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Friday, January 04, 2008

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to one and all and tight lines for the 2008 season.

The new season is rushing towards us with the river Helmsdale opening first on the 11th January closly followed by the Halladale and Tay, lets hope that the snow stops falling before then!
Talking about the weather I had the great pleasure of getting away from our winter and visiting the Seychelles in November. The trip was hardly 5 star regarding accommodation, we were based aboard a 1950's ship but it was comfortable, a great adventure, wonderful company and first class fishing. I fished with Matt Harris of Trout & Salmon fame who I last fished with many years ago in Argentina. On this trip I benefited both from his great company and also his brilliant photographic abilities as can be seen by these photos.
The trip was like being in a BBC Blue Planet programme with amazing wildlife and awesome fish in a truly remote part of the world.
We were based around 2 Atoll's called Astove and Cosmoledo which lie 560 nm south of Mahe the capital of the Seychelles. Getting there involves a 3 hour flight to Assumption Atoll and then an overnight sailing to Cosmoledo.
It was worth all the travelling when you see your first Giant Trevally [GT] cruising across the beautiful white sand flats. The excitement is incredible when you cast a baitfish pattern, such as a Flashy Profile or Sea Habit at the GT and strip like crazy as it turns and charges at your fly. When they take it is like hitting an express train as they tear away in the shallow water heading for deep water and any obstruction they can find to bust you up on. These brutal fish are often to be found cruising along side big Skates or Sharks which make them a little easier to spot particularly on a windy day when the water can become choppy. The head guide Arno would shout 'charge' as soon as he spotted a fish [which became the motto for our trip!] and you would then wade as quickly as possible to try and intercept the quarry. This is really psychical when wading deep in very high temperatures and casting a fly that is heavy and wind resistant.


One morning we fished Astove's most unique feature called the "wall", this involves casting over the 2km deep drop-off to huge GT's which our guide Jacko had teased up and lured within casting range of our 9' #12 rods. The excitement was unparalleled as the fish charged towards our fly's pushing water with their backs cutting through the surface. In the space of a hour we had multiple hook ups, lines and rods broken, one anglers towed towards the 'drop off' and an occasional fish landed. Words can not do it justice, it was fantastic.
As well as the GT's we landed lots of beautiful Bonefish which were there in huge shoals. The average size we landed was really high at approximately 6lb and some were caught at around 9lb. We also saw several fish at well over 10lb on one afternoon and typically I only had my #12 rod with me! These Bones were without doubt the hardest fighters Ive come across tearing hundreds of yards of backing out before you could regain control, truly putting your equipment to the test. We also caught a wide range of other species which I think is a major attraction to this area. Emperor fish, Trigger fish, Blue runner, Dogtooth Tuna, Permit, Grouper and Barracuda to name a few. Some beautiful, some weird but all fight like Tigers.

I used Sage 9'Xi2 rods which are specifically designed for saltwater use, #9 for Bonefish and Permit and #12 for the Giant Trevally. They cast a great line in difficult conditions and I cant recommend them enough. The reels I used were a Sage 3500D for the Bonefish and a Abel Super 12 for the Trevally, both featuring serious drag systems. Do not make the mistake of using anything but the very best reels for this sort of fishing as nothing puts reels under more stress than these types of fish and the extreme conditions you are fishing in. We at Gamefish carry a wide range of all the equipment needed if you ever decide to go a little crazy and try some serious saltwater angling, I would recommend you do its awesome.


Thanks go to Arno, Pauli and Jacko the guides who are all totally insane but also brilliant at what they do and a great pleasure to fish and have a beer with. Special thanks go to my good friend Keith Rose-Innes who organised the trip for me but sadly couldn't join us on the boat. Keith is a director of the travel company Flycastaway who have the best operation in the Seychelles, please have a look at their website if you are interested in fishing there. http://www.flycastaway.com/
You can view some more of Matt's photographs at his website; http://mattharrisflyfishing.com
I am hoping to lead a party back to the Seychelles this year, please let me know if you would be interested in joining me.
Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 12:26 PM

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Autumn update

I am delighted to report that the later half of the season was a dramatic improvement on the start. Large numbers of Grilse were caught through out Scotland with some records being set on Rivers such as the Thurso. In August alone the river landed over 600 fish, mostly Grilse but fantastic sport was had on all the beats.
Sadly for me I arrived in September when the water levels had dropped away and the fish had gone dour. Although the fishing wasnt at its peak we had great fun on my first trip to the river and in my 3 days managed to land 3 small Grilse. Some of our party did a lot better fishing Sunray shadows in the lower beats.
I returned from Thurso to fish the remaining 3 days of the week on the Findhorn. The river levels were really low and we caught nothing for the first 2 days but then following a small rise on Friday night Rory Forteath landed a 9lb and Ian Walls had a Grilse, all on the Sunray.

In August we took a few of our clients to the Junction on the River Tweed. I have never seen the river looking better with a good water levels and good clarity. As always its such a pleasure fishing at Junction with Billy Jack and Gavin being superb Ghillies and great company. We all hooked fish and quite a few were landed during our 3 days. Geoffrey Mitchell landed a lovely fresh Grilse whilst fishing with Gavin.

The two Ghillies seamed especially keen to assist with casting work when the wives and girlfriends of our clients joined us on the last day!
Thanks to them both for all their efforts. We also had some great sport with the Sea Trout, Rowland and Hugh who work at Gamefish had a cracking evening landing 4 fish. Hugh landed the best at 8.5lb
I had a 3 day visit to the Glenfurness beat of the River Findhorn in late August. The river was very low on arrival but flutuated during the following two days. There were runs of Grilse moving through the beat although they were modest in number. Clive Williamson pictured here landed a slightly coloured 6lb just after this photo was taken and I had 4 for my 3 days. The Glenfurness beats are among the most productive on the lovely river Findhorn but a certain level of fitness are required.

The River Dee had a fantastic time from late July until the close of the season. Park recovered fantastically from a very poor early season. In August they landed 242 whilst the average is in the 50's. September was also excellent with 285 landed. I was lucky enough to fish for a couple of days in both months and had a truly memorable time.
In August I was fishing with my good pal Ian Neale and his lovely wife Lady Barbara. I had a red hot time and landed 11 Salmon in 3 days and lost a really large fish. The water was high and the fish were running in waves. There is a pool at Park called Jetty which was heaving with fish but they wouldn't look at a thing, further downstream the pool becomes a long glide called Ash Tree and although there were only a small number of fish showing I dragged my bewildered body down to the pool and promptly landed 4 in an hour! It was great to see the river with such numbers of bright silver fish crashing around everywhere and the smiles on the Ghillies faces were a pleasure to witness.

It was then on to the River Spey at Delfur to fish the last day of the Spey season. Delfur is on of the most superb beats on the river and I was delighted to get the chance to fish it again. Although it was very low it was absolutely stuffed with fish any many of them bars of silver. I landed a lovely bright fish before lunch and then landed this lunker just before close of play. We guessed the fish to be around 20lb and after a terrific fight he was safely returned


The following trip to fish the last 2 days of the season was again first class. We arrived after another big rise in water which had me worried that the fish would of pushed through. Not the case at all, as I climbed out of the car Willie Muir waltzed past me having landed his second and lost a monster from the Cellar pool. As I proceeded to tackle up he promptly landed his third!
The runs of large silver fish were quite incredible and I grassed 9 in two days. Durris Stream more resembled fish soup than river with fish leaping through out the pool. If you didn't see 3 or 4 fish in the air you felt it had gone quiet, in some ways it can be more frustrating seeing them everywhere and not hooking them than fishing a river with hardly a sign of a fish.
On the Green Banks pool which is a fast and for the Dee quite a deep piece of water I resorted to a very fast sinking line when the fish went quiet one afternoon and landed 3 to 15lb, not your typical way of catching Dee fish but it goes to prove that a change in tactics can be very successful. I tailed a cracking fish of about 18lb for Ian Neale who changed tactics whilst fishing the Lower Kirks pool. Instead of going deep he went the reverse and slowly retrieved a small sunray shadow just subsurface and was rewarded with this beautiful fish.
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 9:02 AM

Monday, July 23, 2007

July update

Sorry once again for the delay in updating our news page. Whilst I was away fishing in Norway our computer crashed resulting in a complete loss of information relevant to updating our website.
Norway was an angling disaster, we didn't see a cloud or a fish in 3 days fishing and the air temperature was around 34% everyday, just like Scotland...not!
It was however great to catch up with my old friend Jan Daugaard. We did a few television programmes for Sky together. He now owns the Ingstad Østre beat on the river Stjørdal. This is a truly beautiful place, the scenery is stunning, the river is magnificent and the accommodation though fairly basic is very comfortable. Add to that the quality of Jan's cooking, Jugens guiding and it becomes a great place to fish.
The early weeks are not about quantity of fish but shear size. Up and down the river during our stay the average size of those caught was around 20lb with a few in the 30lb bracket. If any one would like the details of Jan's fishing just drop me a line and I will see what availability he has.
Here in Scotland it has not been a good season so far, obviously not helped by the constant rising and falling water levels. We need a bit of settled weather but the forecast isn't too good at the moment.
We are hoping that the reports of big numbers of Grilse in the North East of Scotland will start to impact further south soon. I heard from a very reliable source today that the lower Oykel had 160 fish last week! I am assuming such numbers were mainly Grilse. A client of ours had 9 fish to his own rod by lunch yesterday!
The Dee appears to have suddenly awaken from its early summer slumber. Last week the Banchory beat had a fantastic time with exactly 50 Salmon landed, followed by 16 on Monday 23rd. Park at last started to show its true form with 20 landed on Saturday, the largest being 18lb. I am lead to believe that the majority of the fish being caught on the Dee are multi sea winter fish of 10lb plus, late running Springer's or just big summer fish?

I had a day on Ballogie last Thursday and although I didn't land a fish it was good to see a few and even get a couple of offers. Clive Williamson and Jonathon Sutton were on the river on Saturday at Commonty and Middle Blackhall. Clive had an excellent day landing two Salmon between 12lb and 15lb and losing two Sea trout which were actually in his hands when he lost them...don't ask, he's from the Emerald Isle!
Jonathon had a 8lb Salmon, a 5lb Grilse and a Sea trout, both fish dripping with sea lice . A fellow angler lost a big fish after 10 minutes thought to be in the 30lb class.

I was invited up to fish Glenfurness on the lovely River Findhorn by Patrick Fothringam last Tuesday and despite a late night warning on the Monday that the river had risen 5ft in 30 minutes, I still went! When I arrived she was sitting just below 3ft so we soon got cracking. On a lovely high water pool called Chain Pool Patrick spotted a few fish head and tailing and saw a fish boil at my fly. A few minutes late I had a good hard take and was into a lovely fresh fish. Landing her in a heavy river was not fun but after sending my host into the pitch black water she was successfully tailed. The fish had taken one of our orange Pot Bellied Pig tube flies fished on a sink tip line. Patrick also had a fish that day and ended the week with a very respectable 11 fish.

My previous trip to Findhorn was successful for my dear friend Ian Neale but alas not for me. I believe the story is recounted on Ian's excellent website ; http://www.speycaster.net/fishing_news.htm I will of course be consulting my lawyers soon!
Although the river was again very big, we had a great day on a wonderful beat with the Ospreys and Roe Deer for company. Ian managing a lucky fish and me doing long range catch and release, sums up my season !
I was on the Findhorn as our weeks Sea trout fishing on the Spey at Kinhurdy was beginning to be a complete wash out, such a shame when you look forward to a week so much. One high light was Jeremy Lee landing a 6.5lb Brown Trout and another was Simon Chew landing his second ever Salmon, it was sea liced and caught approximately 60 miles from the sea!. In a week we only had two nights really worth trying to fish and managed 4 between us. Oh well there's always next year! On the lower beats of the Spey there have been big catches recorded but as usual little is ever reported. Orton, Delphur, Rothes, Arndilly's etc have all been rumoured to be averaging very good catches.

When the Tweed stops yo yowing and the colour drops out there have been some superb Sea trout landed, Ian, one of my fly tyers has had some crackers up to 12.5lb and he isn't alone, Rowland who helps me in the shops has had quiet a few up to 8lb. I'm sure the Salmon will be joining them soon.
Having literally just written the last sentence I received this photo of a Pink [Pacific Salmon] caught at Boleside yesterday [21st]. It is most probably a fish from Norway/Russia where there is a reasonable population, these came from Russian fish farming in the 1960's.
Stephen Kay and his wife Nicola headed off to Mongolia recently to try and catch a even more unusual species. The Taimen can grow to huge proportions, they weren't lucky enough to catch one but they did get a couple of nice fish on the fly.
There have been a number of clients heading to sunnier shore's this year and who could blame them!.

Clive Williamson and David Adamson have both been to Cuba and experienced magnificent Tarpon fishing. Clive who has now been 3 times had his best year so far with multiple hook ups and plenty of fish landed. Clive is a huge fan of Sage Xi2 Saltwater rods and Tibor Gulfstream reels and this year was most successful using Rio tarpon sinking lines and his home tied saltwater patterns. If clients need any specialist flies tied please contact us, Clive will tie the best patterns on the best hooks but only for vast amounts of Vino! Remember Im his agent!!

I love this picture of David{Jones} holding on for dear life in case he is torn off the Skiff. He did manage to land some superb fish, but did also point out that you really needed quality equipment to handle 80lb plus Tarpon. He uses Abel reels to handle the raw power of a Tarpon run.
My good friend Alan Olivier from South Africa has recently been out to the Zambezi fishing for Tiger fish. That part of Africa has been experiencing record rainfall, just like here in Scotland. This impacted on the quality of the fishing as the majority of Tigers were swimming around the flooded land rather than in river. They did catch some quality fish. Alan's ideal outfit is a Sage Xi2 9' rated for a 9 line, attached to his Tibor Everglades reel is a 300/400gr fast sinking line but in the evening he swop's to a floating line as the fish feed closer to the surface.
I am discussing with Alan taking a trip to Alan's boat next year, if any one is interested in joining me please contact me.
Gamefish carries a large range of quality tackle and clothing to cater for any destination around the world. If we can help at all please contact us.
That's all for the moment, hopefully I will be able to add some more stories soon when I receive news of hoards of our Atlantic Salmon heading up the streams of their birth. Tight lines.
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 12:07 PM

Thursday, April 19, 2007

April 2007

Sorry about the complete lack of updates for this season. Entirely my fault as I left my camera on the Deveron back end of last season, actually its still their!!

Well so far its not been a record breaker to say the least. There are however some positives, the main one being the average size of the Salmon this year.
Here's one I took of the Dee on Thursday night [18th April] whilst fishing with my good friends Alan Olivier and Ian Neal. It was a terrible day for fishing with bright sunshine and summer levels. The fish took a size 10 ThunderFlash on 13.6 Seaguar Fluorocarbon, more like mid summer fishing than April. After a fair tussle the fish was beached, admired and returned. Ian and I estimated the fish between 18 and 20lb.



An even better fish was landed in early March by visiting angler Robert Gillespie from the Cellar pool. Netted by new boy Ghillie Kenny-Southbank-Reid.
The fish was estimated at 25lb and was covered in sea lice.



Otherwise Ive been flying around a bit, as well as the Dee Ive had a lot of fun on the Spey [but nae fish], fishing Tulchan D beat on the opening day. Tony Black had a lovely fish of 12lb on a Templedog tube fly, then it was on to Easter Elchies, Wester Elchies and with Bill Drury at Lower Pitchroy. All of them superb beats offering awesome fly fishing but there appear to be few fish around to date. I did hear today that a rod at Delfur grassed a 27lb fish which would not recover, he had 2 hours earlier landed a fish estimated at over 30lb which was returned, now that is some days fishing.

I had a very pleasant day at Upper Hendersyde on Tweed as a guest of David Pigott a couple of weeks ago and although we didn't land a fish the day I was their, they did have 5 for the week. There were plenty of fish in the beat but due to the weather most of the fishing was done first thing in the morning and late into the evening.



I also had a couple of days on the Findhorn at Altyre but only managed to loose one but it did go ballistic spending most of the fight dancing up and down the Rowan pool.
Ian Neale has had a bit more success with his clients. Here is Andrew Shaw with a cracking 12lb from the Rowan Pool. Don seems to love this river as this is his 3rd fish in his 2 visits.


Ian and I had a great day at Park in late February when we both managed to land our first fish of the season.
Mine came from Castleton which is a great pool in high water.It took one of our new Cascade Templedog Tubes fished on a wet cel 2.
What a great feeling landing your first fish of the season.

Ian's was also a superb fish with long tail sea lice covering its back, they don't get much fresher than that!
Just to bring us back down to earth, the next day every other angler seemed to be catching fish and we didn't touch a fish all day. Its a great leveler is Salmon fishing!


Earlier in the season we had are regular boys trip to Park on the Dee. This year the weather was terrible with strong winds mixed with blizzards. Plenty of Kelts to help keep us warm but no fresh fish for our two days.
We also should thank the new owners of the Potarch Hotel for the quality of there refit, warm welcome and excellent food.
Ok that's the wee bit of news to date more again soon especially if I can get my camera back !
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 11:05 AM

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Fishing update October 4th

Well the weather has started to change which has resulted in regular rises in river levels. Sadly this doesn't seem to have resulted in a decent run of Autumn fish yet. As the summer was long and the Grilse came late it seems that the multi sea winter fish are following suit Grilse however seem to keep on coming in large numbers.
I was invited down to Bemersyde on Tweed by Brian McAllister on Thursday 28th. I was really looking forward to fishing this beat as it is one if not the most beautiful piece of water on the Tweed system. Brian had been at Rutherford the previous day and the water conditions had been good with Brian landing 4 to his own rod. It should by mentioned that Brian was sharing his rod with his great friend Malcolm Gillan who caught nothing!.


Unfortunately we timed our visit just as the river had risen and was the colour of milk chocolate. So for the first time since the Spring our sinking lines and Copper tubes were the order of the day.

Ian Farr the Head Ghillie took Patrick Burns and myself to the top of the beat. Ian put Patrick in the boat whilst I was given a fairly interesting pool to wade. A couple of fish showed which served to prolong my enthusiasm in very difficult conditions and I managed to hook and land a Grilse of 5lb. I don't know who was more surprised, me or Ian. The fish took a Copper Ally tube dressed for Gamefish by Les Robson. Its a deadly pattern in the Autumn.
That was the end of the action for the day as the river continued to colour up but a fine day was had by all. The following day with the colour getting better 3 fish were landed, Malcolm redeemed himself with an 11lb fish which was landed after a long fight. On the Saturday 4 fish were landed with Brain catching a 13lb bar of silver. Tweed ended the week with a total of 477 Salmon landed with a good number of fish coming off the upper beats.

Whilst I was on Tweed my colleague at Gamefish, Rowland Robinson was fishing my rod on the Dee with our client Charles Fothringham. Rowland had a nice fish of 14lb and Charles had a grilse from the same pool.
I was up to the Dee with Clive Williamson on the Friday and Saturday to see out the last days of the season. Park is usually heaving with late run Salmon at this time of the year but sadly they hadn't arrived before the close. The river was in perfect order on the Friday and what a difference from the day before on Tweed where we had been using wet cel lines and 1.5'' tubes. I had 6 offers on the Sunray Shadow fished on a floating line with slow sink poly tip but the fish just weren't in the mood to take it properly. That was until I handed my rod to Head Ghillie and good friend Keith Cromar who proceed to hook and land a Grilse from Lower Kirks pool, you can go off people rapidly!
The Saturday started with a cold mist on the water but soon burnt off to become a roasting hot cloudless day, more like July than end September.
Despite the conditions Clive hooked and landed a cracking fresh Grilse of 5lb from the Upper Kirks pool. Now there was a happy boy after we had safely returned the fish to the river.
The day just got brighter and subsequently a long lunch was called for and with Jonathan Sutton sharing my rod many fishing tales were recalled accompanied by much laughter.
After lunch I managed to coax a grilse of 4lb into attacking the Sunray and this time it held on. I had Jonathan trying the Sunray for the first time and although he didn't manage to land a fish the pure excitement of seeing fish chasing the fly means we have another Sunray addict in our midst!.
So the 2006 season on the Dee came to a close, it was a really mixed year with outstanding Spring fishing followed by prolonged periods of low water. Then the Grilse came in good numbers followed by a relatively poor Autumn. That's fishing, there's always next year!

On Sunday whilst recovering from a hectic few days on the river I received a phone call from my good friend Patrick Fothringham, did I fancy a day on Monday at Murthly on the Tay. Guilt got the better of me and I decided to do some work in the shop in the morning then head up to the beat in the afternoon. When I got there the morning had been poor, no fish and the river running high but clear.
As Patrick and I headed up river with the excellent Ghillie Tony[crime watch]Black we could see Charles Fothringham playing a Grilse at the Corner pool. Filled with enthusiasm after witnessing Charles success we headed on to the marvelous Tronic pool. Armed with a sink tip line, a size 6 Cascade fly and Tony's knowledge we started to throw a line. In what seemed like just minutes my fly was pulled strongly and the fish was on. Although hardly a bar of silver this 15lb cock fish put up a strong fight and is my best fish of the season so far. After this quick photo in the rain the fish went back to do what he had traveled many miles to achieve. Later in the afternoon Patrick hooked and lost a fish in a pool which he is famous for losing fish in! Murthly is the equivalent to Bemersyde, surrounded by stunning scenery both beats offer exceptional fly water with first class Ghillies. A real pleasure to fish.
As I sign off from this update I have just received a call from Rowland informing me he has just caught and returned a fish of 13lb from Ashiestiel on Tweed... and Im at work!
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 12:16 PM

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Fishing Update September 19

When I said I was praying for rain in my last update, I hadn't quite envisaged that we would receive so much !
Our party arrived on the R. Findhorn on Thursday morning to find no flow in the pools. There were however Grilse showing in the faster water at the necks of most of the pools which encouraged us to give it a go. The neck of Roehillock pictured here, was stuffed with bright Grilse but we couldn't get them to look at our flies.



Later in the day I got lucky with a Grilse of 4lb from a small pocket of water below Pallamore which was great sport on my 10' Sage.The fly was a small cone head Red Francis tube which we import from Iceland. It is very effective when the rivers are low.




During the course of the day it rained and then it poured and finally it was torrential. This photo shows Clive Williamson fishing the Rowan pool after lunch. We were all excited that this would lift the river and envisaged a spate but the size of the rise was incredible.




These photos should give you an indication of how quickly the Findhorn can rise. When we left the river on Thursday night Soldiers Hole is very low. On Friday morning there is no pool just a massive torrent of water.




We did fish the quiet edges and David Adamson [Jones] landed a Grilse from the tail of Rowan and Clive had a Sea Trout from Pallamore. Not bad when you consider the river was still around 4 foot !



We were truly over the moon when we arrived back on the river on Saturday morning. Although still high, around 2 feet, the Altye beat has water that fishes at most heights. I fished with Jones on the Rowan and had a Grilse of 3lb whilst Jones had one at 1lb! The Copper Ally Shrimp tied for Gamefish by Jimmy Younger was doing the damage on a sink tip line. We saw a lot of Grilse moving through the pool but didn't
manage to contact with another.
Our feeling was that we had caught the end of the run as the pool went very quiet.
We then went down to Garden pool which is a lovely pool although difficult to wade.
Jones poached a 5lb Grilse from behind me which put up a good battle before being quickly returned. Clive and Jonathan Sutton caught a Grilse each from Pallamore. Jonathan described the pool as being like the M6 for Grilse when he first arrived. We end up with 7 for the day but we were a bit disappointed that the larger Autumn fish had not shown up but 9 Grilse for 3 days with a 5ft flood in the middle of it is not bad going.
If you are interested in fishing this fantastic beat contact Ian Neale at ian@speycaster.net or view his website www.speycaster.net

On Monday I was at Islamouth on the mighty R.Tay as a guest of Graham Catton. The river had also experienced a big water on Friday but was at a good height with the colour dropping out, all was looking perfect.
I fished from the boat with the head Ghillie Brian who has been on the beat for 18 years. He knows every stone of this fantastic beat which is a benefit on such a big river. We saw only a few fish in the morning but managed this 8lb from New Shot, I have never seen a fish with so many long tailed sea lice. After a quick photo she was released to carry on to the spawning grounds. Michael Leather lost a cracking fish after 20 minutes which was estimated to be around 20lb, Graham landed a nice fish from Long Head and several other fish were lost before lunch. After lunch we saw a lot more fish and I had a nice sea liced Grilse from the Castle pool and Graham managed another 2. He also lost a fish estimated at 15 lb before the end of the day. Thank you Graham for a great day on a superb beat.

The R. Tweed has started to fish in the last week with large numbers of Salmon coming off the high tides. Eric who is the Ghillie at Horncliffe reported that large numbers of Salmon were moving through his beat. I had an email from Ronald Campbell who is the Tweed Scientist reporting that 30 salmon were tagged yesterday, 23 in one shot of the net. 14 today, and 12 Sea-trout, two of which were 12-13 lbs.
The general weather forecast is for wet and windy weather so with more consistent water levels in all our rivers we should start to see the larger Autumn fish.
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 1:52 PM

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Fishing Update September

Apologizes are in order once again for the very late update of the Fishing here in Scotland .
You can blame the wife, yes I finally got married ! Many thanks to all our customers for their kind words and some lovely gifts. For those who haven't asked...I didn't take my rods on my Honeymoon!!

In my last update I mentioned that I was heading to Kinhurdy on the R. Spey for a weeks Sea Trout fishing, well it wasn't quite the bonanza we had hoped for. This wasn't due to the lack of fish but the weather conditions. .
During the nights the temperature dropped to just above freezing with the exception of two nights where we all caught fish. We caught over 30 Sea Trout for our 5 nights and the largest was a cracking 6.5lb caught by Tim Franklin
Kinhurdy has one of the best Ghillies ever to grace a river bank. Thanks Hugh for a lot of fun and good luck recovering from the knee operation.



The general story regarding the Grilse this year has followed a similar path to last year, they arrived but arrived very late. Few rivers saw much of a run until the last week of July but on the plus side they are still running.



The Tay which doesn't suffer from the effects of low water has had a superb months fishing. Tony Black at Murthly 2 was well up on last years monthly total with 97 fish.


Most other rivers have suffered from a lack of rain but we have had occasional lifts of water which have resulted in good catches. I had a great day on the Lower Dee with Ian Neal and his better half Barbara towards the end of August.
We were the only ones fishing the beat and we landed 6 cracking Fish between us. We were also astounded by how hard they fought, I had a real tussle with a 8lb sea licer in the Silver Spoon pool. This picture shows her recovering before carrying on upstream to spawn.



Gamefish regular Patrick Burns has fished like a demon this season.
He had a terrific week in Russia and was convinced he would find it difficult getting back into fishing in Scotland [man of little faith]. However he hadn't reckoned on this beautiful fish from the R Ness. It was his first 20lb Salmon and he managed to land it on his own, this is no small feat if you know Patrick !

Last week I joined Nigel Passmore and friends on Park.
What a week we had although the water was still low until a 2ft lift on Wednesday. The party had an unbelievable 96 Salmon/ Grilse and 20 Sea Trout for the week. Not bad for 9 rods. Many thanks as always to Keith Cromer [head Ghillie] for looking after us so well.

That's it for now, I'm fishing the R Findhorn for the next few days and I'm praying for rain !
 Posted by Gamefish Ltd. on 2:12 PM

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