Not much news at present,  River settling in now and a few coarse fish being caught.   Anyone seen a salmon  yet?    Things look pretty slow on those rivers that have already started.

                                                    One of the one's that got away.

Everyone loses fish from time to time and the longer you fish then perhaps the more you lose.I remember once I lost eight salmon on fly on the trot, all on treble hooks and all through the hook coming out for no apparent reason.  It got to the point where I thought I would never land another one.

However probably the most disappointing loss was at the Nyth back in the nineties.    I had seen a good fish show in the Cafn Pool in front of the lodge, told my boss who was resident at the time and he said he would have a go for it later..  However about mid afternoon he came out and told me he didn't want to fish and that I should have a go instead.   So I picked up the fly rod and started fishing down the pool.  Halfway down or so I had a solid take and hooked a fish which felt pretty heavy.   If any fish in this pool turned tail and bolted downstream it was almost certainly lost but for some reason they rarely did.    Eventually it settled down and did the old trick of walking it up, through the neck of the pool and into quieter water above where it played deep and heavy for some time.   My boss say what was happening and came out to help.

I had to get down into the water from the gabion made bank so I gave him the rod as I waded out with the net to hopefully net it,  As the fish surfaced I saw just how big it was.   It came across the net but too far with the head on one side of the rim and the tail on the other, it wouldn't bend and go in   It thrashed and swam off again.  Get the bigger net my boss said but I told him I would get the head in first next time.   Well the fish came towards the net, literally within a foot of the rim when the hook came out,  I floundered around, waded out too deep stabbing fruitlessly at it with the net but the fish was gone.

I looked up at my boss and said  "Hell, how big do you think that was/".  "Well sorry to say he said but that was a good thirty pounder.  It hurt for a while but in fishing you win some-lose some. That/s how it always will be.