Ryan,
I'll be the first to admit that this is a tough river, for many of the reasons mentioned here on the board, but the biggest factor in the ever changing fishing on the yough (in my opinion) is the temp and flow fluctuations.
Be that as it may, there is predictable fishing on the river: of the past five seasons that I have been guiding on the river, I have never had a zero fish day--my worst day was this summer: at the end of the day we had only had three fish in the boat, but the fellow was new to the sport and missed a few and lost a few more due to line management issues. We usually do quite a bit better than that.
First and foremost, if you want to catch fish on this river you need to fish deep. Dry flies will take plenty of fish--even if fished blind--this time of year but you have to cover a lot of water, which is most easily done from a boat—we all know this is a tough river to wade. Day in and day out this is a streamer and nymph river, and if you want to catch fish when you go, that is what you should fish.
As for the sporadic and unpredictable hatches, I find that this actually makes it easier to take rising fish when I find them. The fish that are inclined to look up on the yough have generally stationed themselves in a bubble line and are (generally) feeding on a variety of floating food. Show them anything, even something outrageously large, the right way, and they'll eat more often than not.
The biggest factor though, and I don't think many people realize this, is that there aren't the number of fish in the river as the other fisheries you are accustomed to fishing. I am on the river a lot, and I know the places that hold bigger numbers of fish, in those places, the fishing can be pretty fast and furious most of the time. But it doesn't take very many good fisherman to clean a place like that out, even on a big river like this one. I can't tell you how many times over the summer I see people fishing from rafts or canoes with stringers of fish (of all sizes) tied to their boats. Any mention of the the regs usually only results in blank stares on the part of these guys (and gals) and they proceed to do whatever it was that they were doing before I showed up. So, by midsummer, we are all fishing over fewer fish than we should be—that doesn't help matters.
But, as everyone else has noted, it is a special place, and I hope that you continue to return to the yough whenever you get a chance.
Any day now we'll be getting some pics from this season up on the website, check it out.
