The Flyfishers’ Journal: Winter 2022
Mayflies in midwinter: the latest issue of the Flyfishers’ Journal has been landing in the midst of a week-long deep freeze for much of the UK…
… but I hope it’ll bring something of the warming hope of a springtime hatch to this beautiful-but-Baltic season.
Cyril Bennett is on the front cover, hunting bugs in his native habitat, and this issue celebrates his generosity in lodging his collection of high-resolution mayfly photographs with the Flyfishers’ Club for permanent safe-keeping. Two of his favourite photos appear on the centre spread, accompanied by Andrew Farr’s profile of Cyril’s skills as an entomologist and photographer.
In fact, there’s a subtly mayfly-related theme throughout the magazine, together with a ‘good cause’ article from the Cancer & Pisces Trust, a study of fly-rod and fast-jet carbon nanotechnology from Bob Bradley, Intupsification with Peter Hayes, and SWFFing materials ancient and modern from John McGill and Nigel Haywood.
Normally you’d have thought mayflies-to-SWFFing would be a tough segue to pull off, but every now and again, in the course of editing this Journal, something so serendipitous comes along that I’m forced to believe that the fishing gods really are watching and pulling the strings.
This time, the connection arrived in an email from Uffe Westerberg in Denmark, telling me about his fishing pal, Per Schaap, and his techniques for capturing photos of seagulls and hobbies hunting mayflies on Danish chalkstreams.
It’s a brilliantly alternative angle on spending time by the water when the trout aren’t eating the big bugs yet…
… not to mention a salutary reminder to some of us to get the long lenses out when the hatch charts begin warming up again next year, and stop relying quite so completely on snapshots with our mobile phones!
(The Flyfishers’ Journal is a complimentary benefit of membership of the Flyfishers’ Club; it’s also available to non-members by subscription).
