MORE THAN a quarter of a century ago, I helped to publicise the Czech nymph technique here in the UK. I talked at The Game Fair and other shows but it was my article in The Field that attracted the most attention. There was a certain amount of criticism back then, especially over the use of the strike indicator, which was dubbed little better than float fishing, but as my grayling catches in particular rocketed, I felt confident in what I was preaching.
I was mentored in the Czech Republic by my guides Franta and Radim (both members of the country’s fly-fishing team), who had taught me as well as they could. With much hard practice, I became proficient enough but watching Radim fish the nymph five years later in Mongolia was to be stunned by his fluidity of movement and his surreal sense of what the water was telling him. What I hadn’t fully realised until then is that Eastern European anglers learned their skills under pressure. In short, Radim had grown up needing to catch fish to feed his family and that survival necessity hones a certain focus.
At the time, I was
