Monday, 15th September

Lake of Menteith, Day Session

A look at the Menteith reports sent out by Quint shows that catches have been averaging around 8 fish per boat recently.  Given the 100% ceiling we enjoyed we should have expected to equal that, if not do better.  However, a flat calm for the first two thirds of the day meant that no one was covering water and it was very much a question of dropping in on fish in a taking mood.  That was by no means easy.  The stock method at Menteith these days -- a washing line set-up on a slime line or similar -- was again the best thing to be on.  Fish were taken on that early and late, mostly at the pink buoy (that isn't there any more -- would someone please return it!) and International bay.  Dougie S was one to follow this route, catching on his Santa's beard with crunchers and slow glass.  Steve-O, fishing with Dougie similarly caught on booby and Diawl Bach.

Our best boat by a long way was Tommy S and Alan M, who stuck to the pink buoy area all day, cashing in on late activity there.  Tommy went with 2 snatchers (a black and silver and a kind of soldier palmer variant) and an orange booby, figure-of-eighting them on a Cortland camo, while Alan had fish to all sorts of stuff, including boobies, Diawl Bachs, a black hopper and this claret dabbler, fished on a ghost tip.

For Stu B and I, the lure of a few rising fish was too much to resist, and we thought we should be able to make a bag from what was on the go on top.  Alas, it was one of those days when you have to work your socks off, just to get your fly in front of a fish that is up more than once, and then what does it do?  It swims straight past your fly!  A lot of work went into trying to put this problem right, including changing size, colour, profile, footprint etc of fly.  All with little success.  The final straw was getting the light conditions just right to see a fish swimming along, check when it saw the fly above, come up for a look, then swim away without making any mark whatsoever.  The conclusion was reached that they were seeing the nylon.

Stu reaches for the net.  Note the Gothic weather

Experiments with flourocarbon and an ethafoam beetle showed that this may well have been the case.  Pity flouro is such a problem with dries!  Spoonings showed the fish were basically taking whatever they came across, reinforcing our idea that it was the leader, not the fly, that mattered.  Anyway, that was our day about shot by the time we had all that sorted out.  Fraser G was another who went down the dries track and found much the same problem with the fishes' policy of non-cooperation.  Like both of us, he managed a brace for his efforts, both to a claret Shipman's.

The Club's catch for 16 rods was 24 fish for 45 lb 10 oz, plus 12 returned.