Excellent water levels should keep river anglers happy
Well the rain appears to have arrived in good quantities again during Wednesday’s downpour. Hopefully the river anglers will forget about all the frustrations and frayed tempers and get out and do some serious fishing now that the water levels are up where most anglers want them!
The River Leven was busy on Monday with plenty of anglers out hoping that with the Barrage gates now fully open the fish would be there for the taking. Unfortunatley the water was coloured for quite a bit and then cleared but overall Monday was a big dissappointment to some anglers. The loch lomond system is not a large system so sport is dependent on getting a run of fish into the river that particular day. With the weekend water slightly higher than normal and suitable tides it is likely that the fish had already went through on the first high tide in the early hours of Saturday morning hence the seven fish off the combined loch and river on Saturday!
With the now excellent water levelsTuesday passed off fairly quietly as well, sufficient no doubt to frustrate enough anglers to give the river a miss on the Wednesday. In typical Leven fashion at least four fish were caught on the Wednesday. Gordon Pollock had one at 9lbs, Andrew Leadbetter a 4lbs grilse on the fly and a 5lbs grilse tailed out by Andrew but we never got the anglers name and another double figure fish was landed at the Bonhill Bridge pool. Grilse are being seen in the river so prospects look fine for the weekend.
An angler fishes the run in to the Bonhill Bridge pool on Thursday afternoon.
It is likely that more fish will start to come off the leven over the next few days. The river is weel worth a visit or two and with the superb streamy flows it is an absolute delight to fish with the big salmon fly rod spey casting down the pools and streams.
Others still spin the river with a variety of lures with the flying C being particularly effective.
This extra rain might not please the sea trout anglers on the river leven given that the sea trout runs should really start to be arriving soon. One mans loss is anothers gain so the loch angler could enjoy some exciting fly fishing with fresh sea trout over the coming weeks, weather permitting.
The extra rain over the weekend did not appear to entice many early fish into the Endrick. The water was very dirty though which tends to put fish off until several more spates follows. We were hard at it on Monday and Tuesday removing the trees at Drumtian. Aftere a lot of effort we finally got the last tree removed from one of the main pools. A sea trout of about 2lbs showed itself but that was all that was seen at the Drumtian stretch but there is always a chance the odd salmon will have entered the endrick and lying in one of the pools somewhere?
Fallen trees is now a regular event each year on the Endrick.
Drumtian: The main pool is now cleared and fishable once again.
This large tree provides cover for the fish but a fierce gale could see it in the pool!
There must be preventative work done on the river to prevent the destruction of good pools. We are considering taking the whole top part of this tree off and leaving just the bottom section. This might allow the tree to survive that bit longer. This work will be done in the winter period when the season has finished. lets hope the tree stays upright in between times.
Another example of two trees unlikely to stay upright for long.
This is another example of trees whose roots are exposed and the trees likley to end up in the river. More work for the winter period.
The River Endrick was up about four feet at Fintry today so we can expect a few anglers giving the river a go when the riverstarts to clear and fall to a reasonable level.
Loch Lomond is likely to have received another helping of fish so prospects there should be quite reasonable.
A trolling boat rounds the Black Rocks hoping for a salmon.
The bailiffs patrol boat will hopefully be doing the rounds at weekends and during week days as well over this next few weeks so please have your permit to hand.