Working on the theory that trout coming out of a hard winter will be conserving energy in the slow waters, I tried weighted nymphs and clyde-style wets near the banks and under trees. But no signs of trout, not even a small tug.

But it was great to get out again. Saw two pipistrelle bats hunting in the daylight, some needle flies, courting ravens.

Got out of the water unable to feel my hands and feet.

Here is a photo of today's Welsh Dee.

No go. The river was showing its bones. The water temperature was high; a heat wave and drought. My heart wasn't in it. The trout were probably barely surviving, gasping for oxygen. I wasn't about to make things more difficult for them.

And that's it!

There are times when it's not right to fish!

Will report back.

There is, I think, a more fundamental reason. It is knowing something very deeply, not just intellectually but experientially. The intersection of many things at an instant: the trout's behaviour, the structure of the river and its currents, the shape of the river bed, the weather, the fly life, the expert use of rod and fly-line, the tying and presentation of flies, your own limitations, the sound of your own heart-beat, the structure of your own consciousness.

Fly fishing, in its deepest sense, is a phenomenological inquiry. Hence the need for restraint as well put at Classical Angler .

He is also an outstanding angler who helped set the compass towards modern fly-fishing.

See here and here.