First of all I must apologise for not updating the blog in a couple of weeks as I was off on holidays. In my absence the fishing continued and indeed was not bad at all with 26 fish landed in the interim.
The weather was relatively dry although we did have one good flood on the 14th that put the river to 70 but it ran off quickly and was below 10 again within four days.
Urs continued in his good vain of form after landing his 400th with a fish from Fin Stream on the 10th of 11lbs9ozs on a Collie Dog. He followed this up on the 12th with one of 6lbs15.5ozs from the harbour on Fin on a Francis.
It was then the Turn of Rich Taylor from Brighton to land his first ever salmon. It was a fine fish of 9lbs14.5ozs from the stream on Finlough, taken on a Cascade on the 13th.
There were two landed on the 14th with Malcolm Bell taking one from the Kings pool of 5lbs5ozs on a Cascade and Markus Merz landing one of 3lbs4ozs on an Ally from Morrisons.
The 15th belonged to Urs when he landed four, one from the Grilse pool of 3lbs on a Silver Stoat. The second was from the Quarry pool also on a Silver Stoat of approx. 4lbs. His third was off Fin of approx. 10lbs on a Willie Gunn and finally the fourth also off Fin on a Willie Gunn of 5lbs1oz.
If the 15th belonged to Urs the 16th belonged to Mark Corps who landed five all off the Turn and Quarry pools, three on beaded nymphs, one on a Cascade and one on a Tara. They weighed in at 4lbs3ozs, 6lbs, 4lbs11ozs, approx. 7 and approx. 5. Sean Dempsey also managed to land two fish both in the Bridge pool on nymphs, one of approx. 3lbs and one fresh fish of 5lbs.
Paul Shalvey had a fish on the 17th off the Turn pool of 4lbs11ozs on a beaded nymph. Tom Burke aged seven also managed to land his first ever also off the Turn pool on a beaded nymph of 6lbs15ozs. Paul Shalvey had another two, one off the Turn pool of 6lbs8ozs on a beaded nymph and one off Finlough of 7lbs1oz on a Collie Dog on the 19th. Hugh Brennan also had a fish off Finlough of 2lbs5ozs on a Delphi Collie.
On the 21st John Boland had one off the Turn pool on a beaded nymph of 3lbs5ozs. Yesterday the fish started to move and we landed three, with Andrew Cunningham having two, one of 8lbs8ozs off Boat Point on Fin on a Collie Dog and the other off the Turn pool of 4lbs12ozs on a Red Francis. Stephen Kennedy also had a fish of 7lbs4ozs off the Turn pool on a nymph.
This morning we got some heavy rain and as the river began to rise William McBarnet had a fresh fish of approx. 7lbs8ozs off the Turn pool on a Cascade. The river is now running at 60 and with broken weather forecast it should keep it at good levels for a few days to come. Although I would say it’s very hard to go by the forecast here for the last couple of months.
Sea trout have been a little quieter in my absence, although this was in part due to the fact that a lot of anglers were targeting salmon. There is no great hatch of Daddy’s yet and I’m sure the sea trout will turn on again then. In the past two weeks we landed approx. 60 again the majority small but in excellent condition.
I would be hopeful that if we get some normal Autumnal weather the fishing will pick up dramatically. D.McEvoy