I am a bit late in writing up Sunday’s last outing of my week off. To be honest there was little to report on what turned out to be a difficult and fruitless nights angling at Swanswater. With the World Cup Final on it was always likely to be quiet and I arrived up there at 18:00 for the last 4 hours of the day. It was quite bright but there was a fairly stiff breeze and I sort of hoped that this would make the fishing viable. Unfortunately Alastair admitted to me it had been a difficult couple of days though Friday, another bright day, had apparently fished well all day. Such fickle things the Troot!

As I made my way round the main loch and passed one of the two other anglers there, I said hello and asked how the he was doing. He had had one fish, a blue, on a gold beaded nymph but had seen nothing move since arriving about 3/4 of an hour earlier. I carried on my way to have a wee cast round the mouth of the burn which was cooler and in the shade. “The Unfamous Fly!, isn’t it… the website….” I was a bit startled then realised the guy I was speaking to was one of a pair of anglers who had been at Swanswater the last time I was there from over East Lothian, Tranent in fact, only a few miles from where I grew up in Musselburgh.

They had been up to Frandy but came away as it was blowing a gale and couldn’t remember the other places I mentioned to them on their last visit when they were asking about other fisheries in the area. It seemed to me at the time they were on a bit of a lads road trip round fisheries. While they remembered my website ( which I told them about so they could use my fishery review pages to locate the places I told them about) they hadn’t it seemed actually done that and consequently hadn’t been able to find some of the locations we discussed last time!

Anyway after a blether I got on with the fishing. I decided to start on a dry, more out of wishful thinking, and immediately got a rise from a fish in the burn area though I suspect it was a wee wild fish. After 10 minutes here I then moved round behind the island but fishing sub surface was a trial of patience as there was a lot of weed breaking the surface about 10 yards out and proving to be a bit of a snag-fest, even on a dry. The wind was very strong too and blew one cast about 5-6 yards left to right hooking the flies in one of the trees on the island. One lost leader and flies then!

I decided to move round onto the island and spent the next couple of hours here. I seen a few fish move but I am pretty sure nothing sizeable and managed to get the attention of a couple of Perch but nothing else. I fished dries and buzzers and I am almost ashamed to admit a couple of smaller beadheaded lures but had only the tugs and takes of the wee Perch. With about an hour remaining and no sign of a rise of any sort being about to start I headed over to the wee ponds.

Fish did start to show here but again there was a wee bit weed to contend with in places and despite trying a broad range of dry flies ( there were plenty fish on top by nine thirty, I never got so much as an offer: Sedges, Shuttlecocks, CDC split wings , hoppers, hopper poppers,  Bits. There was nothing of note showing insect wise on the water so it was kind of hard to match any sort of hatch. One younger lad stopped to chat as he headed away and said he had spent 6 hours thrashing the other pond to a foam with nothing to show for it and then came up to the smaller pond, and got 3 fish on a foam headed dry daddy before a Tiger stole his fly. I tried a daddy but they weren’t interested in mine either! The guys from the east had nothing either as far as I could ascertain, and had quite a long run through for nothing to show for it.

Such is fishing I guess. I managed 5 evening outings in a week, the most for a very long time but the tally of fish was kind of thin, with Millhall providing the best sport. The summer doldrums have set in I fear.