Sunday, 22nd April

Linlithgow Loch, Day Session

Not a bad day for it at all.  Breeze a bit stiff at times, but overcast and mildish for mid-April.  The water was gin-clear and a good hatch of buzzers came off through the early and middle parts of the day.  The buzzers were substantial too.  A size 10 was a good pick to represent them.  The specimen in the photo below was recovered from the stomach of a chapped fish.  They were feeding well on these pupes.  The apparent armour-plating is the air under his skin as he (or is it a she -- how do you sex a buzzer pupa?) was getting ready to hatch.

OK, Oliver Edwards, let's see you tie an exact copy of this guy!

The fish were lumps as well.  Most of them were 3 lb plus, with a good mix of stockies, near residents and long-termers all showing in the catches.  All our boats opted to set anchor and fish nymphs.  I'm sure there would be a few variations in the set-ups: swinging them static, slow figure-of-eighting, hanging them under the 'tache, but that was effectively it for how we all went about it.  Depth was probably not that critical -- we had fish to all 3 positions on the cast, and experiments coming up higher, and dropping down lower didn't really lead to any firm conclusions. 

Alan Morrison -- with the smallest of the day!

Flies used were a frugal few.  Buzzer pupes featured heavily.  Many folk simply wrote "buzzers" on their card, and there was no point in trying to elaborate.  Ian Macdonald had by far our best bag of the day, and Ian's set up was a brown buzzer, a hare's ear and a Diawl Bach.   Ian took his fish all from one anchorage off the north shore, just east of The Rickle.  However, there were fish all over the water.  Trevor Gibson and Bob Allan had 17 between them out in the middle of town Bay.  They were off to a flier, netting half a dozen while we we still faffing about trying to get the boat set-up right. 

Bob Allan and Mossy Oak with a twos-up

Tommy Steven and Fraser Gault had 14 down at Ponsonby's (the south east corner).  Dougie Goddard took his fish further into the shallows of the west end than most boats cared to venture.  Alan Morrison and I, after said faffing about, eventually got tuned in and had a good spell off the north west point.  Among our successful patterns were epoxy buzzer, orange thorax Cove, Spanflex buzzer, and Jimmy's flash-back melanistic Cove.

Stewart Barnes with the biggest of the day -- 6 lb 12 oz

As the day wore on, the buzzer hatch dropped off, and so did the fishing for those who stuck with the nymphing tactics -- eh, well, that was all of our club, anyway.  Well, nearly.  Stewart Barnes gave up and switched over to cormorants and pulled out a late one.  It wasn't his best of the day, but one of his earlier fish was the best so far for any of us on a club outing: 6 lb 12 oz.

The Club's total for 11 rods was 71 fish.

Photos: Canon 10D

Images 1, 3 and 4: Canon 70-300mm IS

Image 2: Canon 100mm Macro

Image 5: Sigma 10-20mm