Take a New Angler fishing
It’s something we hear a lot, to take a non angler out for the first time. I have mentioned to a few work colleagues ( not that i have many based up here) that if the opportunity arises I should take them fishing. It transpired that both myself and colleague Alan were on leave this Friday with no particular plans for the day so I asked-“fancy a go at fly fishing?”.
“Why not ” was the response so we made plans to meet at my place, have an hour in the playing-field across the road, learning rudimentary casting- I am no instructor in the sport so I have to say that I found it harder than I anticipated. It is kind of hard to explain where it’s going wrong despite the fact you can see when the line isn’t forming the ideal sort of loop. After more than an hour and having also explained what to do if you hook a fish, with the basics at a level safe to take to the water, we broke for lunch before heading up to the wee ponds at Swanswater.
I was surprised how busy the fishery was generally and also that there were anglers on the wee ponds. We tackled up with floating lines to keep things easy for Alan and he had a single fly, I tied him on a wee damsel pattern as the few anglers coming off the main loch seemed to have caught all their fish on these. I had a beaded nymph on the point and a buzzer on the dropper. We went onto the lower pond as there looked to be more space there and started. It was pretty cold and grey, though when the breeze dropped it was noticeable that a few fish rose closer to the far side.
Alan playing the fish I hooked ona dry, he did Ok until it decided to have a second run!
A couple of anglers were across there already and the fish looked to be an easy short cast for them. After 10 minutes or so I decided to change things and check out Alan’s leader- it had a few knots in so we got rid of them and replaced his Damsel with a Squirmy Wormy. I was on to a dry on point as I thought it was worth a go as fish were moving far out on the top. I had no sooner returned to my rod when I seen Alan’s line go off and a flash of silver under the water. “I think that was a fish” said Alan but he had dropped the rod tip- I urged him to raise it- I could see there was a fish on but he thought he had missed it. Nope still on! OK so it was only a Perch but Alan was pretty please with this proud wee chap and we were going to take a photo but he dropped it in the water! Ha ha! Once he was back fishing I returned to fish my dry with a buzzer on the dropper. Almost right away there was a swirl at my fly and the line moved off, I lifted and the fish was on, a proper trout. I shouted Alan over to take it from me, might as well let him get the feel of a real fish. He was doing well initially and got the fish in to about a rod length from the bank when it got its second wind. It headed off and Alan didn’t let the fish have enough line and it managed to get off- I thought he was broken but in fact I think it pulled the hook. Not to worry we had a method and in my view I had had a fish! We managed to raise and turn maybe 2 or 3 fish each but no more took on the Shuttlecock dries. When the anglers moved on the far side we went over there and gave it a go where the fish were close to the bank which made things easier for Alan. The fish were far from easily spooked but were clearly fixated on tiny wee midges just under the surface. I tried a myriad of patterns to match the hatch, including wee black spiders, microscopic F flies and similar patterns- none got a touch and pretty soon our 2 hours were up. Good fun, I think Alan enjoyed it though maybe a warmer day in future.
New season at Pendreich
Saturday in contrast to Friday was warm and bright, in fact warmer up the hill behind Bridge of Allan than it was at ground level at home. I decided to get a few hours on Pendreich to see my Brown Trout Season launched. As I drove up the track another old boy was coming the other way, which made for several minutes of amusement watching him try to reverse about 10 yards to a space to allow us to pass. Hopeless. (this is relevant).
A sunny start to my Brown trout season. Maybe too sunny?
Anyway There were two anglers I could see fishing, one on the dam wall and another on the South bank as I arrived to tackle up. The former moved up the North Bank as I was making ready. It was bright and still, maybe not ideal for fish catching. The angler who had went up the north bank then returned to fish further along the dam wall and I decided to start on the dam wall myself and see what was happening. I had a small black beaded DB on point and a wee buzzer on the dropper, two was enough to start with I felt.
I had only cast once or maybe two times when I became aware of two lads on the North bank sat behind a bush. I wasn’t sure right away but as one kept going to something on the bank I realised he was fishing with bait rods. Uh oh! I decided something needed saying as they were then pulling in a sizeable fish. I wound my line in. I then heard the other angler on the dam shout over to them- they shouldn’t be fishing.
I kind of thought he might have joined me to move them on but alas no. Nor did the other angler on the far bank who must have had a better view than the rest of us. It then became clear there were two of them with 4 rods out bait fishing. I politely asked them to wind in and remove themselves. One was a “lad”- in his twenties I had seen before ( though he denied it) the other was new to me. The former was Ok and started to pack up, the other was insistent he got another 25 minutes. which I argued with him wasn’t on, no permits, no bait, one rod…. In fairness they were releasing their catch as far as I could see and admitted initially to one fish of 3lb that I seen them return. However a little later as I loitered and they protested their innocence that they were being removed because “the fly anglers were jealous they were better fishermen” to some passers by, they claimed to have caught 4 fish. Not one of the other members came to help which I was very pissed off about. They also claimed an old boy came by earlier and told them it was Ok to fish as long as they put them back. I don’t know if I believe this, or was it the old guy who left as I arrived?
After they left I was not too hopeful of a fish but fished down this North bank back towards the dam. No interest was shown and it went pretty quiet other than the odd fish moving far out. The other two anglers then mysteriously disappeared. I fished my last half hour sat in the pleasant sunshine in the dam wall. A few fish rose in front of me, well out but I tried to cover them with a small black dry and a nymph on the dropper but still didn’t get any attention and by then it was about tea time so left empty handed. Nice first day of my season though could have done without the hassle of poachers.
