Published Apr 22. 2011 - 12 years ago
Updated or edited Apr 25. 2019

Spring 2011

It has become almost a tradition for Martin to do a small gallery of images from the different seasons in his own fishing, especially the spring, and this year he has done it again in keeping with this tradition.

All alone - So much water, so little time
Blue sky and clear water - A sight that can make your heart skip a beat or two
Close to shore - It mostly pays to give the near shore shallows a cast or two
Last snow - Spring is not always blue sky and sun
Spring
Martin Joergensen - Hans Jacob Schou

We always anticipate

spring with excitement and a lot of pressure built up during the winter months, where the cabin fever sometimes can rise to unbearable temperatures. This winter has been particularly long and cold in northern Europe, and the longing for warmer weather and the start of the season has been quite prominent.

The winter lost

its grip late, but in the end the season did actually start, and we got to go fishing. Some years we have been out early and gone to Sweden or the Danish island Bornholm to fish for large kelt and bright chrome winter fish, but this year we waited out the Danish spring and went out when the water started becoming warmer.

In my own case

and for those that I fish with often, it has been a slow spring. We're fishing for sea run brown trout, and the fishing is highly dependent on the state of the streams and how the fish manage to spawn. This process has for many years been supported by the stocking of fish in streams and estuaries, which has built up a healthy population of fish in the ocean, albeit not helped the natural reproduction. It seems that this stocking has now stopped in favor of helping the natural reproduction, which is all good and right, but unfortunately not able to sustain the same number of fish mostly because the streams on the island that I live on are few and small, and unable to support large natural populations of trout.
The net result seems to be that the number of fish on the coast is dropping, and our success in fishing for them is going down at an equal rate.

Ah, the beauty! - The tail of a sea trout in the spring sun
A big kelt - Sometimes you run into really large post spawn sea trout in the spring
My first spring trout - It was to be late April before I could land and release my own first sea trout - this small fish.
Unwilling - This large kelt was unwilling to go ashore, and was released seconds after this shot
Little folks - Usually there are lots of these little toddlers around in the spring
Fish
Henning Eskol - Paul Kalbrener - Martin Joergensen

Right now it's the big salmon adventure

that steals all the headlines here in Denmark. A couple of very large and very expensive projects have reinvigorated the Atlantic salmon stocks in some of the largest streams in west Denmark, and that is of course all fair and fine, but unfortunately it seems to have taken away focus from the coastal fishing, the most widespread and common fishing in our country and definitely the foundation for a healthy national fishing community.

Where I live

in the eastern part of the country we have no salmon, no brown trout worth mentioning and no grayling. We have the ocean all around us, and our fishing is utterly dependent on either stocking or reestablishing of some streams for the fish to spawn in. The water for many of these streams is either running in the taps in Copenhagen or to and from farmland where it depletes the natural runs and winds up polluted with nutrients in ditches that lead straight as a ruler directly into the ocean, wrecking havoc with algeal blooms and dead bottoms.
Neither of this helps the already scarce sea trout, and the result is fewer fish, fewer people fishing for them and less focus on the whole issue.

Pontoon spring - The view from my pontoon boat on a nice April day
Rowing - I have taken to the pontoon boat, and get a lot of exercise
Shallows - The shallow water warms up quickly in the spring sun
Hard shadows - The pontoon boat al ready for some action
Gear display - You always get the urge to shoot your nice gear in the spring sun
Clear - Spring water can be amazingly clear
Martin Joergensen - Henning Eskol

Well, 'nuff

whining here.

I did catch

my first sea trout this year (a 12 inch fish in mid-April!), and some of my fishing buddies have been doing OK this spring, as have other anglers on our coasts. I hope that it's just a temporary phase we're going through and that the fish will be back plenty and large.

Spring is in the air - A nice stretch of coast in the spring sun
Time to rest - Spring means that laying on the beach or the bank is so much more comfortable.
The day ends - Rods on the car, ready to return home
Nice
Henning Eskol - Martin Joergensen

PS:

One good outcome from the slow fishing this spring has been a handful of GFF articles. While fishing for a week with some friends I spent a couple of rough weather days indoors shooting pictures and writing texts for a few articles for the site. Don't say that unproductive fishing isn't good for anything!

Red Tag step - A Red Tag is being tied and the process is shot with a remote release every now and then
GFF's mobile fly studio - My trusty Nikon, my LAW vise, an Orbis ringflash and a couple of tripods plus assorted goodies and fly pix are on the way.
Working for GFF - Here I am tying flies and shooting tying steps for a GFF aticle
Gear - It takes lots of photo gear and tying gear to tie and shoot for GFF
The GFF workshop
Henning Eskol - Martin Joergensen
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