Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2019 i Trout & Salmon

NO. 15 G P R BALFOUR-KINNEAR (1888-1978 ) Read about the life of Balfour-Kinnear in "Fly-Fishing Luminaries" on p66. His writings were extensive. Flying Salmon (1937) is a useful explanation of greased-line fishing, and includes two entertaining chapters on fishing for salmon with flies without hooks. A second edition was produced in 1947, after the stock of the first edition (and of Spinning Salmon) was destroyed during the London Blitz. The second edition omits the hookless fly chapters, but makes detailed comparisons between the use of gut and new-fangled nylon. As Walton did with Piscator and Venator, Balfour-Kinnear uses an imaginary discourse between The Sheep and The Shepherd to explain his points. Spinning Salmon, published in 1938, covers lightweight thread-lining with the Illingworth reel and medium- and heavyweight spinning…

BLAGDON? HOW LOVELY! The nature you see! But I’m home in a temper with nothing for tea. From “Evening Rise” by Chris Newton The scene of my first attempt to cast a fly on to water was nearly a thousand miles away from Somerset, on a tributary of the River Aare, near Berne in Switzerland, where I lived and worked as a journalist between 1978 and 1979. It was a freezing April day when my guide Rob Brooks, a colleague in the radio newsroom where we were both employed, drove me down to the river to show me how fly-fishing worked. The droopy little rod (it was of built cane) seemed pathetically short of erectile tissue, the line clumsy and heavy, the reel absurdly simple and low-tech. It was impossible…

England & Wales BORDER ESK UP to August 21, the Burnfoot Beat on the Esk had recorded 78 salmon and 118 sea-trout. Despite some very heavy spates, catches held up well. On the Willow and Cauldron beats catches included Colin Hudson’s 3lb 4oz sea-trout and a 10lb salmon. David Laidler caught salmon of 14lb and 8lb while Brian Hollingsworth caught a 3lb sea-trout. On the Hollows Beat Geoff Harris caught a 10lb salmon and seven sea-trout to 3lb from Chapel and Sykefoots. On the Tower Beat Geoff Harris had two sea-trout to 1lb 8oz. RA Thompson caught an 8lb salmon and a sea-trout of 1lb 8oz. D Peart also had a sea-trout of similar size. George McCrea caught nine sea-trout to 3lb 4oz while his son Murdo landed two sea-trout…

Aberdeen Fly Fish 50 is a new initiative that aims to take 50 people from their first cast to their first fish. Run by volunteers, it is hosted by the Dee Salmon Fishery Board with support from the River Don and River Deveron. The project gives lessons to beginners and intermediates as well as hosting “come and try” events. Dee fisheries development officer Ross Macdonald said, “We are delighted with the start we’ve made and I believe we can inspire new people to join us and share our passion.” In 2020 there will be five-lesson blocks at trout fisheries across Aberdeenshire with 50 new people receiving professional instruction. After three sessions, participants will be able to go fishing under their own steam but with follow-up support available. Ross said, “Tackle…

CALLING ALL JUNIORS! Catch a salmon or trout and send us a picture of you and your fish, including details of its capture. Caught a memorable fish? Send your pictures to: troutandsalmon@bauermedia.co.uk…

THE SPORT HAS BEEN ACCUSED — among other criticisms — of being too white, male, elderly, expensive, time-consuming, and generally out of step in an increasingly inclusive world. Surely, they don’t mean us? Actually, they don’t. The quote is taken from a BBC news report about the parlous state of golf and the drive to bring more women into the sport to boost participation. Which, when you think about it, makes perfect sense. Why ignore half your potential market? Which makes you ask: should fly-fishing take the hint? I’ll come back to the white, male stuff in a minute but first, what is the true rate of female participation in angling? The truth is nobody knows for sure because, for reasons I won’t bore you with, the data is suspect.…

Best times: April, May and June are the best times for trout, after which the salmon fishing comes into its own. Tackle: Bring 10ft six- and seven-weight single-handed rods with predominantly floating lines. Don’t be without Clan Chiefs, Peach Muddlers, Claret Snatchers, Soldier Palmers, Kate Maclarens, Sedgehog and emerger patterns, and small salmon and sea-trout doubles. Morsgail Lodge is bookable by the week for sporting lets. For trout fishing there is a daily charge if gillie, boat and Argocat are used, otherwise it's free. As well as trout and salmon fishing there is deer stalking and walked-up grouse shooting from late August, and wildfowling, including snipe and woodcock, from October to January. Various packages are available depending on the time of year. The lodge is also available on a B&B…

By Chris Newton. Hooked on Books (tel: 01285 640 485; mereobooks.com). Paperback. The subtitle – “Scenes from an angling life” – indicates this book’s genre. Angling memoirs are commonplace but what distinguishes Newton’s work is the quality of its writing and the generosity of its imagination. In 18 chapters, each an extended vignette, Newton ranges over the triumphs and disconsolations of boyhood, much of it spent on pools and streams around Manchester, through the discovery of fly-fishing and towards later preoccupations — even obsessions — with sea-trout fishing, much of it on the sewin rivers of Wales. Chris has written extensively and memorably in Trout and Salmon about these last interests. It won’t therefore come as a surprise that he brings to this account of his angling life the same…

I ’M SCARED. SCARED of being criminalised next year if I reassure my kids that their worm is still on the hook because there’s a microbarb to keep it there; scared of a system where Natural Resources Wales appears to place more faith in paper projections of adult salmon presence than walking a quarter-mile from its Dolgellau office to the tidal pools to see whether the fish are actually there or not (they are, in life if not on paper, lots of them this summer, more than for a decade according to local anglers). I’m scared of an analysis called technical which omits commonsense science that if there are fewer fry it is likely to result in a higher survival rate through a number of vectors; scared of official action…

Murthly 2, River Tay One of the best places on the Tay to fish the fly. There are two separate beats, Upper and Stenton, fished on alternate days. Island pool is fished on all six days. Both Upper and Stenton consist of swiftly flowing runs and pools, all with a good draw, ideal for the fly. Fly-fishing is the preferred method unless the water is high. Wading is from the bank or on pea gravel. Banks are well maintained and access into and out of pools is clearly marked. Many spring salmon make their first stop at Murthly and a fresh springer can always be expected. In summer, grilse fishing can be first rate – in low water, Island is one of the best grilse pools on the Tay. Given…

Hendersyde, River Tweed One of the top beats on the River Tweed, which often achieves the highest catches per rod in Scotland. There are two miles of fishing, which include long streams at the top of the beat, through the deep Sprouston Dub to the fast waters immediately below the cauld at Banff Mill. Only two rods are allowed to fish at a time and each is looked after by one of the two gillies provided. There are boats and a hut on each of the top and bottom beats. Day permits for salmon from £766 plus vat. Contact: Tom Carter, FishPal. Tel: 01573 470 612. Bookings fishpal.com/Scotland/Tweed/Hendersyde…

Friars Carse, River Nith Just under 1.5 miles of salmon, sea-trout and grayling fishing within a 45-acre Dumfriesshire estate. There is a mixture of pools suitable for all methods from the fly to spinning. A good riverside footpath allows anglers with mobility problems to fish what are some of the more productive pools on the River Nith without difficulty. Access is via paths leading from the hotel’s parking area. Day permits Grayling £10; salmon £50. Contact Tom Carter, FishPal. Tel: 01573 470 612. Bookings fishpal.com/Scotland/Nith/FriarsCarse…

Flying Salmon (1937) With or without dust-wrapper: £60 (Unfortunately the paper used for the dust-wrapper of the first edition of Flying Salmon, and that of Spinning Salmon, had such adhesive qualities that invariably the flaps have become stuck to the endpapers. It is impossible to find dust-wrappered copies in fine condition.) Flying Salmon (2nd edition, 1937) In dust-wrapper: £50. Without: £30. Spinning Salmon (1938) With or without dust-wrapper: £60. Catching Salmon and Sea-Trout (1958) First edition in dust-wrapper: £35. Without: £20. Reprints: In dust-wrapper: £25. Without: £15. A Boy Goes Trouting (1959) In dust-wrapper: £20. Without: £10. More About Trout and Salmon (1963) In dust-wrapper: £20. Without: £10.…

Releasing a salmon quickly and preserving the memory with a photograph can be tricky. Follow these guidelines to make sure your fish has the best chance of survival. Before fishing a pool, identify where you can land the fish safely. Somewhere without sharp rocks or grit, which can harm the fish’s protective mucous and scales. Play and land fish quickly to avoid exhausting them. Using a net is preferable and keep the fish in the water at all times. Do not drag it up the bank. Use a net with fish-friendly knotless mesh. Never lift the fish by its tail or gills. Ensure your hands are wet. Use long-nosed forceps to remove the hook quickly and minimise contact with the fish. If a fish is deeply hooked, near its gills,…

A remarkable £50,000 has been awarded to the Atlantic Salmon Trust by the Gordon and Ena Baxter Foundation to fund its Moray Firth tagging programme. Gordon Baxter, of soup fame, was a keen salmon angler on the River Spey. The three-year tagging project aims to identify salmon migration routes to better understand what may be affecting the fish’s survival. Monitoring is undertaken by local fishery boards and trusts and since the spring 800 smolts have been tagged as they migrate downstream from the headwaters of seven rivers around the Firth.…

IT’S TOO EARLY TO SAY WHETHER THE pink salmon caught in UK waters this year were the returning offspring of fish found spawning in Scotland in 2017. But it’s a fair guess that they were. If the pinks are becoming established in our rivers what should we do about it? The scientists seem delighted — something new to chew over in the sort of academic papers that conclude only that further study is needed. If we catch one of these fish we’re supposed to report it and turn it in somewhere. Underlying these demands is a code of conservation that struggles to grapple with change. As a species we seem to be caught in an eternal paradox of both instigating and resisting change. I detect a sense of pragmatic ambivalence…

I WAS OUT ON LEVEN t’other evening. It was a fine evening, one that reminded me very much of the sessions we used to fish in the late, lamented days of the Benson & Hedges matches when fish activity on the surface, as the day drew to a close, could be relied upon. In recent years, with climate change and associated insect decline, Leven evenings often fail to produce an evening “rise” (this “rise” defined as an upward movement of fish in the water column in the expectation of an insect hatch). But Leven trout have always had a propensity to feed deep if conditions allowed. Nowadays, Leven brownies are fixated upon buzzer larvae and pupae which, in a non-hatching phase, will be found within inches of the bottom of…

Q As a younger angler hoping to improve, I am frustrated by how often you mention the past. Can you refer more to fishing as it is today, please? Billy Plummer, by e-mail A I suppose I must plead guilty. But in my defence, I mostly refer to the past in an effort to contradict incorrectly held beliefs or the views of older anglers wearing rose-tinted spectacles. I have kept fishing diaries for almost 50 years and referring to the written word is a better way of revealing the truth than relying on one’s memory. I’d recommend you do the same. You’ll realise that you are writing for your old age rather than simply recording what you’ve caught. I don’t think I can be accused of harking back to good…

JAMES BALFOURKINNEAR married Catherine Fraser at Berwick-upon-Tweed on January 26, 1887. They had a son the following year, who they named George. James was a Writer to the Signet practising in Edinburgh. The Society of Writers to Her Majesty’s Signet is a private society of Scottish solicitors, dating back to 1594. Originally, they had special privileges in relation to the drawing up of documents that required to be signeted, but these have since disappeared and the Society is now an independent, non-regulatory association of solicitors. In the later Victorian era they were ordinarily employed as conveyancers, as agents acting in the court of session, as commissioners and factors on landed estates, and as confidential, family legal advisers and “men of business”. Despite his ties to the city, James was keen…

Failure to prosecute? I write in response to your excellent editorial (Autumn issue) regarding the decision made by Natural Resources Wales to introduce mandatory catch-and-release of salmon in Wales. While I no longer wish to kill any salmon that I am fortunate to catch, I do like that I have a choice. I have no issue if others wish to take an occasional appropriate fish for the pot. As you rightly state, 86 per cent of salmon in Wales are currently returned. The risks to future fish stocks are linked to pollution, predation, extraction and poaching. This is compounded by NRW’s lack of interest in prosecuting farmers who discharge slurry into our precious rivers. The River Dulas, a tributary of the Dovey, recently lost in excess of 2,000 fish due…

Game-changer on stillwaters The launch of Greys’ GR80 range marks a serious step up in its rod-building technology. GR80 blanks include 3M Powerlux 1000TM resin — a material that until recently was only licenced to a handful of manufacturers. It has enabled Greys’ rod-designers to create lighter, stronger blanks with more refined actions. The GR80 range includes single- and double-handed rods in four or six pieces. We tested the three Comp Specials, whose GR70 predecessors gained a big reputation in stillwater competition circles. The trio are based on the 9ft 6in 7wt and 10ft 7wt and 8wt in the standard GR80 range, but their actions have been “tuned” to better handle sinking lines and other techniques used in competition fishing. Each rod looks the part with a slate-grey, slightly-metallic blank.…

Invest in famous Sutherland beats The Lower Cassley has fared well in fishing literature. Sir Edward Grey, Foreign Secretary at the outbreak of the First World War and a regular guest, recorded his experiences there in a later edition of his famous Fly Fishing. Subsequently the Lower Cassley and the Rosehall Estate were bought by the Graesser family. In the 1950s Neil Graesser, extensive and authoritative writer on salmon matters and author of the famous Fly Fishing for Salmon, designed many of the pools on the Lower Cassley, which launched his career as a renowned salmon fisheries consultant, leading to the award of an OBE in 1987. For the first time since 1985, a section of the £ Lower 900 Cassley ,000 is for sale. The Oykel and Cassley system…

UPS AND DOWNS Scottish Government has announced its grading of salmon rivers for the 2020 season. There are 36 rivers in category 1, 34 in category 2 (where catch-and-release is promoted strongly), and 103 in category 3 (where catch-and-release is mandatory). This compares to 48, 30 and 95, respectively, for 2019, and is the result of very poor catch returns in 2018. Notable changes are: 2 to 1: Gruinard. 1 to 2: Alness, Deveron, Stinchar, Teith SAC, Moriston SAC, South Esk SAC, Ness SAC. 2 to 3: Girvan, Nith, Earn. Some rivers (eg Ness) have been downgraded because a Special Area of Conservation (SAC) (eg Moriston) has received a lower grading within the same catchment. The assessment criteria for 2020 remains the same as for 2019 (fish counters and five-year…

Upper North Wark, Tweed One mile of prime water on the famous stretch of the river between Coldstream and Kelso. The beat fishes particularly well in mid to high water. The beat contains the famous Snipe Rock pool, reputed to be one of the best on the Tweed in high water. Under new ownership, the beat has two full-time gillies, Martin Ritchie and Richard Farr, longstanding boatmen who will enhance your enjoyment of a day. The beat is generally fished from boats unless lower water conditions make wading possible. A new hut with heating, cooking and toilet facilities has been built. Day permits for salmon from £45. Contact: Tom Carter, FishPal. Tel: 01573 470 612. Bookings fishpal.com/Scotland/Tweed/ UpperNorthWark…

Hoddom, River Annan Hoddom is just four miles from the sea and comprises two-and-a-half miles of double-bank fishing with ten named pools (and much fishing in between them). The beat offers classic fly water with strong flowing streams interspersed with steadily flowing glides. Based on Brydekirk gauging station, the ideal levels for fly fishing are 1ft 3in to 1ft 10in and for spinning over 1ft 10in. To encourage young people into the sport the beat allows one child aged 16 years and under to fish for free when sharing the day permit of a parent/guardian (subject to availability). Day permits for all species £35 plus vat. Contact Tom Carter, FishPal. Tel: 01573 470 612. Bookings fishpal.com/Scotland/Annan/Hoddom…

Bemersyde, Tweed Set within a beautiful wooded gorge in one of the most stunning locations on the Tweed, the beat offers anglers excellent fishing opportunties along its one-mile length: two-thirds is double bank, with a pool or stream for every height of water. At the centre of the beat is an excellent hut with kitchen and toilet. There are four boats, two for fishing and two for ferrying from bank to bank. Access is by car down a private track. There is a short walk to the hut. From February 1 to September 8, there’s one gillie and a four-rod syndicate each day (contact Fishpal to be placed on the waiting list). From September 10, six rods are let on a daily basis with two gillies provided. Day permits for…

Guy Innes Ker, 10th Duke of Roxburghe, died on August 29, 2019 at the age of 64 after the recurrence of the cancer that he fought and bore with great courage, fortitude and determination. It is a massive blow to his devoted family, his wife Virginia (“Virge”) and his five children who he adored, to his close friends, and to all those working at Floors Castle and the wider Roxburghe Estates. He was a Corinthian figure, a supremely talented sportsman as any of those who have played him at golf, tennis or cricket will attest. He loved his racing and his Stud at Floors, which has become so successful under his guidance and control. He loved the Scottish Borders and spent as much time there as he could, and, with…

I HAVE SAID BEFORE THAT ONE OF the required skills of the modern gillie is to be able to chat amiably in between fish and with that in mind I asked the gillie what changes he’d seen in his time on the river. “Apart,” says he, “from the likes of you showing up and infestin’ the beat?” “That apart,” I agreed. He took a long breath and then he told me. The biggest change, he said, was a recent thing. When he had started on the river, guests would come for the week. The party might change during the week and some among the party might change from year to year. But, week by week, folk would come and go and, basically, they were known quantities. “Like yourselves,” he said.…