Busy, busy and more busy..

Busy is an understatement – with both family life and fishing.

I have been enjoying looking with wonder at the small things in  nature through my sons eyes – we have spotted lots of young frogs over the last week and we always stop to examine them before carefully sending them on their way..

I think since the last time I wrote I have been fishing a few times and caught a fair number of trout – had a few trips to the Kelvin and a trip to the Clyde – all were fun.

My most recent trip to the Kelvin was during a lull in the rain of the last couple of weeks – I had planned to fish my “shit pipe” river however my wife wanted me to stick around the Kelvingrove Park in case she needed a lift – I was happy to oblige. The “Shit Pipe” river is a little stream I found that is criss crossed with lots of pipes – considering the amount of raw sewage that goes into the stream the name stuck..

Now that I have done my part for the Kelvin habitat survey and pinpointed areas that have problems with invasive plants I now find some of them imposing and alien in the way they tower over me at the river bank..

The day was overcast and warm – the grass was wet and it was very “close”.

In fact I am going to leave that session and tell you about a wee incident that happened last week – it just popped into my mind. I hit the Kelvin one evening as conditions seemed damn near perfect and after a few casts looked up the river to see a crowd of folk in the bushes – one of them had a backpack – a bit like the one out of Ghostbusters. Anyway – it turned out it was none other than Willie Yeomans ( Scientist and all round fish boffin) out giving a talk to a  group of people  from some horticultural society (I think). The person with the Ghostbuster back pack was in fact electrofishing and catching all manner of tiny fish while Willie was giving the talk and showing what they were finding – Willie introduced me and the group of people all smiled a hello – I felt like a commoner at a banquet.

There was one problem – the electrofishers were having a problem getting a trout – I made a joke that I could have caught two in that time..

I wandered up to the Sanitary Towel pool as I wanted to actually get some fishing done and approximately two casts later I had a nice trout for Willie to show the group. I was chuffed about that – it is not often the God’s of chance smile on you however it seems to happen a lot in the Kelvin – must be something in the water.

Anyhoo – I fished on Sunday for a few hours and caught maybe a half dozen trout – there were a few stocked trout mixed in with them – you can tell they are stocked trout as they look absolutely stunning – fin perfect with lovely big spots, they tend to swim about innocently before finally getting a bit panicky at the last minute – not like the crazy indigenous Kelvin trout that instantly go bananas and look quite frankly a little bit f*cked.

I fished on and caught a nice stocky at the Half Penny Bridge – a women took my photo from the bridge – sometimes I feel like a piece of meat beside the river – if sex was personified it would be an angler stuffed into a pair of leaking chest waders carrying a fly rod – he would be wearing a green hat the sex god that he is.

Look at the picture above – it will be a familiar site to many – to those of you that do not know Glasgow understand that there are many people walking along the banks on each side of the river and within a few hundred yards there is the busy West End of Glasgow. As I fished I heard many gasps – “look there is someone fishing down there” As usual as it was a busy day I spoke to many people who wanted to know if the river was clean enough for fish to live in.

I am actually amazed that some people can sit in their office blocks and watch guys catching Salmon in the pool directly below them.

I was planning on a trip to my “Shit Pipe” river tomorrow night however I am reminded that my other half is working so that must be scrubbed – I past by it today and it was running with its usual weird tinge – I watched a trout rise and tried to tell a female co worker why a trout was so special – I think she believed me.

I never met another angler the whole day on Sunday – I felt as if I had a private beat all to myself – nobody wants to fish for trout now that the Salmon are in the river – I find this both a shame and uplifting – a shame that some anglers see them as 2nd class citizens in some way and uplifting as it means they are not being targeted and harmed.

I have watched over the last few years as trout have been shunted into a corner as just something to pass the time while the runs of Salmon are waited for – I have met  anglers that are happy to kill trout without any thought to guys that might actually enjoy catching them a couple of times. I have watched the same old situation that develops on every river in Scotland that has runs of Salmon – plain old Salmon snobbery. Snobbery towards guys that are just old fashioned and want to catch a trout of any size – I have said it before and will say it again I am happy to catch a 6inch trout and will proudly post a picture of it as I am to show a 12 inch trout.

I think the humble trout is the most beautiful little fish in the world – if someone truly “got it” with trout they would never try and deceive such an innocent creature with a worm or glittering bit of metal again – they would stick to some fur tied to a tiny hook that does actually roughly look like its normal everyday food.

I keep hearing about this snobbery of guys fishing with fly rods and I do not understand it – if anyone should feel marginalised on the Kelvin it should be the guys that fly fish for trout – I mean there are only about a dozen of us!

I do not think it is snobbery – I think it is wonder at why people don’t look at trout in the same way.

But hey – I don’t wanna be preachy – I don’t have to tell you guys my views – do I?