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This is a dedicated thread for discussing article: The River Cauvery
The River Cauvery
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The Sogster
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Nice article. Fishing in India is my favourite place in the world after my local rivers the Don and Rother.
I too was a bit shocked with my first view of India. I visited the north, the exact spot actually, where Bailey shot his film. The stench and the rubbish etc, it was all a bit overwhelming.
It was only during my second trip there, which lasted 6 months and took me from the high Himalayas on the border with china to the very southern tip at Kanyakumari, that I discovered its true beauty.
I too love amazing landscapes, unspoilt places. I was lucky enough to visit several such places, and land some nice fish, including mahseer.
But the real beauty I found in India was that of the people. Not physical beauty but a beauty within their souls that I find impossible ,to describe.
Eventually, having got over my initial shock, beauty existed right alongside heaps of rotting food, ramshackle shelters, rabid-looking dogs, and more.
It was only during my second trip there, which lasted 6 months and took me from the high Himalayas on the border with china to the very southern tip at Kanyakumari, that I discovered its true beauty.
I too love amazing landscapes, unspoilt places. I was lucky enough to visit several such places, and land some nice fish, including mahseer.
But the real beauty I found in India was that of the people. Not physical beauty but a beauty within their souls that I find impossible ,to describe.
Eventually, having got over my initial shock, beauty existed right alongside heaps of rotting food, ramshackle shelters, rabid-looking dogs, and more.
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As Consultant (adviser on all things India and Indian fishing, the guy who decided just where the film would be shot and who we'd be meeting along the way) to the production company that made Casting For Gold as well as co-presenter of the film, I rather think that some of you would dearly love to know the stretch of another Indian mahseer river I nearly took the crew to. It's still unfished by foreigners to this day, except by myself and an old trusty mate and a couple of Indian fishers who know only too well what would happen to the water if they broke cover and blabbed, having seen Byas Ghat and the Ganges, Pancheswar and the Cauvery waters become zoos.
Truly a "best-kept secret" - there are so few of them around these days.
Truly a "best-kept secret" - there are so few of them around these days.
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simon dunbar
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I remember watching Casting for Gold thinking I'd love to fish in India , but never thought I would ever get to fish there , loved my trip and would love to go again . Can you get Casting for Gold on DVD , I would like to see it again?
I heard that Burma has good rivers with Mahseer, maybe now people are starting to go on holiday there some more magical Mahseer fishing will be
discovered.
I heard that Burma has good rivers with Mahseer, maybe now people are starting to go on holiday there some more magical Mahseer fishing will be
discovered.
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Nope, not commercially, but I have a pretty damned good, probably now unique, ex-Soho editing suite, first generation copy here on my computer that I'd burn and sign for a score of notes.
Nice movie that has aged little people often tell me, but, then, working very closely with its director and producer on storyline and historical and present-day content from the very start, I did my best to ensure that it wouldn't.
Two words: personal message...........
PS - Burma - I believe that those taking it on will be much disappointed. The country's rivers have changed hugely since the days of A.St.J. Macdonald (they were highly unpredictable in his day - you really needed to live there and know that some years - whole seasons - would be total write-offs). I helped a couple of guys who went to Burma to "take them on" in the 1990s, both decent anglers, both blanked on trips that lasted rather more months than some quick in-'n'-out week or two.
Nice movie that has aged little people often tell me, but, then, working very closely with its director and producer on storyline and historical and present-day content from the very start, I did my best to ensure that it wouldn't.
Two words: personal message...........
PS - Burma - I believe that those taking it on will be much disappointed. The country's rivers have changed hugely since the days of A.St.J. Macdonald (they were highly unpredictable in his day - you really needed to live there and know that some years - whole seasons - would be total write-offs). I helped a couple of guys who went to Burma to "take them on" in the 1990s, both decent anglers, both blanked on trips that lasted rather more months than some quick in-'n'-out week or two.
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geoffmaynard
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The problem with Burma was always the visa. You could only ever get 7 days and then you had to leave so there was never enough time to explore. It was expensive too inasmuch as you had to fly in or out, there being no land route.
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It's not the time available to an angler, but the nature of the rivers and the SPECIES of mahseer - mostly Barbus tor putitora, the Himalayan Mahseer, very different and wider-ranging animals than the sedentary Tor Mussulah fatties of the Cauvery in the South. You have to find the fish (they might be "gone" - fifty or more miles away), and, even then, if they're in front of you, if the river conditions aren't right...
There lies the challenge of fishing for BIG North Indian mahseer - being in the right place at the right time (as well as, of course, doing all the right things), and knowing that some years you cannot be (early / late monsoon or the fish not holding in their usual spots...). So you get big-time failures (not something that commercial operators could live with, whole, in some cases, just 2-week-long "season"s / windows blowing out), but a few continue to try .... and when you get it right...
A 71-pound mahseer from a Northern river is my recent-years best (I won't better it), after two total blow-outs...
There lies the challenge of fishing for BIG North Indian mahseer - being in the right place at the right time (as well as, of course, doing all the right things), and knowing that some years you cannot be (early / late monsoon or the fish not holding in their usual spots...). So you get big-time failures (not something that commercial operators could live with, whole, in some cases, just 2-week-long "season"s / windows blowing out), but a few continue to try .... and when you get it right...
A 71-pound mahseer from a Northern river is my recent-years best (I won't better it), after two total blow-outs...
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eddyfish
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Nice article. Bought back a few memories, particularly the monkeys. Were you at Galibore?
I read somewhere that Bhutan had a large number of completely untouched mahseer rivers. Obviously with this being a devoutly Buddhist country I am unsure of whether it is possible to fish there. Anyone got any information at all?
I read somewhere that Bhutan had a large number of completely untouched mahseer rivers. Obviously with this being a devoutly Buddhist country I am unsure of whether it is possible to fish there. Anyone got any information at all?
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I am not a show-off or name-dropper but can say that I once fished with the royal family of Bhutan. A girlfriend and I were camped up and fishing the Manas River in north east India when a large entourage - jeeps, trucks, a couple of boats, numerous soldiers - appeared on the opposite bank, the Bhutanese bank. A large camp was set up and, as it was, a couple of young men and two very beautiful young women began fishing the river opposite us. We exchanged waves and smiles.
The following morning a boat came over to our side, with the young man in it hailing us with a "Hi. Come over and fish. Stay for lunch...".
We did. And for the next two days and nights. The guy in the boat was was one of the princes of the Bhutanese royal family, the other man one too, the lovely women their girlfriends.
We had fish, after much effort, to just under 30 pounds, but who then was worrying about the fishing.
The following morning a boat came over to our side, with the young man in it hailing us with a "Hi. Come over and fish. Stay for lunch...".
We did. And for the next two days and nights. The guy in the boat was was one of the princes of the Bhutanese royal family, the other man one too, the lovely women their girlfriends.
We had fish, after much effort, to just under 30 pounds, but who then was worrying about the fishing.
eddyfish
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Thanks Paul. Nice to know that at least some goes on. Could be a destination of the future then. After all its a politically stable country with untouched resources. Interesting stuff.
Always wanted to the catch a snow trout too!
Is it still the case that the Indian Guv have a blanket ban on fishing in the reserves? I know a lot of people got very worried about the subsequent increase in dynamiting and poaching now the money isn't there to protect the fish.
Always wanted to the catch a snow trout too!
Is it still the case that the Indian Guv have a blanket ban on fishing in the reserves? I know a lot of people got very worried about the subsequent increase in dynamiting and poaching now the money isn't there to protect the fish.
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Not cheap, though, Bhutan charges a daily tourist tariff - Bhutan Tour Tariff, Bhutan Tour rate, Bhutan Tour Payment, Bhutan Travel Agency, Bhutan Tour, Bhutan Footprints Travel - over and above your trip costs, rightly in my opinion, to stop itself from becoming another international dossers' destination like parts of India and Nepal. Anyone mahseer fishing there will discover that just because a river isn't bombed to hell, its mahseer - northern mahseer, after all - don't surrender themselves easily, however much a time-poor - money-rich few might wish they would. Northern mahseer ain't easy (end of).
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itsfishingnotcatching
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Master of the understatement there Paul
, $2800 per person for a fortnight just in Government Tariffs, looks wonderful but out of reach for most of us.- Joined
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"...but out of reach for most of us"
Me included. And even if I had the loot, I'd be wary. The other thing that some people fail to realise about mahseer is that they respond poorly to angling pressure, particularly the Northern ones once they have had a daily round of plugs and spoons put over them, developing lockjaw and going on to feed probably only at night. On the Ganges - on several stretches - thirty-odd years ago, I began to lure-fish at night, and to catch a number of good fish, at least until they wised up to the fact that grabbing, say, a flickering little 2-inch spoon might be a bad thing...
Me included. And even if I had the loot, I'd be wary. The other thing that some people fail to realise about mahseer is that they respond poorly to angling pressure, particularly the Northern ones once they have had a daily round of plugs and spoons put over them, developing lockjaw and going on to feed probably only at night. On the Ganges - on several stretches - thirty-odd years ago, I began to lure-fish at night, and to catch a number of good fish, at least until they wised up to the fact that grabbing, say, a flickering little 2-inch spoon might be a bad thing...
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simon dunbar
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I was fishing at Bheemeshwari Camp above Galibore , December time. We all went downstream to Galibore one day , the water was higher there. I did catch a 20 lbs Mahseer first cast there though . The wildlife in India was amazing , never saw an elephant , but saw lots of other animals,reptiles and loads of birds .
eddyfish
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I thought Bheemeshwari was one of the camps that closed when the Indian guv banned fishing! Great stuff to know its still open for business! If only I could afford right now, I would be first on the plane next year.
You're right about the wildlife. Awesome. We saw some properly rare creatures just in the camp alone: indian jackal, giant squirrels, paradise flycatchers, fish owls. It was an amazing place.
Still want to chse those Northerns though. One day maybe.
simon dunbar
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Yes I understand that Bheemeshwari is closed for angling now , my visit was a couple of years ago. I got an e-mail earlier today from Angling Direct who have some places left for the Galibore Camp over the next couple of months.
geoffmaynard
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I think there are a couple of camps at Beemishwari now. When I was there last there was only Jungle Lodge
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And when I was last there, my girl and I spent a morning with a machete and a pruning knife (and Elastoplast, TCP and Savlon afterwards) just clearing a space among the thorn and scrub for our little tent. Last year I was sent a link by someone I didn't know from Shiva to a thread on some Indian angling forum where people - Indian nationals - were saying it's now, well, to put it charitably, a tourist-trap zoo. I saw it coming back in the early 1980s - reason why I got out of fishing on those stretches of that river and have never been back.