2 trips for trout..

You would be forgiven with thinking that I have done pretty much no fishing over the last couple of weeks – you would in fact be wrong – I have had two trips after trout – one to my small shit pipe stream and one to the Clyde.

The Shit Pipe Stream was weird – it was a surreal evening – for a couple of reasons. One I have to attend meetings at a building fairly close to this stream which makes me feel kinda weird, almost as if I am playing hooky from work or something. And two, for some reason I got given a serious dose of the heeby jeebies.

Let’s talk more about the jeebies just now. You see every now and then (and I hope this is the case with you) my imagination starts to run riot and I start to imagine all sorts of weird stuff to scare the willies out myself – crazy madmen with big teeth, Giant Killer Rabbits, wolves, being stalked by tigers etc – the usual terrifying scary stuff.

What did not help the jeebies was the fact I kept coming across animal carcasses..

I found at least three dead sheep carcasses – one was pretty fresh as well – you would think the farmer has some kind of obligation to dispose of the body instead of letting them rot away in the field. Anyway – I started to imagine it was an escaped tiger that had killed all the sheep –  hearing rustling in the bushes did not help. It is not the first time I have beat a hasty retreat from some bushes – I mind a few years ago hearing growling coming from a huge tract of bushes next to a loch in the hills nearby. I almost shat myself that time as well.

Very strange how the heebie Jeebies can affect you – I mean it does not happen often just enough to make you wonder what it is that has actually set it off – I am pretty sure seeing the dead animals around triggered some kind of caveman response in my brain to keep me aware of the surroundings.

Anyhow – in my terrified state I managed one trout – I am actually amazed that this river produces such nice trout – this place makes the Kelvin look and smell like a crystal clear chalk stream.

Still – like I say the trout are nice and are obviously turned into mutants by all the chemicals..

By the way – as I write this I just noticed an enormous house spider run across the floor a couple of times – these spiders are huge and your house is full of them – you only see them as Autumn approaches though as they are out looking for some sex – the devils!

Anyhoo – I caught the above trout in a lovely wee seam of water – it was fast flowing and maybe a a dozen feet long – I was using a dry and dropper and the trout went bananas.

You can see what I mean.

As the Shit Pipe stream is next to some serious housing estates I listened to a huge party taking place with live music, shouting and general hilarity – I think it may have been some kind of outdoor wedding as there was a bouncy castle for the kids – fishing to live music was kinda weird.

My next trip was too the Clyde a few nights later – a warm day and a nice humid evening – blue winged olives on the water (amongst others) and me and Paul stayed until dark – Paul caught one and pricked a dozen – I managed a dozen and pricked a couple of dozen – more to do with chance than anything.

All the trout bar my first were caught on the dry fly – I had set up with a dry and dropper and with my first cast into a riffle had hooked into a trout – it took me below the pool into some faster water and then was gone – such is life.

Eventually I started to spot rising trout – they were always very small rises however if you looked at the water in just the right way and watched carefully you would always see some rising trout.

We fished until dark..parking ourselves at a long pool so that we could see rises in the moonlight – caught another couple in that pool. It was fully dark by 10pm – what with the spiders on the hunt for mates and the dark now getting here earlier and earlier you can tell that Autumn is now fast approaching. I read an article stating that Autumn may be delayed due to the exceptionally cold winter – personally I do not see that happening.

Tell you what though – you know what this time of year is good for – Pike!

Bring it on!