31 August 2014
This is turning out remarkably like last year for the Tweed in terms of the frustrations of lack of water.
Am I alone in thinking “No it isn’t” when the weather man says “Good news, summer is coming back next week”?
So the foot of water we had on Saturday will fizzle out by mid week and the catch scores will inevitably deteriorate. The 6 footer we really need, and have long hoped for, continues to elude us.
I hear stories of lack of grilse from Iceland, and our fellow east coast rivers are not doing brilliantly despite having mountains of water from ex hurricane Bertha (they tell me a staggering 10 inches of rain fell on Dallas moor in 24 hours 3 weeks ago and turned the insignificant Lossie into a temporary likeness of the Amazon), so maybe this is just going to be a lacklustre year for salmon numbers?
We will only know for sure here when we get that flood.
Rejoice though that the northeast drift netters are now off as of 31st August, so that, with the exception of our single remaining in-river operating net at Paxton (for the next 2 weeks only), any salmon that wants to come in now should have a reasonably free run.
By way of reflection, until we get more exciting angling prospects and news, I was reminded of the words of Lord Grey of Fallodon when attending the funeral of a friend’s father, an avid and expert fisherman, aged 92, last week.
“The time must come to all of us who live long, when memory is more than prospect. An angler who has reached this stage and reviews the pleasure of life, will be grateful and glad that he has been an angler, for he will look back on days radiant with happiness, peaks and peaks of enjoyment that are not less bright because they are lit in memory by the light of the setting sun.”
A little sombre, maybe, but if we are fortunate enough to ever reach 92, or anything like it, after a very full fishing life, and remain in good nick….I rather like the idea of “being able to look back on days radiant with happiness.”
It would be grand if there were to be many such days over the next 3 months of the peak of Tweed’s 2014 salmon season.
Something for us all to look forward to.
But first we need……...water.
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