Lochside: one very lucky Gull...

Last month found me in opposition with the common gulls that inhabit the islands on Loch Luichart.

With water levels very low in July, my salmon strips of bait, lying not that far from the surface, attracted three gulls to these tempting morsels, that they could obviously spot lying as they were in less than two foot of water!

Two of these gulls after a short spell of circling and 'false' diving attacks, where they wouldn't actually hit the water, soon lost interest and flew off.

But the third gull (I called Sid) was far more persistent. He would dive and feet first hit the water with a splash, miss the target and wheel away only to sit on a nearby rock preening his feathers, then come in like a kamikaze pilot and try again.
After another four attempts and despite my waving of arms and shouts of "go away you naughty bird" (or words to that effect!) which it paid no heed to, I pulled my bait and put a 2oz lead weight on the line.

This sunk into the weed bringing the bait deeper, and hopefully away from Sid, but also creating a 'drag' on the line should a fish pick up the bait, especially now the bait was also in the weed.

Anyway, with Sid's continued dive bombing, my waving and shouting, and lead casting, I'd given up all hope of any respectable fish being within a half mile of my fishing area. I was also far too lazy to move to somewhere deeper on the loch, so just sat and watched amused at Sid's even more frantic endeavours to reach the bait.

I even thought about throwing him a few pieces of my Tesco salmon (which I had got at half price), but this would have, no doubt, brought all his mates around. So decided instead to leave Sid my bait on a rock when I left.

Suddenly, as I watched the gull hit the water for the umpteenth time there was a mighty swirl and Sid screeched and took off in alarm, circled, then sat on his favourite rock, looking quite agitated!

I also now took a fresh view of the situation as only one fish would go for a gull - a decent sized pike!

Would it smell out my bait now amongst the bottom weed - should I pull it slowly in hoping the movement would bring a response from the pike?

At least Side won't be back so I could remove the weight and recast, I thought.

How naive I was!

Not in the least daunted by his near-death experience there was Sid coming down again, this time the pike's head was partly out of the water and as it lunged, for a brief second gull and pike were as one, but somehow it missed and Sid minus a few small feathers rose squawking and screeching, hovered for a moment or two then took off down the loch.

I waited another two hours even put another rod out with fresh bait, but couldn't tempt the pike to strike.

Next day, however, with no gull around and at the same spot, while talking to a couple of Polish anglers, from Inverness, who came along to try spinning. Both well spoken young men named Woyak and Josep.

My rod suddenly shuddered, the reel started turning and as I reached it, the bite alarm started to beep, and I was into a fish that tore off line 150 yards down the loch, for a while it proved unstoppable, but with Woyak running around with my landing net, like a headless chicken, I eventually brought it into a spot where he could net it safely.

"It's a monster" he cries out, all excited, and indeed, although not quiet the proverbial monster, it did weigh a healthy 21lbs (9 1/2 kilos).

Josep then took a couple of photos of me trying to hold it correctly for a good snap, which I found virtually impossible, as it was very slippery. I then returned it unharmed to, hopefully, grow even bigger - it certainly could have swallowed the gull whole, but will that bird have learnt?

I doubt it!

David Willis