[Mike Barrio]

Hi folks

What is the beat at the very top of the River Don called and what can you tell me about it?

Best wishes
Mike

[Hamish Young]

Above the Allargue bridge Mike ...... or below........

Part of the water is on Delnadamph estate and some of it.... errrr..... isn't 

H 

[Mike Barrio]

Above the Allargue bridge Mike ...... or below........

Part of the water is on Delnadamph estate and some of it.... errrr..... isn't  

H  

If we travel as high up the Don Valley as we can, what is the first beat or section that we can go fishing on and what can you tell us about it? Where is it, what's it called, where can we get permission, a contact number, what fish might be caught, wide or narrow water, deep or shallow etc etc

Cheers
Mike

[Noel Kelly]

Interesting topic Mike I have no idea but I'm interested to know more. I hope to fish some of the upper beats this year so would be nice to get some ideas, tips and contacts etc.

[Richard Tong]

Mike,

Paul and I fished in 2004 well above Corgarff Bridge early June. We had a kicking further downstream near Monymusk and wanted some easier fishing so fished here for the afternoon. There was a Woolen shop/cafe place on the right hand side of the road where we parked our car,skirted a cemetery and fished upstream for a couple oif miles leap frogging one another. We used 3 wt rods and brought Trout up on small black Klinks from memory. Had a load of fish and it was great fun but very windy. We ended up not far from Luib bridge(the shot showing Paul playing a Trout was maybe 300m below where we ended up) which is not that far from Allargue Bridge. If anyone still has T & S April 2005 there are 2 nice shots of Paul fishing on that stretch and the Trout skull we found was also from there,

Richard

[Mike Barrio]

Hi Richard

Thanks for getting the ball rolling, I can picture the woolen shop/cafe and I think I might have a copy of the magazine in the fishery hut, so I'll check it out.

For the benefit of forum members, what beat were you on up there and where does one get permission to fish it? I expect the trout were quite small, but brilliant fun with the lightweight rods

Can any other forum members that have fished that stretch add more details and tell us about their experiences?

Best wishes
Mike

[Ben Dixon]

Mike,

I should have details, will look them out tomorrow.

I do have that magazine somewhere, was a good article that one.

Cheers

Ben

[Mike Barrio]

Mike,

I should have details, will look them out tomorrow.

I do have that magazine somewhere, was a good article that one.

Cheers
Ben

Great stuff

Cheers
Mike

[Richard Tong]

Generally the Trout are not of a size that you get downstream but they are far more free rising and can be brought up by speculative casting into likely lies which is not a tactic that works well in the middle reaches.

The stretch is managed by the Colquhonnie Hotel and is part of the 9 miles that they have.

The skull that Paul is holding must have come off a sizeable fish. I hooked one fish (with Paul looking on) on this stretch on another occasion that had the rod nodding up and down,indicating that it was a sizeable fish;however it got off after a run down the pool and we never saw it. Paul had a large fish slash at his fly which he had flicked into the water prior to casting,which took us both by surprise-this was lower down on the Colquhonnie water though

Think 12-13" as an average with a smattering of 15/16" and if you get anything above this it is a bonus. Having said that I do recall reading somewhere of some German? guys who used to visit every year some time ago and by the time their trip was finished they had landed fish between 2-3lbs (was this when Hamish's Dad used to be the Landlord?). And there are bigger residents;the biggest fish in 2002 was appx 4.5lbs I think.

Our biggest fish was appx 16".

Richard

[Iain Goolager]

Richard,

What style/s of comparaduns do you use?

Deerhair or poly yarn wings?
Microfibbet/ C D Leon / ? tails.

Have you tried them with trailing shuck tails?

Any must ties to share?
 I tied a box load two years ago (all poly yarn wings) but can't seem to find them.

Ones from last night






Cheers
Iain

[Richard Tong]

Hi Iain,

Personally I do not use the Comparadun style of fly and am not sure if any of my friends do either. Having said that they will work well just like many other styles. Your top fly looks really good and though you have just 2 Microfibbets,they are long so should support the fly well. This length of Microfibbet tail may not be so good for Grayling but that aint a problem in Aberdeenshire!!

Most of my dries are either Parachute/Paraduns,F Flys and Klinkhamer types with quite a few foam jobs for terrestrials and collar hackles for very small midge(24 or less). I even use parachutes for spent spinners sometimes with a fluo yellow wing post that shows up well in the fading light,a couple of turns of hackle and a bent shank(a la Stuart Crofts). Many times I have fished this to the point where the parachute hackle has come off after catching umpteen fish and I have for reasons of fading light,lack of time or laziness continued to fish with the fly which will be kept up just by the floating qualities of the wingpost and it has been just as effective.

I always use Poly Yarn wings on my duns and prefer it to Deer Hair(which I use on Caddis). All my Don duns have either natural Poly Yarn colour wings,pink,yellow,white or black (great for 'shiny/glassy' water-GOOD TIP!!). I do not find that the colour puts the Trout off and it IS important that you can see where your fly is if at all possible.

Used to use Microfibbets till a few years ago and mostly use 6-8 Coq de Leon fibres which retain their shape after hundreds of casts but are not too stiff.

Must ties...not really. I went overboard years ago in preparation for our trips to the Don and have at least 2 'Don boxes' full of dries and spiders to match the Spring hatches/falls we have encountered i.e MB,IBD,LDO,Olive Uprights,Beetles,Black Gnats,Terrestrials. One thing about the Don is you do not lose flies in trees as there are not many about,and the type of fishing we do is targeting big Trout so we are not catching many fish and by fishing mostly 4X or 5X tippets we have never been broken off. So our flies tend to last a long time and sort of don't need replacing!

I am going to tie the parachute and emerger Grannom patterns which were in this months T & S (the same patterns were in FF & FT last Spring) only because I hit a good hatch May 3rd last year with plenty of rising Trout and I persevered with an F Fly pattern even though I could see that they were not taking the adults(doh!!) and subsequently blanked. I reckon if I had on one of the emerger patterns I could have had good sport. So I will be tying up 6 of each.

I guess you must have good Grannom hatches further down on the Don? We would love to hit a good reliable hatch but think that Monymusk and above where we do most of our fishing may be near the top end of the where they emerge as they are not really an upper reaches fly. Do the Trout further down respond well to them?

I have quite a few with trailing shucks of poly yarn including LDO,Iron Blues and March Browns for the Don and find they work well.

Richard

[Mike Barrio]

Mike,

I should have details, will look them out tomorrow.

I do have that magazine somewhere, was a good article that one.

Cheers

Ben

Hi Ben

Did you find the beat details for the very top of the Don? It would be grand if we could use these as a starting point and work our way down the river

Cheers
Mike

[Ben Dixon]

Hi Mike,

I did not have a look as yet!!

Richard,

Best caddis sport I had was tiny grey sedges in late June at Dusk, simply superb!!

Cheers

Ben

[Iain Goolager]

Lots of good info there Richard (which I'm sure will be digested by many).

Apologies for the Comparadun with 2 fibbets - there is actually three but it's a combination of sh** tying and photography.

I'll have to try the yellow Aero wing for posts (I have been using grey, pink & orange to good effect but anything that might give a size 18/20 Klink a bit more visibility is worth the effort)  I like surface fishing but just can't fish blind/unsighted, it loses its' appeal. small flies at the best of times can be hard for me to see so when in a riffle or in fading light my confidence goes - I need to see the fly so that I can lift or leave so to speak.

I've never considered parachute styles for spinners.

Time to review the tying gear.

Thanks again

Iain

[Sandy Nelson]

I am going to tie the parachute and emerger Grannom patterns which were in this months T & S (the same patterns were in FF & FT last Spring) only because I hit a good hatch May 3rd last year with plenty of rising Trout and I persevered with an F Fly pattern even though I could see that they were not taking the adults(doh!!) and subsequently blanked. I reckon if I had on one of the emerger patterns I could have had good sport. So I will be tying up 6 of each.

I guess you must have good Grannom hatches further down on the Don? We would love to hit a good reliable hatch but think that Monymusk and above where we do most of our fishing may be near the top end of the where they emerge as they are not really an upper reaches fly. Do the Trout further down respond well to them?

HI Richard

Now theres a thing!. I have been witness to many Grannom hatches on the middle beats and have yet to see the trout get interested. I have the flies and have tried many times, but i have never seen a decent rise to grannoms.

On the other hand, what Ben is saying about the grey micro's is spot on in my experience too, there are also some tiny black ones too and yellow

Sandy