Fishing Reports - December 24 -2009

It’s now peak season for Mahseer Fly fishing in Cheow Lan and in the rivers in Mae Hong Son province. We got the honor to guide ABU Garcia in conjunction with Sweden and Denmark's biggest fishing magazines "Fiske Journalen: and "Fisk og Fri" 2009 Dream Trip as the only world-wide operator to do it for a second time (2001 we guided them to the Andaman Island). The streams we fished during the 4 day long Cheow Lan trip produced over 200 Thai and Blue Mahseer on fly and another 50 for the ones who fished with lures. Nymphs and dry flies produced the best action but also some “bombers” worked well.

Morten, a Dane who won his seat on the ABU dream trip by the biggest Sea trout caught on fly in Scandinavia this year fished with me for 2 days and enjoyed the action. He was little bit unlucky to lose a big Mahseer that took his dry fly; Morten had no chance to stop the big fish going in under some underwater roots. He also spotted a huge Mahseer estimates to be between 12 and 15 kg size far up in one of the rivers, the fish was feeding under some overhanging trees but was impossible to cast at. The week after the ABU Dream trip I fished with Dennis Black, a fly tying legend, he was the founder of Umpqua Flies and owned also Metz and was the one who started the fly tying factories in Chiang Mai over 20 years ago. He is now and old man but he still got the blues. He fished our smaller streams in Mae Hong Son and enjoyed the fly fishing action.

We spotted some very big Thai Mahseer under a bridge in a small river, biggest fish was over 10 kg size and many were between 6 and 8kg. They were extremely spooky and were not interested in any flies Dennis offered them. Most of the times the small Mahseer and Barbs took the flies just in front of the bigger fish.  We caught a new species we have not caught on fly before here a “Pla Baa” (crazy fish) or Mad carp as the correct English name is. It’s also a river carp and a beautiful fish.  When Dennis opened up the fly tying factories in Chiang Mai 20 years ago, the rivers we now fish in were empty of fish, because of unrestricted commercial fishing by the locals. After years of no fish in the rivers the locals came up with an idea that works very well, they introduced restriction zones on the rivers where no one could fish, with heavy fines for offenders, after many years these zones has proved to be very fruitful, the rivers are now full of big Mahseer and other species again.

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a happy new fishing year

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Fishing Reports - October 14

The opening of a new Fly Fishing Season - The aftermath of the Rainy Season has many of the bigger rivers in the area still running dirty. However, head-water streams are clearing and fishing is now possible. The bigger rivers should have clear water in two weeks time.

Last weekend we test fished two different head water streams and the Mahseer didn’t let us down. Both streams were located in Christian Karen villages far into the jungle and required a 4-wheel drive to reach on a dirt road that climbs high over a series of mountain ridges. The first stream we fished had maybe just a little bit too much water running, but we soon caught fish on nymphs and missed a couple of Mahseer on dry flies. Next day we fished a much clearer stream located in a beautiful little valley. We were greeted by the village headman; he explained for us that the river is now full of fish and fishable. After seeing hundreds of Mahseer some over 12 lbs in a pool just behind the village bridge we understood quickly that this day will be a memorable one..

 

Half of the inhabitants in the village had by now come down to the bridge and they were all wondering what these tall white Vikings dressed in funny fly fishing gear were doing. One thing is for sure they had never before seen someone casting a fly to their Mahseer. But after I hooked the second fish and Booby was into the 3rd fish they eagerly wanted to inspect our fly boxes, they maybe thought that these strange Farangs got a secret weapon they had never used before.

We left the bridge pool and fished our way upstream and the stream was teeming with nice size Mahseer, we were all into nice fish for the next couple of hours. Big dry flies with trailing nymphs worked very well, I had many strikes on a small olive green colored Woolly Bugger, a fly I normally use for Rainbow trout back in the old country. Mahseer are very social (or jealous) fish, I was fighting a nice 5 lb fish when a much bigger fish came up just alongside it and followed it for a long time, sometimes you see this behavior with Cobia on the sea. In a couple of hours we released over 25 Mahseer and at the end of the day we were all very pleased that the long rainy season is now over and it’s time to go fishing again.

Tight Lines
Jonas