The Urban Fly Fisher

I am now ill

Or rather I have been for the last few days. It started with a sore throat and has gradually progressed to full on feeling lousy. No fishing being done, but plenty of watching Star Wars!

So last week one of the Kelvin fishers (Alex) asked me if I wanted to go and do a bit of Stockie bashing. Seeing as how it must be done a couple of times a season? (At least that is what I have decided on now) I agreed and the day was set for yesterday which was Monday. I had checked the weather in advance and it was for gales and rain. Alex was far more optimistic than me â€“ Ach itâ€™ll be fine a bit of wind will be good for the fish.
windy
So I got my stuff together and got the train into Glasgow Central with all the commuters received some funny looks as I was wearing my chest waders! Alex was sporting a rather large black eye which meant I did not recognise him at the station for around 10 minutes and then we were on our way…
would you trust?

Our venue was Harelaw fishery

Harelaw is a large, shallow reservoir, extending to 102 acres, including four and a half miles of mature, good wading banks, 4 dam walls and three islands. An averaging depth of 5-9 feet, ensures that fish can be found virtually anywhere on the fishery. Harelaw’s moorland setting is also home to a variety of birds and wildlife.

Needless to say it sounds great, it would have been great to if it hadnâ€™t been blowing a gale and pissing down with rain. Or rather it was a great day out, it was the actual fishing that was bad, we did everything right (like casting and retrieving with pink zonkers) but the fish were dour and unresponsive. Alex managed one at 2lb a nice fully finned rainbow, oh and a nice brownie while I got 2 perch.

Big waves, pouring rain, the sound of a blob hitting you full force in the backâ€¦.priceless.
blob
Thatâ€™s what good memories are made of we kept telling each other. Another memory was when I took charge of the engine and ran as aground causing the engine to bugger up. We then had to row back up the loch to get a new one.
rowing
The day was good for stories and laughs (if we didnt laugh we would have cried)!! which just goes to show you that even on absolutely miserable days you can still have some enjoyment! You dont need fish to enjoy a days fishing (but it helps)

On the way home we saw some rather nice toads and frogs.

Ahhhh, another day!

Another day another few fish. It was windy and I am now getting much success with small green CDC flies.
csc
There is without question less fish around after the fish kill (duh!!!), you can really feel it when you go down. Usually I would be catching several nice troots but now I am struggling to catch a couple.

At least in the parts I have been fishing. There will still be nice fish in the deeper stretches!

The newsletter and a cut short session due to working!!

Members will be receiving the usual newsletter from the Association over the next few days. At the last committee meeting we spent a while stuffing them into envelopes and putting little address stickers on them. Its funny but as I was sticking on the stickers I recognised a fair few names, and oddly there were a number of women down as members but I have never actually seen any fishing. Oh no, I tell a lie I met one young women who was fishing bait with her boyfriend, they did not have permits (just had to get that in).
You will see that I also wrote a little ditty for the newsletter, I was asked ages ago and rustled up something, I wonder if I will get some more regular readers for the blog, who knows I might even meet more Kelvin anglers ïŠ
I am a wee bit nervous of people reading what is in the newsletter actually; I donâ€™t know why as in the last year this blogs readership has spiked to pretty impressive numbers. I like my anonymity I suppose as I can be pretty shy around people for the first few times I meet them (it always annoys people when it turns out that even though I joke about falling over and generally being a bit loopy they donâ€™t actually think I am being serious)
When I meet people down the Kelvin I donâ€™t tell them about the website or blog, itâ€™s a different matter if they bring it up in which case they know its me anyway (usually I fall over as I am walking up to them so they definitely know its me)

Speaking of which, I went down to the Kelvin yesterday and had a most enjoyable couple of hours with some acrobatic trout. It seems that every year at this time the trout when caught seem to jump about like crazy. I also had some good success with my small CDC flies, after getting pretty pissed off at them I have now actually started to catch on them. I suppose its all down to fishing confidently with a fly that you trust.

I have taken a picture of the new sign put up for the â€œFriends of Dawsholm Parkâ€ I thought it would be interesting to watch how long it lasts before someone spray-paints â€œKelly luvs joeâ€ or some such on it.
freins

I was fishing this little run (I had switched to a parachute as it was pretty streamy) and annoyingly pricked 3 fish. One of them felt real nice as well.

I am now determined to get in as much fishing as possible before the season ends, I will be starting a new job quite soon (cunningly worked out for the end of the season although not intentionally) so know that next year I will not have the same fishing opportunities as the last 3 years. Although to be honest, at least now I will not be stressed out my head trying to get essays done.

A letter in my inbox!

Well, it is nice that people are taking the time to use my little contact form. I had this little mail in my drawer (among others) when I arrived home from work today.

peter wrote:
Tried to post this on your guestbook but unable to.Just a word of warning to anglers fishing the Glasgow Golf Club
stretch of Kelvin.My mate and I
were fishing about a mile up from
Maryhill bridge and found a cross-
bow bolt on the path.The tip is as
sharp as a needle and would go
through clothing skin and bone.I
got the newsletter through the post this morning asking for returns,but my card has been full
since July.Any suggestions? On the
subject of poachers,what about putting up signs on the river at
intervals stating club rules and
consequences of illegal fishing?
regards
peter.

I have forwarded your mail to the Chairman Peter. I think signs up at intervals would be an great idea !

A Cracking Hour and a Half Fly Fishing!!

So I had a very short session today down at one of the tributaries. I had to wait in for a phone call about a job so did not have much time. It was cold, so cold that I could see my breath. After I had caught my first trout….
firrrst
…..my hands were pretty cold as well. And there was rain too, showery rain……cold rain. But hey, I had a good time anyway…
I was using my usual olive parachute which has been pretty much my fly of the season, if I had got there earlier today and stayed later I would have caught a lot more as there was plenty of trout rising. I also caught my largest brownie from this little stream…..here it is next to my little Tea Stick Bamboo Rod
biggest
The photee really doesnt do it justic really, I was farting about trying to make sure you could tell the size of it. All the fish I caught this afternoon did some pretty amazing acrobatics, jumping and diving and generally giving a good account of them.
There was a rather nice rainbow as well in the distance…
rainbow

Poachers nabbed!!

So there was a crowd of poachers at the Junction pool of the Allander and the Kelvin. They were using nets seemingly to catch fish. A joint effort between two police forces nabbed them after a nearby resident raised the alarm when one of them attacked a young boy and beat him up.

Its good to hear that there is vigilant people out there!!

Contact me!!

I have added a little “contact me” widget in the pages section on the right hand side. Feel free to drop me a line if you have not already and we can talk fish!

Cash up for grabs!

There was a post on a forum I frequent from an organisation called Anglers Voice. There are giving away money::

Dear All,

If I asked you to nominate a deserving cause for a Â£50 cheque/voucher, who would you nominate?.

Are you personally organising clean-ups on a river?
Are you donating time to help our Rivers in a non-commercial capacity?.

Money to help you is availble from Anglersvoice.
We have a list which we send to Tim Smith at Todays’FF.
For every article we write, Tim sends a donation and works down the list.

What we really want is a list of the people working in the background which never ask for or get any “thankyou’s”.

The main agencies/societies all have membership fees which support their activities, so we would prefer to donate to people YOU think deserve it.

Maybe it’s for some new equipment/waders/kelly kettle for a brew-up, petrol money.. ANYTHING..

Drop us a line and we’ll add them to list.

Kev.

I decided to nominate Friends of the River Kelvin and they are soon to recieve there 50 pounds!

Dead Salmon on the Kelvin- an explanation?

So it appears that the dead salmon on the Kelvin was not just the result of the heat.
dead
There has been two fish deaths, the heat and a disease. At the moment there are large amounts of dead Salmon in the Clyde and no one really knows what to do about them. The thinking is that every year this particular run of Salmon suffers the same fate with only a few getting through to spawn. It is something to do with the energy required to jump up the obstacles on the river. It seems that this run only has enough energy to make one jump, if it fails it then does not recover but dies. That is why there are so many dead salmon down at the first fall of water on the Kelvin.

So far no one really knows what to do, SEPA sent out someone who was not willing to get into the river and get a Salmon out for testing and also stated that it was not their job anyway as it was only the water they are interested in. Anyway, Dougie Brown now has a fishery biologist in tow that will carry out a test on the next dead salmon they find to find out what is causing them to go belly up.

Here is hoping!!