It never ceases to amaze me how smooth the journey is from Gifford to Harelaw at the weekends, despite roadworks on the M8 and navigating the Kingston Bridge. The normal challenge is how to approach the water in the summer months. This year though, Harelaw is standing out as a quality venue, given the commendable work that Ross Murdoch and his team have been doing, managing the water. The big difference was the decision to rear their own fish and not rely on the vagaries of their normal suppliers, They can now stock as and when they feel necessary. The fish are being transported short distances so are arriving in absolute tip-top condition and they seem to be thriving in the relatively fertile, shallow loch. Good for the fish and great for the regular anglers.
We had a relatively small outing, with only 4 boats booked. However, the car park was busy and quite a few locals were fishing the bank. Now, I confess to having a bit inside information on how the fishery has been performing. Mario Fionda is a Harelaw regular and guide, with his own excellent fly tying YouTube channel. He had been out midweek and was waxing lyrical about the fishing. Definitely, top of the water with small black dries and smuts on the go. He had suggested the fish were also on ‘jelly fry’. So, plenty fish on the go, but they were not giving themselves up easily. Lots of fish in Shooters’ Bay, but these fish had been hard fished for, for a number of weeks. The encouraging news was, there were fish all over, but patience was required.
I was paired with Peter Fionda for the session. He was ready and raring to go when I arrived. For me, it was a choice between twiddling some small nymphs, or straight onto dries to start. Given the conditions, this did not seem unreasonable – light winds and overcast conditions. No evidence of much fly life, but in the evening the hatches have apparently been impressive.
Peter set up two rods: dries on one, and another with a more commercial approach: sunburst FAB, cormorant and daddy. I opted for 3 ft hover tip, small white booby, diawl bach and pheasant tail nymph. Looked nice on the cast, anyway. We set-up our first drift in the open water, heading towards the windmill shore. It was relatively encouraging that there were a few fishing rolling in the ripple; not hard feeding but showing occasionally. Peter got off to a flier and had the first fish on a black beetle within a few minutes of starting. It was a superb fish in the 3.5-4 lb range. We thought it likely to be the best fish of the day. Well about 3 minutes in, that was enough twiddling for me and on went the dries: a couple of black gnats and small flat foam daddy.
We never saw our boats the whole day. They seemed to be in and around Shooters’ Bay. We just let the boat drift in whatever way the wind blew, but Windmill Shore, Black Sands, drifting from almost as far back as Gull Island, all the way. It had a similar feel to our previous outing at Cobbinshaw. There were plenty quiet periods, quite a few fresh air shots and fish missing our flies – surely not incompetence!
I was fishing with a 5-wt and 6.2 lb fluorocarbon. My advice would be to dial up everything, and be careful when using a bailer, unless you’re happy to lose a rod or two. I started to pick away at the fish. Every one seemed bigger and stronger than the previous one. Some of the takes were fairly spectacular. With others, the dries just seemed to disappear. We were being reintroduced to backing line that we had not seen for a few seasons, hoping all was properly secure. Peter also caught on his FAB and cormorants. All-in-all it was an incredible session of fishing, not necessarily in terms of numbers but the quality was superb. We returned at least one fish easily in double figures, and a few in the 6-8 lb range. These are not normal stocked trout, they seemed particularly powerful and generally angry. We ended with 12 fish to the boat. It was a proper session for Peter’s tennis elbow, but mind you he didn’t seem to complain when he was playing a fish.
Our 8 rods finished with 35 unbelievable fish: a great outing.
Dougie Skedd adds…
I’ve used Churchill’s description of Russia before to describe Harelaw. It’s a place that intrigues and frustrates me in equal measure. This last outing is no different to those that preceded it. Everyone and their grandmother’s butler’s dog tell me it’s a great dry fly water. And, it must be said that I have caught fish there on dries, but not like you would expect from it’s reputation. Anyway, we arrived to find a very pleasant day in the offing. An excellent bacon roll offset the slightly longer journey than normal. I was paired with Dave Hannaford. We set out with dries mounted. CDCs for Dave, a shuttlecock and a deer hair sedge for me. The light on the surface was terrible. Seeing your flies was very difficult, but the combination of a pale sedge and the dark CDC gave me a chance. The surface was heaving with rising trout. Yes, that’s right. Harelaw was heaving with rising trout… and we were fishing dries. One tiny fly in the ointment though. The fish wouldn’t look at anything we offered. I’m fairly sure they were feeding on phantom larvae and that can be a notoriously difficult gig. We grafted away, to no avail. I did hook one but my line was trapped in the cleats of my boots and the fly was gone. Dave was getting rises, but was suffering Harelaw’s common problem of fresh air shots. Like the gentleman he is, he resisted the urge to profanity, but I could see it was quite a strain. Too late in the day really, I decided to try something different. I reasoned that if the fish were feeding on something just subsurface, perhaps a washing line on the floater might give me something I could work with. So, a small pearly cat booby on the point and two skinny cormorants on the droppers. I hoped the sparse skinny wee flies might interest the phantom feeders. I cast it out. Now, being Harelaw and having spent ages casting various carefully crafted imitative dry flies at fish, I should have expected this. A very good rainbow head and tailed the dry booby off the surface. Just like that. Sometimes I can be too clever for my own good. After that it was a choice between just leaving the booby sitting there, figure-of-eighting it briskly and keeping going until it locked up, or puting pauses into the retrieve and watching the swing tip of line at the rod end. Ridiculous follows. Savage takes. Searing backing-out runs. What fantastic fish. Dave had the last laugh. We saw some daddies drifting on, late in the afternoon as the breeze picked up a bit. He put on a daddy imitation and a fish wolfed it down. A much more intellectually satisfying capture than my lure bashing. Wasn’t half fun though. I’ve caught more on Harelaw outings but I don’t think I’ve enjoyed one more than this.
Photos from Mel Mitchell…
