Friday, 29th June
Linlithgow Loch, Evening Session
We did well to get a totally dry evening, given as how it seems to have rained every day for weeks. However, the advantage of a heavy overcast sky is that it holds the temperature in as the evening develops. What you don't want is the ceiling opening up and allowing the temperature to drop rapidly, just as you are expecting the evening rise... which is what happened on this one!
That was a pity, because everything else was teed up nicely. The water was crystal clear. The fish were high in the water. We had a light westerly, and it was warm... well at least early doors it was warm.
Two Johns, two fish
No one ventured up the east end -- not sure if it is weeded up? Anyway, there were plenty of fish in the west half of the loch, and water of 9-10 feet and deeper was weed-clear. There was an early burst of action for several boats. I had an wee experiment with boobies in deep water, and had 2 and several missed chances in the first 15 minutes -- then nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not a touch. At all. The boats around us all seemed to pick up early fish, but likewise they quietened down after a while.
One to a damsel (that's weed, not a 4 inch long tail!)
John Miller and John Levy were fishing nymphs on floaters. They enjoyed the early action, and then had to hunt around. Eventually they got into fish off the north-west point. John L had top bag of the outing, with 6 to jungle cock Diawl Bach. They finished up drifting down towards the Rickle. Douglas Maxwell and I had only one fish each for the middle spell (one to swinging buzzers and one to a damsel), and we tried going for a drift, expecting to get some action to dry fly as the evening developed. After a couple of encouraging early chances, nothing happened. No offers. No fish rising. Later than I should have done, I gave up, picked up the nymphing rod, and for want of something else to try, I replaced the point fly with a small black booby to make an instant washing line. That was a much better option, and it brought some late sport.
Gavin gives the press office their headline: Trevor has caught a fish
John Robertson fished on his own and he too found the washing line set-up on a floater was a good bet, picking up 4 in the town bay and Palace bank area. I'm guessing from Fraser Gault's card that he was also on the washing line, as the component parts are "cat booby, Diawl Bach, floater and figure-of-eight".
Stewart Barnes reported that he struggled to find fish until he dropped in at the end of the Palace Bank. Stewart had a lot of chances and 3 landed to a hot-head damsel and a Diawl Bach, slow figure-of-eighted on floating line.
Douglas Maxwell unhooks a well-conditioned rainbow
Trevor Gibson and Gavin Macdonald toughed it out with nymphs in the middle of the west end for most of the evening, and gradually put a pair of bags together on buzzers, Diawls and hare lugs. Amazingly, while we had gone looking for rising fish later on -- and found none -- Trevor and Gavin stayed anchored where they were, and the rising fish came to them. I watched Gavin cover one, hook it, lose it, then cover another, hook it and lose that as well. And all the time there was not a fish to be seen anywhere else on the loch! They both took fish to a comparadun, and finished with 5 fish each to give them top boat.
The Club finished with 33 fish for 11 rods -- good given the iffy conditions.
Photos: Canon 10D with 28-135mm IS lens
