Lochside

When I lived in England, each 16 June, when the course fishing season started, and I always took the time to do a bit of angling as it coincides with my birthday.

In London, it was the Thames for chub, barbel and the small silvery dace that inhabited the river and weirs in their thousands.

In Kent, it was the Stour or Medway rivers and the many dykes and backwaters of the farmlands and marshes for pike, perch, roach, carp, large eels, and the beautiful rudd - with fins of red, co-habiting with the roach to produce a mixed hybrid, which it would often take only an expert to tell apart!

Here in the Highlands we have not such a variety, but the three species we do mainly angle for, the pike, perch and trout, are all bonny fish, and their fighting qualities when hooked, from the biggest to the smallest, cannot be denied.

So, again on June 16 this year, I took a lone trip to a hill loch (my first fly fishing outing for eighteen months in fact) and found it all a bit of a struggle, with muscles not used to climbing for 2½ hours up over endless hills, through chest high bracken, clumps of tufted grass, and an assortment of soft and hard ground one could easily turn an ankle. Luckily, on the plus side, there was a cool wind that kept the midges away, and made it more comfortable to breath as I certainly couldn’t have managed it on some of the hot muggy days we are now getting!

Six hours, virtual non-stop fishing, later, at the loch, produced 12 fighting brownies, nothing over ½lb, and all returned to fight another day. It remained overcast all day, and I got back home (again after a struggle up and down hills - I thought at times that it would never end), tired and achy at 9.30pm, having been out for a long twelve hours.

The next day, with legs still a bit sore, having cramped up in the night, I took the boat out and fished a lower loch, much easier - taking a light rod and a few spinners. I tried the Grudie River, church pool, nothing doing, ended up in the main loch by Duck Bay and finally after two hours of casting with different lure, at various depths, I suddenly had a take.

A very large pike was on, which towed my light boat up and down against the wind, showing no signs of weakening. Eventually, with the help of the wind, I got close enough to the shore, in shallow water, to jump out and play the fish from the bank. As usual, I had not brought a net, so every time I got it close into the reeds tried to grab its tail, it would shoot away again.

The fight to land it went for a good twenty minutes, and by now I had seen its size, and the fact it had been hooked before, with a float trailing from its jaw. This meant playing it carefully so my line didn’t break as well (leaving it to continue with the original float and hooks in its mouth). At last it was on the bank, very thick bodied with the left side of its jaw turned up showing its teeth (damage from previous encounters no doubt!). After a quick removal of all the hooks, 16 inches of steel trace wire, plus two sets of treble hooks, plus the float and more line, a quick weigh in a large plastic bag I carry, a couple of photo’s, I returned it back to the water, where amazingly it swam off strongly, like nothing had happened!

The pike weighed 11½ kilos (about 25 lbs) and on looking up my fish albums, I think caught this same fish four years ago when it weighed 18lbs, as the turned up mouth on the left was evident. I won’t be sure until I see the recent photo’s developed, and can compare the markings.

Incidentally, Harry at the PO, out in his canoe had seen this float moving about a week before the hill fire at Lochluichart, and again after the fire, a mile or so from where I caught it. Which made it very satisfying to have rid the fish of its burden.

Since then, I haven’t done any more pike fishing - however, a few hours skirmish with the fly rod along the river from Achnasheen produced just one small trout as the water was very low.

I did find three dead sheep, along with the remains of a large deer which looked as though it had been stripped by an eagle, also otter spraint was nearby, but I’m finding this all along the rivers and lochs nowadays.

A friend has set up a mink trap in Tinkers Pool, but there’s been no sign of mink in this area so far to my knowledge, although they have reached Evanton, on the River Glass.

Some new ‘friends’ at my back door have appeared in the shape of a wood pigeon and two hooded crows, both species, it seems, desperate for food for their young.

All wildlife is welcome here, and I think they know it!

More next time...
David Willis