Black Snatcher wins the day - or at least the wine.

The afternoon and evening of Wednesday 20th June was the time arranged for our monthly club competition. Frankly, we couldn't have picked a more unsuitable day if we had tried. The weather was appalling with constant winds of more than 20mph and gusts up to twice that. From four o'clock onwards this was supplemented with heavy and unrelenting rain.

Only one fish was caught. It was a rainbow of 1lb 14oz. The killing fly was a Black Snatcher and the fish fell to the rod of Tony McCoy, who, shortly after, packed up a went home, saying that he was allergic to rain.

A Black Snatcher - The fly that won Tony the bottle of wine

Tony, Mike and I arrived about four thirty just in time to meet Linda who was packing up, having had enough of the inclement weather and the seriously slow fishing. But she left us a fruitcake she had baked earlier. We then found Terry Denley hiding under a bush to keep out of the, by now, torrential rain. He went home shortly after that.

We persevered but with only a few tugs and pulls to show for our efforts. Perhaps the most difficult aspect of the fishing was the wind with its frequent strong gusts and its sudden changes of direction. The highlight was certainly our alfresco buffet supper of sandwiches, pork pies, scotch eggs and, the undoubted 'piece de resistance', Linda's fruit cake. It was worth getting drenched for. However by eight o'clock we were back in the car greedily consuming the last of the sandwiches and with the heater going full blast. Let's hope for better weather at Fernworthy next month.