Week beginning 26 June 2023
A fresher morning now that the heat has given way, 3 or 4” on the gauge and 60f with a west wind helping to put just a wee riffle on the surface. A mix of rods with us this week, I think they have all been here before so know the drill. Jonathan Reddin was up top and gave it an hour then headed for home, an hour is more than enough to cover the slap and cauld at this height, the rest of the team were a bit keener and fished all day. Nick Gurr who is having a couple of days on the Lees before heading north to try his hand on the northern rivers for a few day was the lucky rod today getting a 5lb seatrout out of the Annay, it was just below the bottom croy and took an olive sort of frances thing. The only other fish I saw today was in the slap which was an old river fish that showed a couple of times. The mink population is growing as at 5.00pm a group of three headed across the river from the cobble point in front of the hut, by the time I got to the rifle hopping across the stones in socks they were into the rushes on the far bank, 10 minutes later another two did the same thing but this time rifle was ready and I had my boots on so they were not so lucky, Paul also saw another black one down at learmouth with a duckling in its jaws so must be feeding young as it went quite a distance with it. I’ll have to get some traps dug in as if people find them they wreck them saying it’s cruel, of course they’ve no idea what a mink can/will do. As often the case after a sunny warm weekend the area round cornhill bend had been party central with bottles, cans, food containers and a disposable BBQ all left, they need a few words of wisdom which I will take delight in giving. Catches low again and all below us bar two. The cheery weathergirls forecast of rain which she gave over the weekend now doesn’t look so wet and gets less each day.
Tuesday 27th June. Light rain most of the day and this evening there is a wee bit of water in the Ettrick and Teviot only a couple of inches though, rain forecast for tomorrow again, trouble is if a flood comes great, if it’s just six inch or so it’ll be unfishable due to weed and slime coming down and no great benefit when it’s gone. Anyway today we had three fish and other pulls and a couple of boils at the sunray. Jonathan Reddin had a 7lber from the glide which was an older river fish, Nick Gurr had a clean 10lber from learmouth on a #12 sort of silver stoat and Steve Robins had an 11lber on a wee black and yellow bottle tube from the slap, Paul and Zac Holland had a couple of boils at the sunray in the slap and I had a big boil at the sunray in the glide along with a couple of follows, two of the team are out again tonight so hopefully they’ll be lucky. Ladykirk were top dog today getting five and I think it was 8 fish reported below us which is good, anything caught above us is irrelevant to us as they are gone and out of reach so I never count them. No mink seen today or otters for that matter.
Wednesday 28th June. An overcast day with light rain by lunchtime. Water height 6” and 62 degrees. New team on today and all keen as hungry ferrets, Mike Moran had a pull from something in the Bags after he’d recovered from nearly puting his car over the bank at the Middle stream, it was on three wheels with the back nearside a foot off the ground, after one tow rope snapped it was touch and go getting back onto the track before it toppled down the bank, all ended well. Dave lost a fish at the iron gate and other boils were seen at sunray/collie dug type flies. This afternoon Rodger had a 3lb seatrout out of the glide on a very small frances. Paul saw a lovely fresh fish in the slap this morning and just as they were casting to it a big dog otter decided to swim through and have a wee play, this was followed by another some 5 minutes later, they didn’t see the otter or the fish again. Small flies are the order of the day in the #10-#12 or some anglers going smaller, the salmon will soon be going to specsavers if the flies get any smaller. A sunray/collie dug is a great alternative you can usually get a boil or a follow but sometimes they just won’t take it other time smashing into it like there’s no tomorrow. Dry and a wee bit cooler tomorrow but still no sign of the heavy rain we really need.
Thursday 29th June. A mostly overcast day with a few sunnier spells, the river was on mission creep today going up a few inches which seemed to put the fish down as the only fish I saw all morning was an old one head and tailing in the slap, it did have one look at the sunray but didn’t pull. This afternoon down on the glide a fat seatrout cleared the water by 3 feet or more giving us a bit of encouragement, David Bryson fished it down with a cascade sort of double to no avail so I suggested a sunray as I often do, a quick lesson on snap ‘T’ casting and he was soon pushing the sunray into the distance. David was on his 10th cast perhaps when a fish grabbed it and it was a belter of a fish, it leapt clear of the water the rod went flat due to the line being behind the reel and then snap the leader broke, now it takes a lot of effort to break 18lb maxima but it did, having seen how good and fresh a fish it was I’m still hurting this evening, it was the best fish I’ve seen this season. Down in the tail of the glide a decent seatrout grabbed a hold of the new sunray I put on but after a thrash on the surface it was off. Neil Broughton is fishing this evening so hopefully he’ll get us on the scoreboard. I can’t see how many fish were reported as fishpal seems to be out of order.
Friday 30th June. Well that’s another month away with just 6 salmon landed as opposed to 28 for June last year, it’ll get better I’m sure. Today it rained most of the day but looking at the gauges this evening it looks like the land has sooked it all up as none of the gauges are moving. Andrew King was with us today and he was lucky as he hooked and landed a 6lb fish on a sunray at the Iron Gate, it was a river fish but very welcome just the same, his pal Chris also hooked a fish in the slap but he wasn’t so lucky as it went through the slap and came off. David Foreman was also here for the day and had several boils follows at the sunray but none would grab hold, the three of them are all going back out this evening to chase some seatrout so hopefully they’ll be lucky. There were about 9 fish reported caught below us the best being Ladykirk with 4, I saw a photo of one of them a 14lber which was a nice clean fish but not a bar of silver. It is to blow 40mph tomorrow midday so that will stir up a lot of weed no doubt with the wave action, it’ll likely ruin my flowers in the garden.
Saturday 1st July. A very windy day with a heavy shower just before lunch. Yesterday’s rain did nothing to the levels and in fact it dropped an inch here. New team on today and they were all keen, some were not as keen by lunchtime as they’d been battling the wind all morning. Stuart Maughan was on the slap and cauld first thing and we gave it a wee dressed double, a black n yellow bottle tube and a sunray but not a touch was had, we didn’t even see a fish, moving into the cauld we tried the wee tube first then the sunray at the top, I suggested trying the very tail as there had been a lot of seatrout down there, but not today there wasn’t. Backing it back up with the boat I told Stuart to keep casting a long line and stripping the fly and that when he had a classic take, a bit of a head and tail rise on to the fly and he was on, it turned out to be a fresh 6lber and very welcome, on the second run up we had another boil but this time it didn’t grab a hold. That was all the action for the day.
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©M Campbell 2023
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