Part 2 Annual Fishery Reports

Each of us fishermen has our own favourite fishery as well as a favourite way of fishing.

Personally I almost always fish mid week and like the space to move around or work a bank on the larger fisheries.
My preferred style is pulling a team of flies and this is a type of fishing I really enjoyed during loch style events in the past and usually flies I do the best with are fished in this way.

However, I do like to vary my approach and will also fish buzzers, Dries, hoppers and small nymphs and will also fish with a single fly on my cast when needed.

I have compiled these fishing reports mainly from my experience and some input from family and close angling colleagues and hopefully some of the flies mentioned will be a help for 2010.

Newly added flies this year as a result of my fishing at featured fisheries are:- Montana Gold Bead, Cats Whiskers Booby, Dawsons Booby, Cats Whiskers Competition, Cut Throat Cats Whiskers, Cut Throat Blob.

Please read on for fishery reports:-

This fishery is new on site for 2010 and monthly reports will follow shortly along with the other fisheries.

The bait lake here was regularly the busier of the two lakes in 2009 and this lake normally has less problems with weed growth than the fly lake.

Normally the smaller pan size Trout are stocked into the bait lake but for most of this season fish of 2lb 8oz to 3lb were put in here which may have helped in making it so busy.

The fly lake saw fish usually around 3lb but the odd double figure fish turned up throughout the season although the first half of the year produced the most. The fly lake is always the one where weed growth is rapid and causes a problem but this year more of an effort was made to keep on top of this tan the previous season.
Brightly coloured Buzzers seemed to work better than darker ones here this year with Pink often taking fish ahead of the darker colours.

After the floods which closed the fishery for a while the previous year 2009 was trouble free.

The quality of the fish stocked was superb with a change of supplier in 2009 and although there was nothing to complain about the fish in the previous seasons this year for me here the fitness and fighting qualities of the same sized fish was clearly noticeable and as good as it could be.

Double figure fish up to 18lb were caught throughout the season but the quality of these saw many anglers being snapped.

NJAF flies doing well here in 2009 were Flex-floss Pink Centrebead Bloodworm, then Welsh Nymph& Damsel Flashback Black for me but my Orange Blob has given a lot of good reports back to me from here.

I fished Caistron early and late in the season and in previous years it has been Pink Flex-floss Bloodworm which has proved a top pattern and this year was only different in that it was the Centrebead Pink Flexi-floss Bloodworm which worked.

Early in the season they went crazy for the fly and later in the year it gave me a fine 5lb Rainbow.

This often is a really special fly here and definitely the one I would recommend above all others for Caistron.All these flies found on
My flies.

Although the lake is clear in the first half of the season weed does grow rapidly in the second half of the year but I found that from just past the two stones down the middle of the lake fishing was ok with a Floating line and then an Intermediate line was ok further across towards the bank where the hide is and fishing was not a problem.

Although there were a couple of really good evening rises fish rising and feeding on the top this year was rare and most fish caught were taken well down in the water and fishing was generally a challenge but if you do get 2 or 3 fish this can sometimes seem more rewarding.

Most of the heavy rain in the area seemed to miss Clerklands and the water level was well down. Infact when I was there in the summer this saw weeds at the shallow part at the start of the fishery on top of the water which stopped you fishing that spot which is often good and the only interest I had was either to a Belises Blue or Damsel Flashback, both on My Flies.

Angler numbers have remained fairly low although hopefully a few more attending this year can keep Clerklands open.

Usual weight of fish caught is 2lb to 2lb 12oz.