Polish river. With it's wideness, depth and slow flow it's considered not fly fishing friendly. But, there are interesting spots near Kraków, where's river is shallow enough for wading, and there are some riffles and fast runs too. My goal was to find a place for practicing double hand rod. If there's fish , it would be nice to catch something too. In this particular place, there's island in the middle. During low water (181 cm , 32 m3/s) it's possible to cross from right bank to the island. Good access for fishing left side channel is from the island. There's fast water near the left bank (cliff), and deeper and slow hole near the island. I tried my freshly tied streamers without success. There's a fish called Asp (Aspius aspius), predatory fish of carp family. It's unofficially called "Polish tarpon". This is an active predator, which feeds on small fish in the topwater, chasing it ...

Fly fishermen in Kraków area usually ignore lowland rivers with "coarse" fish (by means not trout or grayling). Usually lowland rivers not well suited for fly fishing - water is opaque in the summer, bottom is muddy and unpleasant to wade, and the flow is slow. But , there are exceptions. Skawinka - big tributary to Wisła, which joins the main river, above Kraków.  It's lower part in city Skawina receives big portion of cooling water from power station, which makes river warm year-around. Bottom composed from fine gravel, which makes it good habitat for fish such as barbel.  It looks like trout water in some places, but trout cannot survive in such warm water. So, river is inhabited by warmwater species: chub, barbel, asp, perch, pike. First fish was a barbel. They live in deep holes with fine gravel bottom.  Another one was caught by spinning fisherman nearby. Another "trophy" fish was a bream... or baby bream. It took micronymph. Water was alm...

Raba runs catastrophically low. 224 cm and 4,3 m3/s the whole week. That's a result of premature hot summer in April and May. But, water below dam is still very cold, +6,5 / +7 C. I fished early in the morning, and it was very slow.  My gear of choice was Ego Glass rod 7'8" 4wt with OPST Commando 175 skagit head, 7'5" floating tip and 7' tapered leader. I tried few streamers, black and purple wooly buggers, white zonker. Only one fish seduced on purple wooly bugger with pink head. There was a hatch of small insects, but I didn't see surface activity. Only one big trout jumped near the opposite bank with loud and spectacular splash. Later, I tried Czech nymph without success. Floating pieces of grass in the river made it harder, I need to clean my flies from the grass on every cast. Quite annoying. I fished until 8:30, and went home. Praying for the rain and higher level.