F.A (Flattieholics Anonymous)

It had been nearly two weeks since  my last Flattie, so i needed to feed the habit. Bait was required and i drew a blank in the supermarket so i gambled with the fishmongers in the high street in Portobello where i was fishing , they had one mackerel and i made up the rest of my bait with a few sides of herring.

I was fishing about 30 minutes after low tide with a relatively calm sea, a set up in a nice looking crease that caught my eye and soon i took a wee flounder.

Off the mark i was thinking they were going to come thick and fast but i was wrong i moved closer to the burn and took another. But   it was slow going.

I have a hunch  my bait wasn't up to scratch today , the mackerel looked a bit dull or maybe the flatties  were having a off day one thing noticeable was despite it being calm it was a big tide.

Before i decided to call it a day i hooked into something different , i was hoping it was a bass , but no a sea trout that was festooned with sea lice. One of these days i will get a bass from these beaches!

tinsel traditionals

With the darker nights kicking in ive had a wee inclination to tie up some tinsel bodied traditionals in the way of a change, there not flies I'll use very often although a couple of lochs have been on my mind whilst tying them.

The loch of Stenness in Orkney with the stones of Stenness in the background



this loch is brackish and garish patterns are recommended for the resident browns and the sea trout which enter the loch. Ive only caught a few wee sea trout on the handful of times Ive fished here, but its one of those lochs where the next cast could be to a monster,  i look forward to fishing there again next year, so a good reason to tie up some tinsel traditionals.  

silver cardinal

Stenness stinger

bloody butcher

Ive also tied a couple of gold bodied patterns which are probably more at home on the next door neighbour of Stenness, the loch of Harray.

Harray is on the left, Stenness on the right

   

the Dunkeld

Cinnamon and gold

 the trout are more numerous in Harray compared to Stenness, and lightning quick on the take!

last season i never fished any lochs for trout,  next season i intend to put that right.   





a dreich afternoon

Today we had an afternoon on the grayling burn, although slightly milder than yesterday the weather was dreich, water clarity looked ok... ish despite the rain so we were hopeful of a grayling or two.

Col got of to the best possible start with a nice grayling on the cdc/elk

i got a trout before spending ages covering a grayling which was rising on the far bank of this pool, i missed him several times on different dries before putting him down, frustrating!

col got in on the act too, missing a couple in this pool!

as the afternoon wore on the water clarity seemed to deteriorate making it pretty much unfishable so we headed home after flogging a few pools, its a tricky wee burn to get just right.  



cdc & elk saves the day

With a touch of overnight frost the leaves are falling fast, this morning i found the grayling burn choked full of them.

 I worked my way upstream fishing some nice pools without a touch except for an out of season trout on the glister bug. There was no surface activity which wasn't a surprise with it being so cold, but i hoped that i might have picked up a grayling or two on the nymph, never mind!

 a fine morning

then in a favourite pool  a nice grayling came up out of the blue for the cdc & elk

 i was pleased as i gazed at my prize in the October sunshine, despite my best efforts this turned out to be my only grayling of the day. Back on the vice tonight to replace some lost nymphs for tomorrow!

        

Half an Hour at the Basin

It feels  really cold today , snow doesnt seem far away! Don't know what sort of winter we are in for but being this cold so early on makes me think we are not going to get away lightly.

Ive got predators on the brain at the moment, coppery/ bronze ones that live off deep rock ledges , the accomodation is booked, the OS map ordered ,  even looking into back up tackle. But for now it is a distant fantasy, so with the dogs eyes  begging for a walk , I  decided to kill two birds with one stone and go and feed my addiction. Grabbing the rod, reel  a few flies forceps  scissors wire etc,it wasnt long before i was  setting up on the canal bank at my favourite basin.

 I started with a pink fly, had a follow from a curious jack pike which shadowed the fly then had a look at me and dissapeared. A few more casts covering the entirety of the basin  proved fruitless , i then changed to a flash fly , but , in my eyes they were a bit small as they had lost a few fibres from previous encounters, so it was on with a chartreuse fly and first cast i was into a small jack . Feeling the cold i decided to call it a day there and then. Must stop being lazy and fantasising about distant trips. I really need to tie for whats required now!  

Back on Talking Terms

I knocked my pan in yesterday putting up a fence, sore and knackered after weilding a sledge hammer i took the day off, with a relaxing bit of fishing in mind. With Brian finding his rare "window of opportunity" being productive i decided to try the same burn . I must confess i had almost given up on this water of recent and was already for abandoning any ties i have with it , as the last few times I've went to fish it has been too coloured , it seems it such a lottery .I think it actually runs clearer when it's carrying extra water.

Perenial Aster

It was a pretty dull day , made me think maybe the glister nymphs wont work.  but i tackled up with a klink and a size 12 glister nymph hung underneath . First few pools nothing , not even a riser , then i came to a big pool. A wee dimple rise suggested a  smutting grayling  i cast something took the nymph and instantly through the hook, then a fish rose again i replaced the nymph with a size 16 black klink and was rewarded with my first grayling of the new season a wee beauty a real delight to see.

For some reason there and then i decided to change flies, resorting to old tried and tested for this burn , on went a size 14 glister nymph and on a dropper (not the usual NZ tied to the bend method) i fished a size 12 CDC and elk. Instantly my fortunes had changed as i struck into a good fish on the nymph , i thought it might be a trout as it was scrapping but no turned out to be a fine grayling of 1 1/4lb.

That's kind of the way the rest of the day went, the grayling were right in the mood , Some good ones too 4 of which went over the pound, interestingly all the better fish took the nymph , where as the smaller ones seemed to prefer  the dry.

Back on talking terms again with this burn, as moody as it can be it has it's good days and today was one of these. 

a window of opportunity

I finally got around to cutting my mother in law's conifer hedge this afternoon, but  as well as loading a hedge cutter into the car,  my wee Norwich and a pair of waders seemed to find their way into the boot too! with the hedge cut and cleaned up i made the short journey to the grayling burn, in the hope that it was running clear enough to fish.

 By this time it was quarter to three so time was limited, but my first impression was that clarity looked ok. In the first pool i hooked a fish momentarily on a glister nymph, don't know if it was a Grayling or a trout, but it was encouraging anyway. Next up in a favourite pool i spotted the unmistakable rise of a smutting Grayling which obliged by taking a wee klink.

and another, like peas in a pod

this pool had smutting grayling too but i missed them all!

one more on the glister nymph

there was still lots of good water to fish but i had to leave with the light begining to fade,looking forward to the next time.