Well were now reaching the autumn months, where for me personally I would rather wave a fly rod about in anger than troll along the shores of the loch. That’s just a personal thing, as there’s nothing wrong with trolling, I just feel that I’ve worn myself out trolling all season, constantly putting out and reeling in four rods, checking if there’s a smidgen of weed hanging on by a thread to either the swivel or hook so that it changes the action of the bait, or so you think, as you’ve trolled for 10 miles and nothing has happened so you begin to think I’ll change the Toby for another, then before you know it all four Toby’s have been changed, and that was your four favourites to start with. Confidence factor going down hill rapidly. For me by the end of July my confidence factor is minus 20, completely burned out, and having difficulty hearing a normal conversation due to the constant putt putt of my engine. Yes, for me it’s time to dust down the fly rod get the old favourite flies out check the hooks are okay and not rusted from last season, tie some replacements and any one’s you think might just do the trick, make sure the fly reel and line are okay, giving the line a clean in the process, load the car, which seems to only take 2 minutes whereas it would seem to take 10 -15 minutes if you were going for a days trolling. Once out in the boat, your main factor is the wind direction for obvious reasons, so you decide to head for Inchlonaig as there’s a touch of north in that west wind, and you might be able to get a drift along the Luss Bank, and then move over to the Ross Isles and around the corner to the Pilot Bank, so that’s the morning taken care off. You just repeat the same for the afternoon, all nice and peaceful, hopefully without the hassle of speedboats and jet bikes causing havoc. Another thing I’ve noticed when fly fishing is that you definitely see more fish moving, as you’ve got more time to scan the water in front of you and you notice the small indications in water disturbance caused by fish. The other week, in fact the last three outings I’ve had, I’ve been armed with my usual flies, Claret Bumble on the bob, an Invicta in the middle and a Burton on the tail, and had fish move to the flies jagging some of them, but definitely annoying them and myself when they don’t hang on, I may have been trying too hard as my old man has been out with me on these occasions, and can I tell you, apart from the nice wave for fly fishing all three occasions were bright and not what you would say were good conditions. On the last trip, I saw two fresh looking fish, Grilse size, leaping well out of the water, the first one was right in at the Ross point, almost on the rock itself and the other was in the Ross Isles Bay. Both these fish looked very fresh indeed, a bit like the one I eventually caught. ( Not wanting to brag too much, but it was a cracker thank you very much).

Okay enough of me bragging, onto some people who deserve some recognition, firstly congratulations go to Colin Lewis and Walter Gilchrist, who have had a bonanza of a July, with I think 6 fish each, all in the 5lb to 8lb class, Robbie Brown has also got the weighing scales out with a couple of Grilse. Then there’s the retired Police contingent, they’ve always had far too much time on their hands to know the loch so well, stories go, that once they were given their beats to patrol their Sgt never saw them again till the end of the shift, and wondered why they were a bit weather beaten and smelling of fish, I’ll change that smelling of fish bit in case anyone gets the wrong idea, displaying some fish scales on their uniforms. Yes, the brothers Raeburn, Jimmy and Alan, decided to escape the ardour’s of the city for a couple of days camping, the truth is Jimmy was to paint the outside of the house and sneaked off, anyway, as they trolled north from Balmaha Alan was the first to strike with a cracking 12lb fish at Sallochy in the morning, not to be out done by his brother Jimmy followed up later in the day with a fresh run 6lb Grilse caught at Rowhoich.

I received a text message from Jimmy Raeburn the other day stating that he and Kenny MacDonald had been on the loch and that Kenny landed a fresh run Grilse of 5lbs at the Ross Isles, (that was the one I had ear marked for my Bumble), and then again not to be out done Jimmy goes and catches a 7lb Grilse up at Eagle point. The only thing I can say about that is don’t mess with Jimmy Raeburn, or it you could get the Policeman’s caution “I’m about to prefer a charge against you if you don’t hand over that fish pal”. Well done Jimmy. I’m nearly forgetting another Polis who has far too much time off, Gerd Elsweiler, he had the fortune to land a sparkling fresh run 8lb Grilse near the end of July whilst having a peaceful days troll with his lovely wife Helen. Pound to a penny it was actually Helen that landed the fish and Gerd was too embarrassed to say so, you know all that stuff about hormones and the like.

Well that’s all my spies can come up with at the moment, so it just leaves me to wish you all tight lines and happy fishing for this month.

In the picture is Frank Donnelly trolling past the sand bar up at Doon Bay.