Dinnet Beats Update- 3rd week of June

Following last weeks catches I hoped for more of the same with an increase of sea trout numbers. Starting with the river at 6" and slightly warmer at 58 degrees once again conditions were favourable. Fishing a falling river on Monday and Tuesday one would have expected some success although we blanked surprisingly so. Not many fish were seen over this period although Terry Webster did come into contact into a very fresh lively springer in high burn on the Monday morning that took a small monkey fly, whizzing down the pool and doubling back the fish leaped and threw the hook.

Laurel Meyers a visiting American student that was staying with me set the ball rolling with a sea trout from Bruich. Picking up a fly rod for the first time and succeeding in casting playing and landing a fish at night is no easy task so very well done Laurel!!!

Wednesday thankfully bought some catches with a 5lb grilse from red brae landed by Colin Esby and a sea trout in Ministers caught by Sebastian Orrel-Jones. Sea trout continued to be caught on the Thursday with 6 more landed between the Wednesday evening Thursday day.

I was ecstatic when walking down to Trochie pool I found retuning rod Quintin Webster's new rod bent double into a fish. Quentin has had some bad luck when fishing Dinnet over the years, when he told me he was still yet to catch and land a salmon last year we both tried really hard to break the duck. I recall he hooked and played a good fish in Trochie the year before, but due to a reel malfunction the fish snapped off. This year after a shopping trip at Farlows he was fully equipped with a Guideline reaction 14' 9/10#  rod and hardy perfect reel together with a brand new Rio AFS Line.  A set up that really suits Quentin and perfect for the Dee at this time of year. We approached Trochie to try and rein act last years tussle yet failed. I said "go and try Bruich with a fast sink tip and size 10 cascade and try Trochie again when you have done that". After running some other rods around I returned to see him into a fish and together we landed and savoured the moment of a first ever salmon.

We finished the week with 6 salmon and 10 Sea Trout.

Quentin Webster first salmon

A Clarke with a fish from Cobbles

Laurel Meyers into her first fish on the fly

Laurel's prize Sea Trout

Dinnet Beats Update - Mid June

On the 9th of June regular returning rods arrived at Dinnet faced with a river of great condition, after a rise on the Sunday the river fell down to 10" and cooled down to 54 degrees, holding still a little peat stain after the rise we all hoped to see some new fish on the beat. Sea Trout numbers last week began to improve and I would expect to start seeing these numbers increase over the next few weeks.

Dick Bradshaw got off to a great start with a very fresh springer of 10lb landed by 10:30am from the neck of Bruich on a size 10 cascade. Mike Noble unfortunately lost a couple of grilse in Logie and three sea trout were landed in 29 and Crawnee. A wet evening brought another little rise and although fishing to our best efforts on the Tuesday we saw no fish landed and a couple lost. Sat at 11" by Wednesday we tried fishing sink tips, floaters and varying the fly range. Mike noble stealthily fished high burn on a short line hanging the fly on the edge of the current in high burn and was rewarded with a lovely 9lber.  This approach often proves to be effective where you first fish down the pool not wading on a short line fishing the near by water before you wade in and cover the whole pool. Robin also managed to catch a grilse in Lower Slached.

By Thursday the river dropped down to 7" a perfect fishing height for the beat and the water had become the clearest we had seen yet this week. Fishing small flies we caught 4 sea trout and a two salmon. Geoff Featherstone fished very carefully through red brae with small flies to no avail, whereby he tried a sink tip and size 6 willie gun which was scoffed down by a stunning 12lber.

Geoff with his fish that had to be killed.

Friday evening brought torrentail rain and the river rose extremely rapidly peaking over 3.5' however by Saturday morning we were sitting at 1'11" although coloured water we still had a reasonable chance of catching a salmon and a very good chance at the Sea Trout as they will always seem to active during a spate. Geoff Stainton proved this when he landed a cracking 4lb sea trout in cobbles on a red devil tube fly and another sea trout in 29.

We finished the week with 10 salmon and 11 sea trout, which is a very similar figure we have been seeing over the last couple of weeks. This years salmon catches on Dinnet are very similar to the catches last year  although much more evenly balanced throughout May and June.

Successful flies this week have been cascades, crathies, silver stoats, munro killers, red frances and muddlers for the sea trout in the evenings. Often trying much larger patterns fished a little deeper can get a response from fish that are not willing to come up to the fly.