My son and I went up to Lake of Menteith yesterday (Saturday ) for a late days fishing, I think the official evening fishing ticket times have ended but fishing as a guest of one of the families who own rights on the lake (loch?) , we took the boat out at the back of three and fished until dusk around nine. We pretty much had the loch to ourselves for all but the first hour.
As we got the boat out the boathouse a near the cages it had up to this point been a pretty windy day and on the drive up to Port of Menteith the lake looked quite choppy with a few white horses in places, but in the time we tackled up and launched it eased considerably. Still, there were plenty boats out and up at the top end near the cages there were at least half a dozen drifting down the line of the out of bounds markers.
A few were catching too and I enquired of one angler what was doing the damage, ” a Bunny Leach” he replied.
I set up both myself and James on floating lines- I had my brand new Airflo 40+ 7 weight on the HM3 and set up him with a Cats Whiskers Booby on point with a Cruncher on top dropper. A two fly cast is enough for him, I also had two flies fishing a couple of wets, a claret bumble on top and a copper nymph on point.
The boat driver
The first drift went fine and let us warm up but we never touched a fish and only seen one all the way down. The drift of the bay was taking 40 mins so we returned to the top to try again, as the other anglers rapidly departed for the end of their shift. Changing tactics we went for a Damsel on point and a GRHE on top for me, and a White Bunny Leach and a Black Pennel for James. About half-way down the drift- which was slowing as the wind eased further I had a sharp knock and a great, great fight from a very fit near 3lb rainbow that came safely to the net. Next cast I had a sharp knock but no fish, and we soon completed the drift. We decided to return to the top of the bay and have a bite to eat and maybe try some dry-fly, if fish could be spotted in the smoother water.
A few fish were rising and so I fitted a couple of dries to James’ outfit and started him casting. There were fish about but he was tending to put the line out short, and not really loading the rod properly so I took it from him for a second and put the flies out at a decent range where I suspected trout may lie. Almost immediately a fish grabbed the point fly- an LTD Sedge and took off at a fair rate of knots, it leapt towards us and keeping the tension on I handed the rod back to James. He held the fish near the boat for a few seconds but then it was obvious the fish was off- I don’t know if he eased off too much or if it simply got free but it was gone. The fly cleaned up and de-slimed, I cast out again for him and immediately another take! This one though never stayed on for me and came off right away.
The amputee fly
We fished on, on dries and drifted the side of the bay but never caught any more and it seemed to ebb down in activity. We headed down to the section called the Rookery and decided to have another go on the dries here. There were fish everywhere but hard to tempt- harder still as by now the water was oily smooth. I was using a brown Klinkhammer when I had a very very subtle take, the fish came in so lethargically I was sure it must be a small wild Brown. WRONG! It then woke up and took off like a train, this fish fought like mad making deep diving runs first away from the boat then deep under it, my rod was bent double and the fish was right beneath the boat running rings round us. I applied quite bit force and got its head up on the surface and started looking to get the net, I could see it was hooked in the top lip and as I drew it close it decided it was having none of that and dived again, this time it went slack! I retrieved the line expecting the fly to be gone, but no, it was there. It did not look right though and on closer inspection the hook had broken, I have the dressing and the eye of the fly here, but no pointy end! Bummer but terrific sport.
As the evening wore on the fish definitely got choosy and but for a few swirls on my fly and James missing a sitter on a dry daddy longlegs- not watching! we never had much more. I put on a small brown Damsel for the last ten minutes and had one knock but it was getting dark now and game over!
So great sport, a lot of fun and one really good fish to show for it, I think we both enjoyed the day.
