[Noel Kelly]

Hamish ours don't like being washed either but put one in charge of the power washer and that's a different story!! Obviously I have to set it up for him (no thumbs) and supervise

Lindsay well done  I really didn't expect much would be happening today. Just goes to show its always worth checking out.

[Iain Goolager]

Well done Lindser  

Pity about the trout that got away.

Iain

[Michael Buchan]

Well done Lindsay  possibly just missed you I left river to early at 130 it was bitter cold plenty flies midges and olives but nothing moved for them so thought I would try get some brownie points as away fishing the Clyde and tweed next weekend.

Michael

[Loxiafan]

Shoulda stayed a bit longer Michael ! Iain, you win some you lose some, im my case mostly lose  Just nice to connect with something. I'm blaming the rod and will be seeing my therapist Dr. Dixon about it all ( I have already raised this issue).

Lindsay

[Ben Dixon]

Fished Fetternear today.  Saw 3 fish up, once each and about a dozen flies.  Left about 3:45 just as it got warm, got into Inverurie then due to change in weather turned straight around and went back again.  Sat for another short while, saw no flies or fish so sacked it and went home.

Which 104 Helios are you struggling with Lindsay?

Ben

[Loxiafan]

Which 104 Helios are you struggling with Lindsay?

The old one dude (eg. my one) ! It's like we talked about a few weeks ago about leverage etc. Dropped a few at end of last season on it (I only uesd the rod literally 3 or 4 times) and this one today. I Guess I am on about 65% conversion. Access 904 TF was 100 % !  It's a real nice rod to use so will persevere - your always gonna bounce a few 8- 10 oz on a long, stiff rod I suppose but I don't want to make a habit of losing anything over a pound ! The fish today was well hooked, jumped a couple of times and all okay, hook pulled and line went slack possibly as the fish turned.

I liked the Helios 2 103 TF but being a munter in the casting department it won't help me I think and only cast with it so no fishing per se !

Lindsay

[Rob Brownfield]

Fished the Don Yesterday, rather disturbed to see some sort of creature on the far bank, something I ave not seen before. Quite dark, moving up the road on the Fetternear bank, every now and then stopping in the cover of the trees and watching. Very strange. It made a kind of low growling noise as well. Big cat maybe? not sure. The only markings I could make out was what looked like the word Surf on the side. Answers on a post card!

As for the fishing..nothing, nadder, not a thing! Considering it snowed most of the day I was not to surprised. I saw one fish take something off the top and that was it for the trout.

I tried bugging but the flow was a little strong so switched to swinging wets to no avail so went back to the car for the streamer gear. Not even a pull.

I did spend an enjoyable 30 minutes watching two salmon in a lie just pushing each other out of the way, twisting and flashing away. Eventually the smaller fish left and headed upstream. I managed to follow it for about 100 yards before I lost it in the faster water. Amazing to watch. Bigger fish was perhpas 15 pounds.

[Ben Dixon]

Ah, was you Rob, thought it looked like someone fishing for pike
Did you get much of a hatch at the top end there? 

Lindsay, I'm not sure what to suggest re bouncing the fish mate.  I'll do some thinking and get back to you.

Looks from the weather like it could go down today on the Don, I'm heading over to fish the Dee.

Cheers

Ben

[Rob Brownfield]

Ah, was you Rob, thought it looked like someone fishing for pike
Did you get much of a hatch at the top end there? 

No hatch, just one or two LDO's coming off not long after I saw you. Standing on the bridge I thought there was a hatch of Caenis coming off...until I realised it was fine snow being blown up from under the bridge arch!! Had me confused for a minute or two!

All in all a pretty grim day regarding seeing trout or flies.

[Ben Dixon]

Yup, was poor.  I saw a few flies and a total of about 1.5lb of trout moved (that was about 6 fish).

Cheers

Ben

[Iain Cameron]

Spent today on the river, from 11am til 5 ish.
Snow, hail, wind. Some sun. More wind.

Very bizarre, fishing a pink dry fly in the snow.... But loving the flouro pink CDC over wing on my pink'n'dink dry fly. Very visible.

One of those days when you kinda know it's going to be pointless...but I had a flask of coffee, sandwiches, warm clothes... 
... so I used it to explore, to practice. Strong upstream wind and short lining (25-30 feet) a klink and dink - was very hard to get slack line for drifts.  Had to really underpower the casts, and wiggle, and also aim high, and add lots of wrist rotation for open loops... What do you folks do to get slack line when the wind wants to straighten the line?

In the end, I did manage to rise a fish to the dry.... Totally, completely missed it...

Also used the duncan knot on my leader ring for the first time, following a post seen on Marc Fauvet's blog  - really did seem to avoid tangling the dropper, so I will play with that and test further

Lots and lots (well, a wee bit more than a few) of LDO in the afternoon, up until around 4. On sheltered stretch, did see a couple of interesting rises...but well out of range

[Rob Brownfield]

Ok, humour me...Duncan Knot? Its a Uni knot to the rest of the world...confuddled.

[Loxiafan]

Just back from mid Don. Faaaarging freezing - I have not been this cold this season 

LDO's hatched later today, well after 2pm, only tiddlers in back eddies showing interest in hoovering up cripples. NE wind was brutal in wind chill but also made casting with any precision (even for me) very difficult - aim 20 feet downstream from target and fly lands where you want it.

After much searching, finally found a fish rising sporadically mid stream. It seemed to be taking the odd March Brown and/or bigger LDO's. Thigh deep wade, some 'freestyle' casting in the wind and finally nailed the bugger on a size 12 Jingler. It was only an oz under a pound but a wee cracker, slipped back with no photo as my fingers were like spades !

At least a another 'non blank' and on the dry too, but these conditions are pretty horrible.

Lindsay

[Noel Kelly]

Good effort Lindsay  it seems our weather is probably going to change by the end of the weekend, southerly winds and rain lol. I for one will gladly take that!

[Jonathan Kerr]

Glad someone saw some fish today lindsay, I was up at kemnay between 1 and about 4ish. As you said there were some pretty cold blasts of wind, but out of the wind I actually found some lovely warm sunny conditions too. Was dissapointed to see pretty much no fly life or moving fish. Didn't even get the usual pesky tiddlers nippin my flies, oh well, another few days off work until school goes back on monday. hopefully some better conditions arrive sometime before then, I plan to be out every day this week.

J