1 a Day!!

                                                         Duncan Egan with his first springer at Ballogie

With the river dropping we are starting to be able to fish the pools properly, the flies are getting down to the fish and we a being rewarded with some great fish!

                             The view looking down to the Garden pool at Commonty from the Junction stream

With the season only 6 days old we've managed to average 1 a day at Ballogie including 2 today for Tom Marshall both caught in the Bridge pool this afternoon. This is a good average for February and if we can keep the river at a reasonable level then we should see a better than average start to the Season.

 

Persistence!

                                                                                                                                                                                Ken Reid presenting Gareth Headland with my box of Franc N Snaelda's for the biggest salmon caught on opening day.

We've started of pretty well so far considering the conditions we've had, the opening 2 days saw 2 from Ballogie and 1 from Carlogie. Commonty got off the mark yesterday with a fish of 9lbs caught on a Willie Gunn Franc N Snaelda from the Boat pool, the river was sitting at 4ft 6" in the morning which is a great height for Commonty.

                          
                                                       Ken Reid playing a Kelt in the Boat pool at Carlogie.

Today saw water temperatures at 34f in the river, which is the coldest it's been for a long time, Grue appeared when we went up to Alans pool at Carlogie this morning, so conditions were hard as the fish were reluctant to move because the water was so cold, but as you know persistence is the name of the game in February and this afternoon Jim Sullivan was rewarded with a 12lb fish from the floating bank at Ballogie
 

Opening day ceremony 2013

                                                        The crowd assembles for the start of the ceremony

                                                        Alistair Hume, Ian Scott, Mark Bilsby and myself

                                                                       Alistair Hume toasting the Dee

                                          Me being interviewed by the BBC, Colin White, for Reporting Scotland

                                                                             The First Cast of 2013

Unfortunately, Alistair didn't manage to catch a springer on the first cast but we did catch a spring salmon from Ballogie, at about the same time the ceremony was happening! It was a 9lb spring salmon caught by Steven Moir from Lower Inchbare. I'm afraid it was just kelts from Carlogie and Commonty but we're only on Day One........!

Thanks to my lovely wife, Tracey, for the taking the photos while I was occupied.
 

Nearly there!!!

Well it's that time of year again!! The start of the 2013 season is about to begin, condition couldn't be better! The river is sitting at 3ft on the Bridge pool gauge, the water is running clear and the wind has dropped.

                        
                                                                     The Potarch bridge a week ago

 

And this how it looks today. Perfect!!!

 

We have a lot of snow in the hills which will be good for the river levels if we can hold on to it until late spring.

The opening ceremony will be again at Ballogie at the Bridge pool and will start at 10.30am we are expecting around 250 people to attend the ceremony, I will do a full report tomorrow with lots of photos from the event.

 

The Marquee ready for the big day

 

 

 

 A bit of fun

Winter Work!

No doubt everyone will be relieved to see that the blog is back up and running!!!
I had lots of you messaging me why the blog stopped in July, the reason being I just didn't have time to do everything!!!! My fly-tying business has taken off in a big way and I had to give up something, unfortunately it was the blog, there wasn't enough hours in the day but hopefully this season I can continue throughout the season even if it's just a weekly report in the summer.

                                       Ian Fraser making a start on the new fence at the Bridge pool Ballogie

New season = Lots of news.........

As usual we have been busy on the riverbanks, however the weather hasn't really helped us out very much! Heavy rain and high water doesn't make for great conditions when working on the banks but we managed a week after the Christmas and New Year break and then the snow started! We had 17" in 1 day so, again, we had to abandon riverbank work.

                                     The bank at Commonty just above the Garden pool before we started work.

And the finished job! This bit will be good in very high water. The fish lie in close to our side and before we did this it was a very tricky wade to get out past the leaning trees so you could cast safely without hitting the overhanging branches.

Warmer evenings

                                  A nice Grisle goes back!

Today the air temperature pushed past 20c, it's been a long time since we had a warm evening for some Sea-trout fishing! Hopefully tonight we can get some good sport and get a few in the book, we are hugely down on numbers and need to catch up to our averages.

                George Kuczera with a sea-liced fish from Rossicks

There could be a fly in the ointment however, as with warm temperatures comes the chance of thunder storms!!! The river has just dropped to a good level for all the beats and the peat stain has all but gone, the last thing we need is a lot more rain and a rising river.

As far as this weeks catches are concerned, it's been a good start, Carlogie is leading the way again and is already into double figures and it has now overtaken Ballogie as the top beat on the river for catches, could this year be the year Carlogie beats Ballogie!!!

Double the 5 year average!!!

 Kevin Fraser with a good fish from the Bend pool at Commonty caught on one of my Cascade Snaelda doubles.

Carlogie has had another great week!! finishing with total of 17 salmon and Grilse for the week, this brings the total for June for Carlogie to 54, compared with an 5 year average catch for June of 25 which is more than double the average!!

   Rob Bull with a fish from Rossicks pool Carlogie, this was caught at 3ft 3" on the gauge!!

The Ballogie beats produced 24 salmon for the week with Richard Newtons party landing 19 for their week at Carlogie and Ballogie, had the river levels behaved we could of had a much better week. Sea-trout catches have been poor due to the conditions but I'm sure if it ever stops raining we could see a big catch of Sea-trout, as I'm writing this the rain is as hard as ever and we may yet again get a rising river for the start of the new week.

"Singing in the rain"