What does a salmon want?

I had to call halt and post this quickly because blipping my fishing flies was getting out of hand. The flies have the same effect on me as they are supposed to have on the fish. I have hundreds of them in about 10 boxes (and that's a lie - there's more than that) and when I'm fishing they drive me nuts because I always think I should be using another fly.

Fishing friends have tried to force me (physically) to take just one small box on any day - the day box - but invariably I end up stuffing every available pocket with a box that I just might need. I'm aware that this a symptom of some disorder - possibly a variant of OCD. Anyway photographing the damn flies was becoming a tad obsessive so I've stopped and now I need to put them away.

I'll resist the urge to tell you all about them. If you'd like to know more I've written extensively about fly fishing here and here. There are whole tomes on fishing flies using all kinds of materials and different patterns. And here's the thing - they all work.... or they don't. People have devoted their lives to working out why salmon take flies.....or don't.

I've only ever come across one tougher question, the one that Siegmund Freud confessed had defeated him in 30 years of research: "What does a woman want?"