The curse of high water

Its been a pretty disappointing couple of weeks after a promising start to the season. with unseasonal high water being the predominant factor over recent times. The fishing usually picks up substantially from the first spring tides in June which was last Monday.

I fished on the Sunday with high hopes but only saw one fish. despite the water being in good order. I was looking foreword to fishing on Friday and Sunday but unfortunately there was a bank high dirty flood on the Friday. I did go down for an hour to walk the dog and was very surprised to pick up a Sea trout in the dirty water on a bright Rapala.

When i arrived on Sunday it looked perfect and had dropped back by 20cms and was clearing nicely. I had invited a friend from my Wild fowling club so was hoping that between the two of us we might have some luck. We fished all morning from about 6.30 until 1pm without any excitement other than a Pike of about 12lbs.

My theory here is that with the high water coinciding with the last 2 spring tides is that a lot of fish have run straight through the beat. Its normally great holding water when the river is at a stable height but given water the fish seem to run straight through.

Interestingly, the beat below which i also fish has had a good year so far so this seems to be a better place given the high water.

There are still some nice fish being caught on the river., my friend on a lower beat took a 37" fish on Sunday and 2 fish were lost on the beat below us. The average size so far is very good at around the 15ld mark. I'm yet to hear of a fish below 12lb and there are a fair few about around the 20lb mark.

They are about, its just a matter of finding them. Bait fishing starts on Saturday so i would imagine a few will be taken on the prawn over the coming weeks. I will be back on the river on Sunday with renewed hope and crossed fingers!