Sunday, 18th March

Lindores Loch, Day Session

A new season upon us.  Time to dig out all the kit from where it was thrown last October.  Recharge the batteries -- both biological and lead-acid.  Go over it all and try not to forget anything -- but there is always something.  Waistcoat or wellies are my usual favourites.  If I forgot something this year, I didn't need it!

A melanistic pheasant - a common site these days - and excellent fly tying material!

The weather for our first trip of 2008 was a great deal better than any of us had expected.  Andy reckons northeast is a good wind direction for Lindores due to the amount of shelter it affords, and so it proved.  The strength was ideal all day, and it stayed fair, with sunny spells giving a wee bit of warmth to proceedings.  Nevertheless, the electric welly warmers were a boon on the day.

We were told that Saturday's boats had had a superb catch, mostly to lures in mid-water, and fairly close to home.  As often seems to happen to us on a Sunday, there is an initial flurry of action, after which it becomes hard going.  Probably a result of going after Saturday's left-overs.  Or maybe we can fish nane.  Whatever, we had the same thing again.  John Miller had a fish first cast, and then went the rest of the day without a touch!  We did much the same early on - three chances produced a single fish in the first half hour, then nothing. 

John Gibson, with a stockie of standard stamp

We hung around the bottom end longer than we should have, then decided to try pastures new.  That proved a good idea, as we got into a spread of fish across the top bay, in front of Lindores House.  John Gibson had fish to a cruncher on DI-7 and a sweetcorn booby on an intermediate.  My best fly was that traditional wet fly, an orange blob, fished on a Hi-D.  However, all it took was a couple of other boats to start making the same drift, and the fish put their tin helmets on.

Back at the home end, it picked up in the afternoon, as it often does.  Best boat was the 10 fish taken by John Levy and Hugh Easterbrook, with John catching on a slow-retrieved WetCel 3 with a damsel and orange lures, while Hugh fished a cat's whisker fast on a Di-5.  It was a successful day for Hugh, on his first outing as a Club Member, as it was for his pal Jim Walker, who took 4 on a medium sink line and various fritz lures.

More new boys...  Hugh Thomson and Ed Green fished intermediate lines slowly, close to the margins, to take fish on both nymphs (Diawl Bach) and lures.  Fraser Gault also had a bag close to the road shore on fast glass and hot-head damsel.  Tom Steven had fish at both ends of the loch to Di-7 and big lures.  Elsewhere among the catches, orange was the stand-out colour for lures, with an odd fish taken to buzzers.

The killer fly on Saturday, we were told, was a yellow dancer.  John Robertson had 3 tied up and gave one to his pal, Bob Norris.  Fishing their identical dancers along the railway shore, the score was John 0, Bob 5!  Bob, you might need to supply your own in future.

The catch for 18 rods was 43 fish.

Photos: Canon 40D with: image 1 = 17-40 mm; images 2-6 = 55-250 mm IS