Rob Hardy finds traditional wild fishing at a reservoir in the Yorkshire Pennines
IFI TOLD YOU THERE’S A PLACE where you can catch naturalised brown trout in surroundings akin to a Scottish loch, but that you’d be little more than 20 miles from the centres of Leeds and Manchester, you would probably smile and wait for the punchline. I may be stretching things a bit, comparing a man-made water to one carved by the ice age, but my sentiments are true.
Ryburn Reservoir first came to my attention when I saw it on YouTube and was taken by the wild nature of the fishing it offers. This 27-acre tree-lined lake is the lower of two reservoirs (the other being Baitings) created in 1933 by damming a deep valley south of the A58 to supply water to nearby Wakefield. Fed by the River Ryburn, a tributary of the Calder, it lies outside the pretty villages of Ripponden and Rishworth in the Yorkshire Pennines. Popular with walkers and birdwatchers, the fishing has been controlled by Ripponden Fly Fishers’ Association since the 1960s.
I found the club’s website and contacted its chairman, Chris Eastwood, better known for running Lathkill Fly-Tying in Halifax, to arrange a day ticket. He told me the club rented the fishing from Yorkshire Water and that it was predominantly bank fishing, although two rowing boats — electric outboards are allowed — with oars, life jackets and a drogue were available to members, accessed from a shed on the north shore near Ryburn dam. Day tickets are available to non-members at an affordable £20 per rod. Chris, who fishes Ryburn twice a week, kindly offered to show me round.
Although open all year, prime time on Ryburn is late March to May, when you might be lucky enough to experience a hatch of Mayfly (vulgata). Like many stillwaters, sport then slows through summer until the water cools in September and October and trout feed on roach fry and sticklebacks, especially around Ryburn dam and in the deep arm at the Baitings dam end, where the trout shoal for winter. Most of the fish are brown trout, of which a good wild stock remains from the damming of the river, but which the club supplements with 500-700 9in-12in brownies each spring. To keep fishing viable through winter — not easy — every few years the club also stocks around 50 rainbow and blue trout. Members are allowed to keep a brace each week; day rods must release all fish.
We arranged to meet in early September and as I left the M62 and looped beneath it to join the A664, then M58, to head down the valley to Ripponden, a heavy mist hung across the moortops, announcing the approach of autumn. Passing both waters to my right, I picked my way into the village, busy with m
