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Fishing for Arctic Char in Ireland

3K views 1 reply 2 participants last post by  Hawkeye 
#1 ·
On a recent trip to Connemara in the West of Ireland we had some really shocking bad luck. Well, we just didn't catch any fish. But we got to walk about ten miles up a mountain in the process, and so got a great view of all the lakes we could have (should have) gone to, and, built on our knowledge base; we will never go there again.

When we finally returned to the car, panting, hot and sweaty, like real men we had a quick bite to eat, and headed off fishing(!). We reached our next spot and were thrilled to see some char rising. But, a problem, something was wrong with the gear count and to keep it short and to save the blushes of the guilty, we found ourselves a party of three with an eight foot fly rod and a twenty something foot dapping rod. Dapping is a great method of catching fish on a big lake from a boat in a bit of a wave, and needless to say the boat which is traditional and somewhat essential was not in the equation and it was a lovely still evening and flat calm. Well the owner of the single fly rod took dibs and left the the remaining two to fight over the dapping rod. We decided that this rod <i>was</i> big enough for the both of us and headed off to catch some char.

We caught nothing, but we rose a few, got eaten alive by midges, got eaten alive by our better halves for <i>staying out fishing for fourteen hours with out so much as by your leave and then to come home with nothing...?!</i>

Much chastened by our experiences, but heartened by the few fish we rose we resolved to do it all again the next day, God willing.

Anyway after all that, has anyone else ever dapped from the shore or even thout about it, I see it as a method worth a shot if for no other reason than to say you did it... any thoughts?
 
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#2 ·
What a great tale. I got a grin out of it mostly because I've done similar things.

I've never used a dapping rod before but I have done what you might call dapping with my fly rod on smaller streams and eddys of bigger ones. It often works well.
 
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