21 October 2018
The Tweed catches for last week were 316 salmon and 16 sea trout, making totals for the year to date 4,305 salmon and 635 sea trout, all within 90% accuracy.
Some may be tempted to say that a week’s catch of 316 salmon is not bad, and maybe in absolute terms it isn’t.
But conditions throughout the river were perfect, with the exception of Monday when the weekend flood was still abating. Perfect conditions and the 3rd week in October on the Tweed used to be the stuff of salmon anglers’ dreams.
Still worth fishing, a reported fresh-ish 27lber caught at Walk and a few other sea licers proves that...but nothing like what it used to be.
As for the coming week, and even the one after that if my weather forecasts are correct, you can forget those fast sinking lines, unless you enjoy catching the bottom.
There will be no rain, some wind to start the week and after that, increasingly cold from the north.
A time for longjohns, neoprene waders, comforting log fires in the hut and a glass of something strong and warming.
And for intrepid, brave fishing souls.
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After five years of this, of many fewer fish than there used to be in the autumn, we should all stop having those ultimately futile thoughts of comparison with days long gone by.
We are entering, indeed five years ago in the 2014 season (unwittingly) we entered, a new era, and we must now look forward to what the future will bring rather than harking back to the past.
You will get no more indulgence, here on these pages, in yet more fruitless theories about spring and summer runs, and of salmon or grilse predominance. They are all huff and puff...and little more than uneducated guesswork.
Just as the scientists never saw the change coming in 2014, they cannot predict exactly what (or when) the future will be....for it involves the comparative chaos of the North Atlantic and all the multitude of dangers our vulnerable smolts face when they get there.
Of only one thing can we be quite sure, and if we have not learnt that by now, we certainly should have after 5 years, which is...
... that it will be, indeed already is, very different.
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Those who blame Tweed’s management for the comparative lack of fish here, have one awkward question to answer.
Are all salmon river managers in Scotland also to blame for the comparative lack of salmon on their rivers too?
Because what is happening here is precisely what has happened elsewhere. The similarities are so blindingly obvious, that only those capable of ignoring all logic can possibly imagine that river managers, and what happens within their rivers, are to blame.
Most sensible analysts would conclude that all of our fish-eating birds, and other predators, are indeed a problem...
...but they are not THE problem.
That lies in the sea and where, for now, such a small percentage of our smolts survive and come back as adults.
As for our Scottish river managers, blaming them is absurd and ridiculous. Many of them are the very same people now as they were in 2010 when Scotland’s rivers had record rod catches.
Have they all become useless, whereas in 2010 they were the bees’ knees?
No, they are highly skilled, knowledgeable and dedicated to their rivers. They cannot control what happens when our smolts reach the sea, any more than their all-too-vocal critics can.
So if you ever meet David Summers (Tay), Roger Knight (Spey), Lorraine Hawkins (Dee) or our own Fay Hieatt (Tweed) you would do well to remember the hard work they do on all of our behalfs every day in the current, most difficult of times.
Anyone can shine when times are good. It is when times are not so good that you need a thick skin, resilience and a dogged determination to carry on.
We should all thank them, and never judge at all based on the entirely random business of how many, or how few, adult salmon happen to come back from the sea.
You, and I, would do well to remember that.
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