Rainbow warriors

River Vah section in Ruzomberok doesn't look very appealing. It runs through industrial part of the city, surrounded by paper producing plant from one side, and railway from another.  Don't except wild and scenic landscapes there.

But what draws attention of many anglers to this river, is the quality of fishing. This section of the river well managed by local angling club. Main attraction is stocked big rainbow trouts. Also it has population of wild native fish: brown trout, grayling, perch, barbel and nase.

Quality of the rainbows in this river is very high. They grow big, fat, strong and can give you a fight of the lifetime on a light tackle. Usually it is not recommended to go for it with less than 0.16 mm leader . Also, these big trouts are very keen on dry fly.

I came to the license shop at 7.00, bought a 1-day license for 20 euro and yearly fishing card for 7 euros. At 8:00 I was on the river. The morning was foggy and cold. I was first on the river, there was no other anglers yet.

I started with Czech nymphing setup, traditional way to catch trout in our waters. Year ago, I lost 3 big fish on the same river and same place.  It's very thrilling feeling, when you cast to the water, knowing that there's big fish under that broken surface, and waiting for the powerful pull.

I got small brown trout on nymph.  But I noticed some rolling movement in the water. Looks like fish were feeding on insects under the surface. I switched to dry fly setup.

The problem was to see very small fly on the surface. I tied in small grey mayfly imitation on hook size 18.  There was couple of fish , striking the fly, but not hooked.  And then came that moment.... I didnt see my fly, but I saw boiling and pull.... Fish on!  It was very strong rainbow.  I quickly picked my line to the reel. You need to use reel to fight fish like that.  After few spectacular runs, I brought this beauty to the net.  This is my biggest fish, caught on dry fly ever!
So colorful, golden body with pink stripe, what a beauty!

Fish were more active, and I pulled more rainbows in first 2 hours.

Soon, two Polish colleagues joined me. I helped them netting the fish, and make photos.

The weather was really nice, +10 C, quite unusual for the late autumn.

It's probably contributed to fish activity, as mayflies were hatching, and there was constant action.

This one was probably biggest specimen we caught in a day

I hooked one male "jack" trout, which has notable long and curved jaws.

They look like prepare to spawning, so colorful, although rainbow trout doesn't spawn in European rivers.

This section of Vah is mostly shallow, with fewer deeper holes. Anglers can cross river in many places from side to side, if water is not high. The level was 35 cm at Besenova, temperature 11.3 C. Ideal conditions.

But riffles can be dangerous for wading, due to fast flow and slippery bottom. I'd recommend to use wading stick in fast water.

In the middle of the day, fish activity on dry fly stopped.  That's the last big rainbow I caught on dry fly.

Then I decided to search for graylings in shallow riffles.

Classic grayling water - shallow and fast runs, with fine gravel bottom and rocks covered with grass.

I used Euro nymphing setup and two small nymphs with 2.5mm and 3mm beads.
Soon, I got couple of graylings.

Not trophies, but nice 30+ cm graylings. But there are 50cm specimens in this river.

I was fishing till 16:00, when it was quite dark to see my fly line.
It was a perfect day. 12 or 13 rainbows, from 40 to 50 cm.  2 graylings and few smaller browns.
Vah absolutely fulfilled my expectations as river of big fish.