Lucky for Some At Hoddom

I have been looking forward to the first River Annan Grayling Day of the season and finally getting a chance to get out on a river I fish far too infrequently for a fish I love to catch. Like many anglers who have struggled to get out this year, between the dry summer, then massive amounts of rain a few weeks ago, COVID, other commitments….we were due a bit of a break when all our stars aligned. And that day was yesterday. The weather was uncharacteristically perfect for a day of Grayling pursuit. It has been very mild of late and quite windy, but Sunday was fairly calm, very clear and out the sun at least, very cold.

Hoddom

Three of us, myself, Radek and Marcin were at Lockerbie Truck Stop, the designated beat allocation venue just after 8am and were allocated Hoddom. I have only fished Hoddom once, ( in fact I thought for a minute twice but on checking back, I was right, it was only once before ) though it is a very popular beat. The three of us headed to the river, I am inclined to believe the best fishing for Grayling is either early on, or later in the day and time waits for no man. John was going to meet up with us at the river as he had been working nights, and at least Hoddom is a beat he would have no issue locating as he goes there a lot with his caravan.

The Pimp Mobile

We were just tackling up when John arrived in the Pimped up Pickup. I took ages to get my gear together ( as usual) and Radek and Marcin headed upstream and I headed to a pot I wanted to try based on a recollection from the last time I was on Hoddom. Almost right away ( within 4 or 5 casts), I hooked up to a wee juvenile Grayling, probably one of this years brood. The water pace and clarity was pretty much perfect and the bottom here seems ideal for the Lady of the stream. John joined me getting in above me by a tree. It seemed to be a little deeper near the edge where he was, and at one point I heard a noise and turned to see what looked like John having a bit of bracing Breast-stroke above me. All I could see were his shoulders and head. I thought initially he had taken an early bath…John does like to have a wee swim in the rivers now and again, especially in winter in my experience, but he was saved by a close fitting hem on his Simms jacket, He had waded into a bit of a hole and sunk up literally above the top of his waders, but the water was kept out by the jacket for just long enough for him to regain his footing and get to a safer depth. Close one!

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We fished here until about 11:30 ish….it was cold here shaded by trees. All the time you could see the sun through the branches of the trees that line the river but it was never able to cast any warmth on you so it did begin to get cold, especially with constant wet hands from unhooking fish. We were both getting regular, mostly small grayling, here. I think I released about 10 losing just the one on the way in, and John I think had four though when he moved down to where I had started, he was getting lots of wee knocks and pulls ( as I had been ) from what seemed to be a fair few small fish in this stretch. Thats not to say they were all small. I had a couple that were better sizes, and one of those was comfortably a one and a half to 2 lb fish. In length I was closer to the pound and a half kind of size but it was a very thick set fish and might have weighed in closer to the 2lb level. Certainly it put up a good account of itself coming to the net and was a bit of a handful trying to grab a quick snap of. John too had a fish that was similar, maybe slightly smaller amongst the ones he netted.

We stopped for a cup of tea as Radek and Marcin came down back to the parking area and we were enjoying a bite to eat in the very pleasant sunshine. We decided to head up the other end of the beat for the afternoon which was interesting for me as I had never been much past the well known bridge that marks the middle of the beat.

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After a short drive Radek and Marcin parked up by the bridge with a plan to fish up the way and John and I headed up to the top of the beat with a plan to fish downstream. It was much more open and sunny up here. While it was undoubtedly pleasant fishing in the sunshine, so a lot less cold, it was coming to us from behind. This inevitably meant, in these higher latitudes that the sun cast long shadows across the river in front of you as you waded. While grayling are fairly well known to be tolerant of anglers presence, I am also pretty sure like most wild creatures they will move as soon as any unnatural shadow is suddenly cast over them.

A change of location

Whether this was the reason, or it was just the typical afternoon lull that seems to typify winter grayling fishing, but none of us was exactly hammering the silver fish in the afternoon. Radek and Marcin soon joined us by the golf course and we all had a few fish which always seemed to be in one particular stretch. Radek in particular was either fishing a bug or in a manner that seemed especially attractive to Brown Trout, and he had three in rapid succession from a spot where I think all of us fished with nothing to show for, previously.

I picked up three more fish here closing my account at 13, one decent sized Grayling one juvenile and one kind of in between, John was much the same I think and Radek and Marcin both had fish as well though as I say Radek seemed to be a bit of a Brown Trout magnet, not only in the afternoon but in the morning too I think. He had three I think decent Grayling and a few Brown Trout as well then.

What was catching

All but three of my fish were on a Size 16 French Nymph ( Frenchie), the others were on a small pink shrimp pattern. I never caught a single fish on the bottom ( point) fly. Radek seemed to be able to draw the brownies in on a small mostly Purple bug. John I think left most of the contents of his fly box on the bottom of the river by all accounts…..between his box actually falling to bits…and the number of bugs he left stuck on the bottom of the river, there must be about £50 worth of Tungsten down there, worth salvaging when the water is low!

The Lull

It was midafternoon and things had definitely gone “off” a bit so we stopped for a bit of a blether and discussion of what to do next. Had we all been on blanks I suspect we would all have gamely fished on into the dusk as often the Grayling pick up again as the sun started to set. However as we all had fish in the bag ( in a manner of speaking) I think we were all fairly content to end what is a long day as you do need to leave early to get here and get the best of the morning so it was a walk back to the cars and the longish drive home for tea and medals after a great day out. Already looking forward to my next Grayling outing.