Friday 28 March 2014

Better Water Conditions (but still a bit cold)

Measuring in at 32 inches
At last! the water has now been fishable (in places) for the last couple of weeks, and we have actually been able to get out onto the river to wet a line. Good news too! there has been a small number of spring salmon caught up and down the river already, and although I had to go further afield, I too managed to start the season with a bang, by hooking and landing a fresh sea liced salmon of around 12 to13lb.

A quick snap whilst in the water
We have also managed to get one or two early season brown trout since the trout fishing kicked off on March 15th, however they are still a little tentative in their approach to the fly, with low water temperatures and persistent east winds, which seem to have become the norm at this time of year.

There are some good quality browns out there though, just waiting for conditions to improve, and whilst fishing for salmon a nice example of one decided to take a large snelder fished deep on a full sunk line, a fish of around 2lb, (with an all too common piscivorous bird attack mark near it's tail) a little unfair on the fish though, being as it was landed with the salmon rod, so needless to say it was returned to the water to fight another day, and believe me it will make a formidable opponent on the trout rod!

As big as the top handle
During this cold period we have also had the odd warmer spell too, (albeit short) and in turn, the odd sparse hatch of Large Dark Olives, couple this with the sand martins showing face again last week and all the signs look good as we approach April, and with the long range forecast not looking too bad, we should soon be tapping into some good trout fishing again here on the Eden, and with several fishing trips already arranged for people, it won't be too long before we are putting this into practice. Can't Wait!