I fish with bamboo rods between 7.6 ft - 9 ft in length, a few built by H. L. Leonard around 1900 like the famous model Leonard 51DF, 9 ft, # line 5, the W.B.R. rod (The World´s Best Rod) which G.E.M. Skues, “Father of Nymph Fishing” used for nearly 56 years fishing the Itchen in southern England reintroducing the wet flies, later nymphs to the holy chalk streams. Another rod is the famous Leonard 50DF, 8 ft, # 4/5. Per Brandin´s 8 ft, # 5, quad, hollow built is another rod in my bamboo forrest. His 8´3 ft # 4, hollow built is my latest bamboo rod, a magic wand, sensitive, light and resilient - my Henry´s Fork Special. The casting and fishing qualities of bamboo rods are amazing as well as hooking and fighting the fish and protect a light leader from breaking.

The reels I use are our own Scandiwest Reel with its classic look; S-shaped crank and raised pillars and English Hardy and American Plueger Medalist.

The fly lines can be of any brand as long as they are Double Tapered and my favourite colours are yellow and lime green. 

Dry fly floatants are either gel or liquid. It is easy to be “spoiled” by dipping the fly in liquid, wipe of the excess by false casting and then cast for a rising fish. However - I have found that by using the liquid I have to let the fly dry for several minutes before using it, whatever the label says. The gel like Loons is excellent. Dry fly powder to dry a sinking or slimy fly is an important piece in my equipment.

I always use a wading staff like Simms. It helps me when I am “gliding” through the water searching for rising fish without having to look where I put my feet. This “third leg” is very good and practical.

My polaroid glasses are two, one pair with lenses for bright and sunny days and one pair for cloudy and dark days.

The leaders are mainly two, one is designed and made by Göran Sers in Sweden - The Gimdalen Leader - 12 FT and made of 8 links of stiff Maxima nylon. The other one, Trout Hunter, 14 FT, is designed by “Mr Dry Fly of America”, René Harrop and comes from Trout Hunter Shop situated on the bank of the famous Henry´s Fork of the Snake River. 

When I wade or walk the banks of a river, I move slowly and cautiously looking for rising fish close to the banks, around rocks or small grass islands, the seam line between faster and slower water and in the deeper part of the river. In the water I wade as deep as possible upstream to keep a low profile which helps me to get close to a rising fish or a fish I see in the water without spooking it.

Essential casts are: upstream, upstream and across, across, left reach cast downstream, parachute cast down and across and right reach cast. Presentation and drifts are very important, if you cannot cast, you cannot fish. Casting a dry fly has nothing to do with distance. To get as close as possible to the fish and using the right cast is vital. Presenting a fly upstream or downstream depends upon the speed of the current and trees and bushes on the bank.

A basic knowledge of entomology, the cycle of mayflies, caddis, stoneflies and midges is important to know, to understand what the fish feed on in the morning, day, afternoon, evening and night during the different parts of the season. The size of a hatch of mayflies for instance tells me what the fish are feeding on. The number of duns on the water may be enough for the fish to eat on the surface, if not, they take the nymphs under the surface or emergers in it. Late evening, or early morning, fish feed on spent spinners, late morning and afternoon, duns.

 Many times it is important to stop fishing, put the rod aside and use the eyes more than the rod or search in the fly boxes to try to find “the right fly”. What I can´t see with my eyes, I can see with my binoculars and if that doesn´t help I wade into the river with my insect net to collect what is drifting with the current so I can match the hatch. 

The splashy rise tells me the fish had taken a dun in fast water. If I see its head above the surface when it is feeding I know it takes insects on the surface. A (slow) head and tail rise indicates spent spinners. A sip is for a small insect. A fish that is moving sideways with the back or tail showing in the surface, is nymphing.

I have the Gimriver dun in olive green and grey colours in different sizes, an olive green and yellow flymph which I always fish dry, two stone flies, an egg laying fluttering dry and a fly with a wing. My caddis are a brown and a grey Squirrel fly. I also like to fish the old wet flies March Brown and Wickham´s Fancy as dry flies. Old flies fished with a new technique will be new flies!

With my series Gim River Flies I wanted to limit the number of fly boxes and flies and create something practical. They are all tied with natural material, nothing artificial.

When I fight a fish I use a steady pressure and let it run and tire itself until I give it a little more rod and finally net it.

OLIVE GIM RIVER DUN BY LARS-ÅKE OLSSON

Written by Jennifer Olsson

“Who tied these flies?” I asked flippantly, pointing at the neat row of exquisite patterns atop the coffee table.

“I did,” said my Swedish husband of two years.

Stunned, I examined the clean lines of hackle and dubbing that shaped a most delicate fly. Chagrined that I had missed this other talent that my fly-fishing, river-keeper, author, instructor, guide, rod-building husband held, I quickly added fly tyer to the list.

Lars-Åke Olsson was born in 1942 in the village of Långsele, in Northern Sweden. An active outdoor child, he skied, hunted, fished for perch and pike, played endless games of soccer, and, somewhere near his 15th birthday, came upon a local river and cast his first fly to eager grayling. Always curious, Olsson returned streamside again and again to study and engage its exciting, mysterious inhabitants. In 1981, after careers as a national league soccer player then school teacher, he settled in the village of Gimdalen where he was able to more fully exercise his passion for fly fishing on Idsjöströmmen (a section of the 60-mile Gim River). In 1989 he became the river’s first manager, commonly referred as a river keeper. His was the first designated catch-and-release river in Scandinavia and Europe.

Years of logging had disturbed Idsjöströmmen (and other rivers in Sweden) as her riverbeds had been rearranged to accommodate the annual, spring-runoff transport of felled trees to Baltic sawmills. Those days ended in the 1970s as trucking replaced floating the forest’s harvest to various mills in the east. Cue the new, vigilant river keeper with the knowledge that Idsjöströmmen could be improved, along with the lives of the grayling and brown trout that lived there. Three major restoration projects later, habitat was restored to pre-logging health, and the insect hatches and size of fish both began to grow. In 1993, Olsson received the Federation of Fly Fishers Conservation Award for his efforts.

Devotion to his river inspired Olsson to study more closely the aquatic insect life, which led to the creation of his signature Gim River series of flies. He began tying in 1961 after reading about Frank Sawyer’s Pheasant Tail Nymph and Killer Bug, and in 1968 when Olsson was traveling with his soccer team in England, he stopped by the Netheravon to spend a few days learning nymph fishing from the master himself. “In addition, I read books and bought a vise and fly tying materials from a Swedish company called Fly-Dressing. I taught myself a lot about fly tying from reading,” says Olsson.

His Gim River series began with the Squirrel Caddis. “Because caddis dominate the aquatic insect life on Idsjöströmmen. I wanted to make a fly that was easy to tie, and use materials from the forest where I lived. It was very common to find dead squirrels on the roads, and I found I could make the body and the wing from the same animal as well as in two colors: gray from the winter coat, and mahogany from the summer coat.”

Yet, of the 12 flies representing the various stages of caddis, mayflies, stoneflies, and midges, the Gim River Dun is the most elegant. “I borrowed the idea for the Gim River Dun from several sources. The wing is from the famous Catskill flies, the lemon-speckled wood duck was substituted by the gray-speckled feather from a Swedish male mallard. I tied the wing between the middle of the hook and the hook eye, not directly behind the hook eye, which is more traditional,” he says. “Then I borrowed Vincent Marinaro’s idea of splitting the tail at a 45 degree angle to the sides instead of the conventional position of straight off the hook shank. I tied a sparse hackle; one turn behind and one in front of the wing. Since no dry fly is ‘high floating’ as the hackle fibers actually drill through the water’s surface, I cut an upside down ‘V’ under the hook so the fly is resting more naturally on the water offering the fly more support. All these adjustments make the fly more stable, like an outrigger, the center of balance is more correct.”

The Gim River patterns Olsson created have proven successful on the spring creeks of Montana’s Paradise Valley, and the Henry’s Fork, and on the Missouri, Madison, LeTort, Little Lehigh, and Catskill rivers, including the famed Junction Pool. In England, he has cast them on the Test, the Itchen, the Wye, and the Avon, as well as over the waters of Slovania, Norway, Finland, and Denmark. Apparently, the trout and grayling of the world all speak Swedish, as they have succumbed to Olsson’s charmed patterns. It goes without saying, I seem to understand the attraction.

hook: 12-22 | Topping: Olive tying thread | Tails: Whiting Coq de Leon tied two and two to the sides in a 45° angle | body:Olive fur from muskrat, beaver, or squirrel, dubbed in a loop of the tying thread | wing: Speckled, gray flank feather from a male mallard or wood duck, tied in a bunch | hackle: Whiting grizzly, dyed olive