Nowt, odder than trout

It struck me as I arrived at Loch Coulter that this is the first time I have fished it since 2019. What a peculiar time we live in. I wouldn’t like to say I fish it regularly in any normal season, it probably amounts to no more than a couple at most, part-day sessions and maybe three or four evenings but none at all is odd.

With the boat arrangements as they are, unless I am going to get 3 or 4 hours on the water as a minimum, I just bank fish and so it was tonight.

It is the first evening that the weather seemed anywhere at all near spring-like. By that I mean it was light until after 10 pm and you weren’t at risk of death from exposure if not wearing several layers of technical under clothes.

Even then there was an annoying breeze that grew quite cold as you stood exposed to it for long and by 9 pm, though there were some nice colours in the sky from the setting sun, I still ended up with my hood up to protect against the encroaching chill. Summer is coming but it isn’t here just yet.

Bank Fishing

I fished along what I figure is the North bank, access was easy as surprisingly the water is lower than I might have expected. It isn’t like we haven’t had fairly significant rainfall of late, but there was a dry fringe of about 3 metres around the loch that indicates the water level is a good couple of feet down on full.

I fished initially about 100 metres or so ( maybe not even that far) from the boathouse and thought I felt one small pluck at my flies early on then nothing. Likely it was a Perch. Another angler started fishing to my right about 20 minutes after me and was into a fish first cast that looked to be a Perch by the way it splashed and he handled it- or rather tried to avoid handling it.

A couple of guys passed close by in a boat and told me they had managed a couple and that fish appeared to be starting to move. But I saw nothing in my first 30-40 minutes. While not deep around the edge, Loch Coulter is quite a tricky wading water with uneven sharp rocks that can make balance precarious at times. I was therefore only out about knee deep most of the time.

Trying to get out that wind

I decided nothing much was happening and I had to find somewhere that allowed me a more broad arc of water to fish away from that direct wind so I made my way along another 100metres to the corner of the bank as it turns into the next bay. There was an easier to wade shingle type beach here and I started fishing. Almost right away I had a very definite pull but then nothing more. As the wind appeared to relent a little ( as I suspected it might as dusk encroached), I changed my team of flies to be a bit more “floaty”. The point fly was an Orange foam daddy, the middle was a ginked up Green-tailed Kate and the top fly a ginked up Bob’s bits, all on a freshly tied on leader of 8lb down to 6lb fluorocarbon.

Nervous Water

Almost right away, despite the fact I had not seen a fish rise, there was a slash at my point fly but no sign of an actual take. What followed was the most peculiar spell of fly fishing I can think of for quite some time. As a fly angler, you become very attuned to your surroundings very quickly. Whether it’s the sound of the water ( especially on a river) or the way the waves roll by, driven by the breeze. You very quickly notice changes to the rhythms, both visual and audible. Whether it is a fish rising out of your field of view or something rising in a wave that conceals the movement, it creates its own pattern of waves that flows against the natural flow of the water. So most anglers will also be aware of the term “nervous water”.

This is where you can see something almost imperceptible, that tells you there are fish there though there is nothing to the casual onlooker indicating the presence of a fish or fishes. The next 45 minutes or so of fishing revealed what I can only describe as some VERY nervous water.

After the initial slash I had, I never had any real interest for a few minutes. Then on one cast, as I gave the flies some motion on their way back towards me there was a splash and for a few moments a fish was definitely on, The rod hooped over but if I am entirely honest, it “felt” like a foul hooked fish. I never saw the fish clearly but it splashed and splashed on the surface as soon as I hooked it, and never really felt like a properly hooked fish. I therefore was not surprised when the line suddenly went slack.

All three flies intact, I cast to the same area. Nearly every cast I was seeing the water bulge and a distinct change to the wave pattern though nothing overtly indicating a fish was looking. In general, it seemed to happen as the flies landed or as I put some movement into them. As time progressed it started to get a little cold and the actual obvious activity around my flies seemed to abate though I was still seeing something in the way the water was moving that told me something was there. I was alone on the side of the loch here and I distinctly spoke out loud to myself ( I sometimes do- I am not nuts!, I think!) that I felt it wasn’t to be and I might just call it a night when as I lifted the flies to recast, maybe for the last time, a huge wave appeared to grab at my point fly and I felt everything tighten up for a couple of seconds…. then it was off again!

It was definitely feeling like it wasn’t to be my night and I cast a couple of more times but then thought I better check my flies. The point fly was gone. The tippet though looked to be clean broken, no sign of a knot pulling through and that characteristic pig tail at the end of previously tied tippet material. I was a little surprised as while I had a good pull it never felt like a 6lb+ fish or even anything much more than a fairly common 1lb or so fish.

I retreated to the bank to tie on a new point fly and decided to try a Grunter. I wish I knew where this mix of cock hackle and leggy partridge feathers got its name from as it isn’t obvious to me!

As I was sitting tying on the fly and not looking at the water, other than it being in my peripheral vision I actually became aware of something flying towards me, or it seemed to be at least as how my peripheral vision detected it. I felt myself flinch as it felt like there was a dark object like a bird coming at me, there was a clear high-speed flapping sound, then a big splash. By this time I was looking up and I think a trout had either leapt clear of the water in front of me, not 10 feet from the edge or perhaps, it had fallen from the sky dropped maybe by an Osprey? I never had the presence of mind to look up as I got a bit of a fright as it was and was trying to fathom what just happened there. The flapping sound was the sound of the fishes tail swimming against thin air, which if you have fished still waters for any length of time will be a sound you will have heard, but I never heard any sound prior to the tail beating noise and then the splash. Evidently, though there should be a fish little more than a rod length away from me!

With the Grunter on point, I cast out in the area of the splash, but had nothing and gradually increased the distance and area I was covering I waded out a short way and was casting more or less parallel to the bank when I had a very hard-to-see rise to the fly but it never took. I lifted into nothing. Next cast, I actually saw the pluck from beneath the fly, lifted, felt the fish, then it came off. Within two more casts in the same general area, I had the same again. Again it never stuck. I checked all three flies, all seemed fine. I cast around, over the area which still looked “nervous” and there was a huge wave of a slash at the flies, but again no take. What was going on here?

I let the flies lie there for the next few casts and again the water bulged and rippled to the movement of something but no take. Then I decided to cast and give the flies a few good sharp pulls….

and then an Angry Take!

WHAM, there was a huge angry wave of a slash at the flies and this time a fish was on. This was definitely no 1lb fish and it bored deep right away. I tightened into it and with just gentle pressure it appeared to come with the line but as it got over the shallower water near the bank, immediately drove hard for the deeper water. This happened a couple of times and it still felt like a good fish. My heart was just beginning to settle after the explosive take when I caught sight of the back of the fish.

It wasn’t a trout.

It was a Pike. On a dry fly ( the Grunter) , and was clearly a bit pissed off.

It made a few powerful runs before I was finally able to get it into netting range fully expecting the whole time that its sharp teeth would sever the line. It didn’t and soon I had it in the net. A Jack Pike of maybe 3 to 4lbs. It felt fairly heavy in the net, and was clearly well fed though not huge in size.

I couldn’t see the fly at all, I expected it to be on the outside edge of its mouth given it never snapped the line but it appeared to be well inside and though I had forceps with me I wasn’t that bothered to try to get my fly back. I know how to safely handle a pike so as not to get cut or bitten but I find with the smaller fish there is little room to avoid their gill rakers and a set of cuts that wont stop bleeding, so i snapped the line near its jaw and let it go. I am still wondering what all the nervous activity in the water was, was it a shoal of Perch, Pike or some stocky Brownies? I reckon there was maybe a shoal of Perch and the Pike was corralling them and picking off the easy ones.? Your thoughts?