I was keen to get out but it was well cold outside the house, and a sudden downpour sent me scurrying back into the house. Too cold, too wet. But it didn’t last and I toyed with heading down the river, but there was a problem. It’s time to get the upstairs carpets changed in the house so we are slowly moving everything out the house into the garage and it’s full of beds and related stuff. I can’t reach my river fishing gear now the garage is full. My heavier rod was already in the car and the rest of my gear was in the boat box where I left it after Menteith last outing. In a short run I was up at Pendreich and it was windy and cold. No one was there and there was a cold easterly wind blowing in to the dam wall. The loch rarely fishes well in an easterly ( as the lack of any other anglers was evidence of) but if you are going to do it best do it from a boat and fish with the wind behind you.
When I was up at the boathouse getting the oars I had a look at the catch returns. As far as I could tell only 18 fish have been caught this season ( at least recorded) and half of those seem to have been taken. Not a particularly bountiful harvest in 5 days short of a month.
Out in the boat rigged with a three fly team of bush wet, beaded point Diawl Bach and a buzzer on the middle I headed up wind and anchored over water well out from the bank near finging weeds. I had noticed from the off that there were quite a few birds swooping in low over the water suggesting there wer einsects coming off and when I looked behind the boat in relatively calm water I could see tiny wee midges steadily coming off the water. So there were flies around. I had fished maybe 10 minutes when I thought I seen a fish disturb the surface in front of me, or was it wishful thinking, wasn’t sure. Then a fish leapt from the water maybe 50 yard down wind, and as it hit the water another leapt an easy cast from the boat. Maybe I hadn’t imagined it at all. I covered the fish but had nothing in return for my efforts.
I didn’t give it too many tries before I decided to change my flies. A new threesome went on and I fished these varying the retreive speed. Nothing. I let the boat drift down about 10 yards and tried again. Nothing, I changed flies again, then changed the line to a slow sinker, then all the flies again. In all I tried about 18 flies in a couple of hours of very cold fishing. I never seen another fish until I decided to head in and call it a day when a fish in typical fashion right up in the East end of the loch, rose right in front of the boat. as I recovered the anchor. Still to get my first brownie of the season.
