Esox hunt !

Saturday 3rd

On the way it started raining heavy, the burns and rivers were running full and coloured, luckily though by the time we arrived the worst of it seemed to have blown over, we were actually struggling for a breeze, the water almost flat calm . We set up , got the boat organised, rods etc, and were setting of to a bay. It didn't take long before Brian hooked a pike and lost it then hooked it again, (or a different pike) on a red fly , but again it through the hook. Me, well i was going through box trying to find a fly that would work, trying orange, pink, everything , i had but couldn't get a bite. For that matter . Heading over to an island Brian once again had a violent surface slash at the fly looked like a not bad fish too! again he had a red fly , next few drifts were fish less, it was really quite dour, much of the piking has been so far this season.
 The next bay close in i had an offer to a hot orange fly, but as a reoccurring theme they just were not sticking, for some reason i changed to a lime green fly with a rattle, fishing over open water i suddenly got a take, at first i thought it was a small jack then it approached the boat and dived underneath it i responded by standing on the seat to get the line around the Bow. and keep the pressure on. It fought well once it woke up , but eventually it tired , and Brian did the honours with the net, but she wasn't as big a i thought just short of double figures she was though a lovely conditioned fish!

  We continued flogging the bay casting all sorts , then we moved on. The next bit was a deep drop off straight from a reed fringed bank. And it seemed to be a bit of  a hot spot. Brian was in!

Then it was off, then i was in and landed a wee jack which did it's best to bury itself in the weed.

I'd no sooner landed that fish and Brian was in again.

This one went about 5lb. Unfortunately it was trailing a trace had a fish lodged down it's throat and it's gills were ripped on one side, it's a wonder the poor thing was alive! unfortunately there was no way we could have removed that trace without causing the fish further damage, so we returned it and wished it the best of luck. 
We  continued our way round the loch flogging away , then Brian hooked up again a wee Jack on a chartreuse fly .

Then i took the smallest fish of the day!

Last fish of the day fell for Brian i managed to capture the acrobatics on  camera!

Smokin'

Tail walkin'

It had been a hard days fishing, for some reason or another the fish weren't really on, it's been the way of it over the last few weeks, one day though we will catch it right!