Spring has sprung

We were quietly excited about our first trip of the season on this beautiful river, conditions were looking ok with good cloud cover and only a light downstream wind to contend with, all we needed was a decent hatch of fly and a trout or two to go for.Once on the river it was nice to bump into fellow anglers Bri and Davie, we had a good blether before heading our separate ways.

 

 Its that time of year when the surrounding fields have these cute wee fellas in them

We patrolled the river on the look out for signs of the hatch starting and eventually with a few march browns and dark olives coming off  i spotted a steady riser at around 1.45 pm, i had a few attempts at him before Col changed my size 14 olive biot klink for 12 brown biot klink and bingo, a nice fish of around a pound and a half.

A good hatch of mainly march browns came on in the afternoon but still there were few risers to go for.

  what we did see rise were generally going good style and we got two or three more on the brown biot klink.

We met Bri and Davie again in the middle of the beat, they had also landed a couple of trout each including an escapee rainbow for Davie which had a full tail too. After  blethering for a while we went our separate ways and Col and i jumped in the car and drove to another stretch not to far away.

 My main objective was to have a look at my favourite pool on the stretch, by the time i got there it was now close to 4pm and there was no sign of any activity in the pool, i thought i may as well fish it blind and set up with a size 10 klink and a wire nymph suspended below to search the pool,  Col had just headed upstream to see if anything was happening up there when a trout boiled at my fly and i struck, at first i thought it must have taken the klink but no it was the nymph, and a big trout too! i shouted to Col but by now he must have been to far upstream to hear my call. A nervous fight took place and i was mightily relieved to finally get him in the net, at just over four and a half pounds i was over the moon!

another mini hatch of march browns seemed to get under way again and although the pool i was fishing was now jiggered with all the antics the pool below had a couple of trout on the feed, back to the usual size again!

It wasn't until this morning when i was looking at the pictures that i made this discovery, my biggest trout from last season came from the very same pool, a fine  but slightly leaner trout on the day of the royal wedding which weighed 3 lbs 12oz, looking at the markings I'm sure it's the same fish which now weighs over 4lb's 8 oz!

a wee video: