Fly fishing for grayling is one of the few things that gets better as the year gets colder, and it is the reason a lot of river anglers keep their rods out through the winter. Autumn is when it starts in earnest, and it is a very good time to learn because the fish are still active enough to be forgiving.
Read the run before you cast
Grayling hold in specific water and if you can learn to read it you will save yourself hours. The water you want is moving at roughly walking pace, over clean gravel, somewhere between knee and thigh deep.
The head of a run, where the fast water starts to level out, and the middle of the run are where I start. The tail, where it slows and deepens, comes into its own later in the winter.
Look for the smooth, slightly oily-looking surface that indicates even flow over gravel. Broken choppy water usually means the bottom is too uneven and the fish are elsewhere.
Getting down is everything
Grayling feed close to the bottom and a nymph drifting a foot above them will be ignored. Nearly every grayling problem is a depth problem.
Tungsten beads are the simplest answer. Carry the same patterns in several weights so you can adjust to the run rather than changing pattern. If you are not occasionally touching bottom, you are not deep enough.
A two fly setup with a heavier anchor fly on the point and a lighter one on a dropper covers two depths at once and is how I fish most of the time.
Hot spots and why they work
Pink, orange and chartreuse hot spots on otherwise natural nymphs are a grayling fishing staple. There are theories about why, from mimicking an egg to simply triggering curiosity, and honestly nobody knows for certain.
What is not in doubt is that they work. A pheasant tail with a pink collar will consistently outfish the same fly without one. Carry both and let the fish tell you.
Keeping in touch with the drift
The core skill is maintaining contact with the flies as they drift without dragging them unnaturally. Too much slack and you miss the take entirely. Too much tension and the flies lift out of the zone.
Whether you use a short line euro-style approach, an indicator, or a sighter section of coloured leader, the principle is the same. Lead the flies gently downstream at the speed of the current, keeping just enough contact to feel a stop.
Takes are frequently nothing more than the drift hesitating. If anything looks different, lift. You cannot strike too often.
Work the run properly
Grayling shoal, so a run either holds them or it does not. But within a run they are not evenly spread, so cover it systematically.
I start at the near edge and fish a series of drifts, extending a little further across each time, then move down a couple of steps and repeat. That way I cover the whole run in a grid rather than casting randomly into the middle of it.
If you catch one, work that exact spot hard before moving. There will be more.
Dry fly is still possible
Do not put the dry fly box away. Autumn and even winter grayling will rise to olives and midge on mild days, and a grayling taking a dry in November is a real pleasure. If you see rises, fish to them.
Cold weather practicalities
Fingerless gloves, something to dry your hands on, and a hat. Cold hands ruin fly fishing faster than anything else.
Wading in autumn and winter rivers needs more care than in summer. The water is colder, the flow is often higher, and a slip has more consequences. Wading staff, felt or studded soles, and do not push it.
Where to start
A day ticket beat on a river with a known grayling head, ideally in the north of England, Wales or on the southern chalk streams. Take a light rod, a box of weighted nymphs in three weights, and expect to spend the first hour getting your depth right. Once you crack that, it comes together quickly.
Sarah Marsh came to fly fishing through her father, who kept a rod on a small syndicate water in Devon. She spent her teens fishing stocked reservoirs and gradually worked her way toward wild fish on moving water – first on rain-fed freestone rivers in Wales, then on the Hampshire chalk streams she now considers home water.
She holds a level 2 APGAI fly casting qualification and guides informally on the River Test and, from June to September, on a private beat on the River Tay for Atlantic salmon. Her personal best brown trout came from the Itchen at 4lb 1oz; she’d sooner not talk about the salmon that came off at the net last August.
At The River Bend, Sarah writes the game fish species guides, fly fishing technique articles, and the legal content covering trout and salmon regulations.
Covers: Brown trout, rainbow trout, sea trout, Atlantic salmon, fly fishing, chalk streams, Scottish rivers, close season and regulation articles