Traditionally On the first of February is the opening day on many a Scottish Salmon river, some like the Tay choose to open on January 15th, some wont even open untill March with Beats further upstream sometimes not even kicking in untill May. Currently we are experiencing one of our coldest winters for as long as the younger generation can remember.This can slow the prized spring Salmon down on its migration upstream, some will even stay out at sea until there is sufficient water flows and the temperatures are not to cold!!.
Present in every Salmon river at this time of year are Kelts, this is a Salmon that has already spawned and is slowly making its way back to sea, the majority of the cocks (males) die and most of the hens (females) survive. Kelts can give a short lived excitement as you feel the take and then you soon realise its not the real deal as they quickly come to the surface as they tend to be almost weightless as they havent eaten for literaly months, as salmon dont eat in fresh water.
Having spent a great fun day on the opening day on the river Ness with good friend and fisher Andrew Goodenough, I accounted for three kelts, Andrew had 1.
The Ness is not historically a famous spring salmon river it tends to have its most prolific runs in what we call the back end, from around the end of july untill mid October.
The famous Aberdeenshire Dee on the other hand is regarded by some as the best spring Salmon river in Europe.
After getting a phone call from my previous work (Orvis) I had been invited down to fish Banchory Lodge by Ghillie Walter raitt. It turned out x footballer Hendrik Larsson had paid for the beat for a week, however as soon as his wife got wind of this she booked a week in the seyshells as she did not want to hang around the icy banks of the river Dee all week. This was fine by us as we gladly fished Hendriks rods for him, myself and a couple of other guys fished all day but only caught a few kelts. A little disappointing but I knew i had a day on Crathes coming up where i was in with a good chance of a spring salmon.
Monday arrived the river had a days rest after no fishing on a Sunday, we met our very knowledegable Ghille Cleave then began Fishing, it was biterly cold in the morning even with thermals under the waders, this didnt stop us from casting and hoping for a fish!! just before lunchtime in the Boat pull I had a fish on, it put up an ok fight, however Cleave landed it and declared it a kelt, the rain came on so I joined the Ghillie and Andrew who was also fishing for a quick warm up cup of coffee, I had a feeling inside me this was going to be my day, so i quickly finished my coffee and began to fish again, with in minutes I had a strong take, the fish shot of straight away and went deep, the signs were looking good, I shouted on Andrew and Cleave within minutes they were both next to me as the fish continued to take line from my reel, Cleave was getting excited as Andrew kept on saying how big do you reckon it is, I was so nervous I was going to loose this fish as it is every Salmon fishers dream to get a spring salmon, especially a Febrauary Dee springer, 20 minutes later we landed the fish, an absolute stonker a sure springer, I was shaking, we weighed the fish which turned out to be 15lbs, took some scale samples for the scientests and returned him safely to the river. Just before lunch i landed another three kelts and had one at the end of the day, Andrew had one kelt. What a day to remember. something tells me its going to be a while before my rod is in action again as the ice floats down the river.
Nicol Paton.
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