news/editorial

20 September 2015 News/Editorial

The past week has been the fishing week from hell for salmon anglers on the Tweed, no water, no wind and very often blazing sunshine out of the clearest and bluest of skies.

Without a proper flood since the spring, the river is dirty, the stones covered in a browny/black gunge.

There are two questions uppermost in my mind, first, when will we ever get that flood, and secondly, after the initial flush, will it solve the problem?

It is all pretty much exactly, uncannily, like September 2014, which was also plagued by drought and fine weather, and the catches, like this year, about one third of what we have come to expect of recent Septembers.

I am, of course, not saying that the fishing would not be better if we had water; it would, the fish would be fresher, more mobile and much more inclined to take. But is there the weight of fish to come from the lower beats and from those fish still in the sea, so far preferring to run the gauntlet of dolphins and seals, rather than enter an uninviting, summer level river?

I know what we would all like the answer to be, but this year’s late summer/autumn is following an ominously similar pattern to last year.

I do hope I am wrong, and results from other rivers, mostly much better than 2014, give us hope.

But first we need rain, and although the week ahead looks more unsettled and windier/wetter than last week, will it give us that flood?

Time alone, as ever, will tell.