Week beginning 10 October 2017
Monday 10th October. A much colder start than of late with showers from the east but these gave way to a sunny day by mid morning. The Lees gauge was showing 10” and 48 degrees squeaky clean but lots of stone dirt on the river bed and on the stones I suppose as that’s where the name comes from. A new team on this week, one has been here before around 10 years ago but the rest are Lees virgins. William Daniel was up the top with me this morning and we soon had him into a fish out of the slap, it was I think the blackest fish I’ve seen this back end, even its belly was black and it would have tipped the scales at 6lbs soaking wet. Somewhat buoyed by our success in the Slap we headed up the Temple on more of a exploratory expedition than anything else but it was calm and sunny and it filled in half an hour, the real reason I went up was to look over the side of the boat on the way back down to see how many fish were hiding, I found that they were very good at hiding as I only saw two and one of them had a fungi head, or there’s none there which is more like it. We headed to the Cauld and I suggested a hitched sunray, right up at the top William was lifting into his next cast when a nose popped out and grabbed the fly (photos on instagram tweedbeats)this was a better fish around 11lbs but still not fresh/clean, that was all the action at the top end. Further down the beat David Fell had a 9lber from the Cornhill bend, Joules Brown hooked himself and Bruce (Ghillie) fell in. This afternoon there was a fish from the Iron Gate; Nick Holtby had a pull in the Duddo on a Crazy Charlie. There are less fish showing now and mostly in just the streamy water, Learmouth stream and Duddo having a good few in, the pool that bucks the trend is Iron Gate which is very busy and that with a pair of residents Otters. It’ll be better tomorrow.
Tuesday 11th October. Biggest catch of the day was a Grayling out of the Cauld this afternoon; William Daniel had a pull or two on a wee Black Francis in the Iron Gate area. 10” and 50 degrees with an easterly wind which turned to the north east by afternoon that along with a lack of sun and odd showers made it a miserable day. Still no fresh or clean fish to be seen round the beat. Not really a lot to say about today.
Wednesday 12th October. Another showery day and cool, 10” and 48 degs, Started in cauld with William with the hitch, he likes the hitch so I like him in a hitchy sort of way, there were more fish in the Cauld today and one of them soon had a go at it but didn’t connect. We then gave it more conventional tactics but couldn’t interest them. David Fell (birthday boy) had a 13lb hen from Duddo on a sunray; the fish hadn’t had any lice about it for quite some time. Lunchtime came and went and the rods went too, they were only here for three days and a long drive home in front of them. New team on tomorrow so they’ll be keen. More fish being caught upstream of us so some movement has taken place, Kevin my downstream correspondent tells me they had a fresh fish this morning but after some more detail was squeezed out of him it had maybe been in a couple of weeks, I should imagine it was the freshest fish in the whole system today. Still using the same type of kit which is floating lines with a sinking tip of some kind fixed to the other end, fly choice? If you have a favourite use it then you’ll fish with a degree of confidence, line choice might soon change as the weatherman is saying we’re in for a wet weekend.
Thursday 13th October. Heavy showers and an east wind making it a miserable day, but it wasn’t a miserable day for Reid as he had 3 from Learmouth stream and lost one, he was using a floating line with an intermediate tip with a little black and yellow thing on the end. The other fish of the morning fell to Anthony Thorpe who had a 9lber from the tail of the Glide, he also hooked me whilst fishing the Duddo stream when he switched from right handed casting to left leaving me with a w shaped mark on my cheek where two hooks of the treble stuck in, a quick selfie with the camera to determine hook position and a tug with the forceps and it was out, much quicker than a 2 hour wait in the health centre, a yellow card was issued and a new observation stance taken well out of the way of any further change of direction. Jason lost one in the process of beaching it and Anthony had a splash at a sunray in the Duddo. This is a new team to the Lees apart from Anthony who was here some 20 years ago and we would like them to see it at its best but thats not going to happen this year. There was a wee silver fish seen in the Bags this morning but no pulls from it or any other come to that. This afternoon Reid Griffiths kept up the scoring getting an 11lb hen from the Iron Gate pushing the score for the day to a dizzy 5. The two young otters are still at the Iron Gate and swim among the salmon all day but when they come up its an Eel they have and the salmon seem to be getting used to them or maybe they have nowhere else to go. Tillmouth had 8 today so I’ll have to try and find out if any were fresh/clean. The foundation has been netting at Paxton trying to catch salmon to tag and release to help work out the exploitation rate but they haven’t caught anything apart from 3 black salmon and a few seatrout so that gives an indication as to what’s coming in. The forecast is for heavy rain tonight so it might put a bit of water in and shuffle the pack a bit and who knows bring a clean fish up.
Friday 14th October. River up 2” so not quite a flood. East wind still blowing along with showers but a bit brighter than yesterday, I took Anthony into the Cauld first thing where there were a lot of fish moving and in no time we had a hold of one on a hitched sunray, we were almost to the bank when it came off that was the only pull out of the Cauld this morning. We had a fish from the Middle stream this morning again an old one round about the 5lb mark for Jason. The Iron Gate and Glide are full of fish as is the Duddo and the top of the Bags apart from those areas its quiet. Down in the Bags this afternoon there were a lot of fish eight up in the neck and you would think you had to get one but they wouldn’t play, there were about a dozen swallows flitting round the willow tree at the Bags looking for the few flies that are left, all the others left weeks ago so this lot better get a move on or they won’t make it. More heavy rain forecast for tonight and tomorrow but it’s all coming from the east, it might catch the bottom end of the Teviot and the Leader we’ll have to wait and see. So to sum up the days bag it reads 1 Salmon landed and one lost plus four squirrels, the website reads two for today but I forgot to add one from last night, in fact I didn’t hear about it until lunchtime.
Saturday 15th October. Well the days are getting shorter but for some reason they seem to be getting longer can’t think why. 1’2” and 48 degs squeaky clean. We started with a wet morning but Lucy the dug didn’t mind as I’ve bought her a coat well she is getting old. I was down in Duddo with Greg and I suggested we hitch a sunray as I do. Sunray tied on and second time through Cornhill bend and right on the lip the fish was on, it was a decent sized fish and it fairly thrashed about, eventually it started to crocodile roll the line got round the body and it was square across the stream when the line gave way. The other action was Ian Thorpe getting a 4lber from Duddo, well it would be 4lb wet. Still not seeing any fresh/clean fish and the old ones are really starting to hold in just a few pools or bits of pools. I watched flipper on the other bank netting a 22lber for his rod this afternoon at the Iron Gate it was a black old thing as well. The swallows are still down at the Bags and there was a big flock of Golden Plover this morning. Next week? Well I’m going to tie a few sunrays and maybe some other oddities to play about with, you have to ring the changes. Floating lines with sink tips are the order of the day teamed with #8 to #10 doubles/trebles, wee tubes and of course a sunray or two. It’ll be better next week.
©M Campbell 2016
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