you cant always get what you want

It's been in my head this week to return to one of the rivers we fished earlier in the year on our "trailer trashing" weekend, it's probably the moodiest river i know but on it's day can fish superbly and show why it has a such a big reputation for quality trout. With the good days in mind Colin and i visited the river again today, hoping that some of it's bigger residents might put in an appearance if we were lucky.

  Col started of missing a fish of around a pound which was encouraging, but high hopes of a good day were short lived  as we fished through some inviting pools where we have encountered good trout on previous trips without so much as a sniff. We kept our chins up though and  col got the first fish, only a wee one mind but welome non the less on the klink.

we picked up another two or three modest trout before the river changed character above the falls, lots of pocket water to fish where a big stimulator comes into its own

 even then though  the pocket water wasn't fishing as good as we know it can and it didn't help missing most takes when they did happen! Col was really  unlucky with a long lean trout in the two to three pound bracket which came off at the death, surprisingly though it hadn't put up much of a fight, perhaps an old fish going back in condition, who knows.  I lost a  nice trout of around a pound when it cleared the water in a bid for freedom, and in the last run i fished a big fish took the stimulator, showing its flank on the take, i'm 99% sure it was a Salmon/grilse which had been in a wee while, there were quite a few showing here and there especialy above the falls, anyway after holding on for 30 seconds or so with the fish holding static in the current the hook sprung back,  if it had been a trout i would have been gutted! a long walk back to the car to end a tiring day with little reward but what a location to spend the day!  looking forward to another visit next season. It's a river where the conditions have to be just right for success but then thats what makes it so special when it does go to plan .

Friday night flounder bash

Today after work  i quickly got some gear together for a wee bash at the flounders,  two or three breakaway leads and a couple of traces in my jacket pocket, some Mackie for bait and i was ready to go. My son  Jamie came along too and by half past four in the afternoon we were on the beach setting up.

 Plauged by weed and no bites for the first hour, the doubts were creeping in, then a  tap on the rod tip resulted in a nice flounder around the pound mark to boost my confidence and keep Jamies interest for a wee while at least! we kept this one for the table.

another few flounders followed before we packed it in at seven, happy but ready for dinner! 

this summers sea angling adventure has been so much fun but  I'm feeling the need to cast a fly rod again, hopefully this weekend on one of my favourite trout streams if the weather plays ball that is.

Tributary of a Tributary

Headed to my local trout streams main tributary for a few casts yesterday late afternoon , caught a few then decided to head up again, further one of it's tributaries. It's been almost exactly a year since ive fished it, and only a handful of times before this .

The water looked great , but it was tough going fishing in amongst the weed nothing rose, it felt fishless and i even suspected a pollution incident. I was just about to head back when away upstream a fish rose, relieved  i put on a size 12 dirty polly and it obliged , nothing big just a wee trout typical of a wee burn.

 A few casts later i turned something much bigger felt the resistance and it was gone. Things were  looking up.

The next pool was quite deep and through it's main body fairly slow , i upped my fly size and up came a fish , it was a good one too as it scrapped really hard bending my 2 weight into a continuous arch. with a few nervous moments , i thought have i foul hooked it , but no it was hooked fair and square in the scissors, the fish went a 1lb 1/4 a fine fish for a wee burn .

 After that the fishing nose dived again though i did prick a couple.

3rd time lucky

Last night we dug some lug worm from a local beach, we spent 2 hours doing so just to make sure we had enough.
This Morning Brian picked me up at 8am ,on the way we passed a fish van , so i picked up a couple of fillets of herring with plan C in mind.

Plan A
We arrived at plan A a rock venue we have recently float fished for wrasse from ,the sea looked ok but in closer inspection it was carrying quite a bit colour, and the  swell was causing us bother , there was some windy weather  mid week that i think did the damage.   We gave it a hour before deciding it was no good.

Plan B
With the water so dirty we decided to try a peir. But ruled out the wrasse as they are primarily sight feeders but were hoping for a cod. But only the crabs bit our baits and again our confidence was knocked, so again we decided to move if it was  the evening i think we would have stuck it out as this is when i believe the cod bite, but not when the sun is splitting the sky.

Plan C

Plan C was for Flounder and for us virgin territory, lots of bays to choose from on our way back down the Fife coast ,  we decided on the first road side option . When we arrived a guy was digging lug and fishing the beach, we asked him of the prospects of which they were Flounder and maybe the odd bass , but the weed may be a problem . We decided to give it a go . Brian noticed a Burn along the shore a good feature which often attracts flounder so we made a v line for there basically set up 2 hook flapper rigs baited with lug tipped off with herring , fished from the burn, first cast i reeled in a tonne of weed, Brian though was getting bites.  He lost one, then i got lucky with a nice fluke.

A good start , I rebaited and took another. Which Brian kept for his dinner.

Next Brian had a Brace of quick-fire flukes.

After that we had a bad spell with weed, every cast fouling the line baits and leads.

This coincided with running out of herring, which i felt was our best bait for the day. After that the tide slowed but our worm baits would come back untouched . We decided to call it a day , and i think we were contented that we managed to pull something out of the bag on a day that wasn't initially looking too promising . Dying to know what the flounder tasted like?

Back on the Neuk

We just can't get enough of the sea fishing just now, it's just so diverse, and enjoyable. an evening tide tonight, we went through the usual ritual  of digging  lugworm ,before heading over to our Fife rock mark, unlike the previous week there was a fair swell on the water, which made things difficult , but quickly Brian landed a wrasse, which took fairly close in. 

 i then found myself connected to another colourful wrasse, which i landed .

i then lost one, Brian caught a wee coalfish then also lost a ballan right at his feet.

We decided though that conditions were far from ideal to bin the float fishing , and  head to a peir further up the coast, unfortunately i'd only brought float gear but we managed to cobble together a setup of pulley rigs and 4oz  grippers to fish the reef edge of the harbour. We were joined by a gent with his grandson, turned out to be the infamous "Codhead Bob" a mine of info on the East Neuk  . Set up ,I took a wee wrasse.

Then Brian had   a wee  red codling, the first we've had from Fife so far , but after talking to CHB i think it wont be the last we just have to time our visits accordingly.

 this was followed by another first a bearded rockling to boost the species list .

 

It was starting to look red hot with plenty knocks but , That was our lot for the night  as our bait supply ran dry. Can't wait for next time , need a visit to ebay for some more gear.

Perch Sessions

Brian phoned me asking me if i could make it down the pond , i had to baby sit, but shortly after i joined him, he was fishing away with his intermediate with a white fly with bead chain, whilst i set up with the floater. He was doing much better than i was getting far more bites , then he connected with this beauty! 

That was the best his  fish of the session as we finished up early as Brian was still to get his dinner.



Turns out i had a guilt free  opportunity to return to the pond tonight , armed with the intermediate and a few fresh tied clousers made of my dogs tail hair. The rain didnt seem far away with the sound of thunder in the distance, and sure enough it did arrive but nothing to serious.

A count down of 20 seconds seemed to get to the fishes level most were wee things.

 But i did manage a couple of better ones, still the big one eludes me.

a day at the wrasses

I picked Col up at the back of eight this morning, we were in high spirits and looking forward to the days fishing ahead. But first we needed bait and spent a sweaty hour or so digging some lug before heading up the fife coast to our chosen mark. It  takes an age to get anywhere along the fife coastal route so best to allow plenty of time, we stopped on the way  for some juice and couldnt resist a hot roll too when we were in the shop, Col went for the black pudding , i had the link sausage! just the ticket after digging the lug.

Not being familiar with the mark we headed to a likely looking rocky outcrop and set up with the float gear, and  soon after i had the first fish of the day, small but welcome!

I caught a couple of  nice wrasse after that before  leaving the rock  as we were in danger of getting cut of by the tide.

we mucked about a bit before finding another suitable rock to fish from, and when we did Col was soon in on the action landing his first ever ballan wrasse, result!

 loads more of these characterfull fish followed throughout the afternoon , nothing huge but great fun on the float tackle.

we were having so much fun that we failed to notice that we had been cut off  a wee bit by the tide and had to get wet to reach the shore, oops! 

A  lady was sitting on the shoreline watching our daft antics and  kindly offered to make us a cup of tea as she was staying in one of the shoreline properties, a nice slice of cake each too, result! back home a wee bit on the wet side but happy with our days fishing.

Knocked off my Perch

I was watching Matt Hayes last night fishing Eyebrook reservoir catching some huge perch by spinning soft plastic lures , kind of got me in the mood for some stripy action. So i thought i'd try out my local wee pond this evening. I decided instead of the usual trout sized lures like wooly buggers etc, to give some saltwater sized flies a bash , i packed a few size 4 clousers and surf candies in white and a few in  black. I started off with the clousers but it was slow a change to a white surf candy seemed right up there street.

i then changed to a smaller surf candy and they came thick and fast but just wee fish , so i decided to go back to the size 4 , and then something much bigger took hold , this it felt totally differant then i saw it,  a huge perch, then it thrashed  and was gone arghhhhh!I reckon he might have gone 3lb.

About halve an hour later i did manage a nice'ish  fish a small consolation. i'll be back for him though!