Fly Fishing for Mahseer: Cauvery round II

It's been a while since I've been to India, over a year from today. I've been missing the country, the people and the fishing lately. These shots are from one of my previous trips, around Feb. of 2010. I had taken a trip to see my friend Bopanna, who runs a camp on the Cauvery river. I had been once before, and had a great time catching mahseer. This time my focus was getting them on the fly. With lures, I spent plenty of time casting for each fish, so I knew trying to catch decent size mahseer with a fly rod was going to be a challenge. At the same time, I knew I could emulate the baits we had used with flies.

I bought an inflate able boat to take with me. Lugging it through several countries was a major pain, but it was a much better platform to fish from then the round coracles that were available at the time. Bopanna has since built a boat to comfortably fish out of.
The first few days I fished big streamer patterns and had some success getting some takes, but every fish on soon came off. Bopanna suggested I tie a stinger hook off the back of the fly. After we rigged up some of my flies with his hooks, it was game on.




Baking in the sun after eating too much lunch. After about 11 in the morning, it gets too hot to stay out on the water. Lunch at noon, followed by some reading, and then a nap every day. Back out on the water around three or four. My kind of days.








As usual, I can't wait to get back. I didn't land any fish on a fly over about 15 lbs, and these fish get up to a hundred. With the right flies and equipment, I think I can do much better.