On  Wednesday April 17, Hans Aigner fished the Ager River with Jorg Schuft and me. Hans began guiding for Hans Gebetsroither in 1959 when he was just 12 years old, and fished with a large variety of world class anglers over the years, including Joe Brooks. On today’s outing, Hans caught his first fish of the season, a very handsome rainbow that was thick of body and fought with exceptional strength.

When we arrived at the spot the Hans had picked for me to fish, I sat on a big flat rock to adjust my leader and tie on a fly—an orange nymph I tied the previous night. I told Hans that I would sit there and catch one.  On the second cast about 10 feet out, a nice rainbow grabbed the fly. I was using the jigging indicator tactic and Hans was delighted; he had not seen another angler use it, but used it himself. My second fish from the sitting position was a very large European chub—every bit as much a game fish as trout and grayling.

After a couple more fish on the nymph, I switched to a size 2  Silver Leech. Hans thought it was too big, and gave me some small streamers that they use in the Ager. I said thanks, put the flies in my box, and then heaved the big fly into the quiet water between two  current tongues. Almost immediately a very nice male Kamloops grabbed the fly with zeal. It fought well, and Hans was delighted. Then a few minutes later, I hooked another big rainbow that tore off, fighting like an Atlantic salmon, jumping again and again and running hard.  I had to chase it quite a ways downstream before finally landing it. Again Hams was delighted. He had been afraid that the several floods they had over last Christmas season had pushed the fish downstream. Evidently they had not.

Jorge found a huge school of European chubs under a bridge and caught them with great regularity. They were taking a size 12 gray nymph with vigor.         We then went to another section of the Ager that was largely stocked with browns. The sun was very bright, and the browns were all tucked away in hiding; however, I did take a very nice rainbow of about 24 inches on a brownish gray Hen Saddle Matuka. My final count for the day was 11 hooked, 13 landed.

Hans nymphing a deep pocket from which he took his first trout of the season.

My first ever European chub. They take the fly well, and fight like, well, big chubs.

The big Kamloops took the size 2 Silver Leech with robust zeal.

Hans was excited to see me catch the bigger fish , indicating that they has not been washed away by several large floods over the last Christmas season.

Jorg, busily landing one European chub after the other on a gray nymph.