One from the Hut pool

Despite my run of never landing a fish from the hut pool until last year it would appear that things may be changing. After last year continued high water and re shaping of pools I wondered what effect this would have on the river and how it fished.

As the season progresses and we are starting to see a few fish we are able to see how some of the more productive lies seem to have changed and new lies become evident. Due to the nature of the lower Frome, a combination of deep pools and gravelly runs with some steep muddy banks, things tend to change annually. The undercut banks have collapsed in the majority of pools leaving large chunks of earth and grass etc on the bottom especially on the inside of bends. These temporary boulders look like great lies so once a few more fish make their way into river it will be interesting to see how these spots fish.

I arrived at the river on Sunday morning at about 8am with high hopes as tony had taken another fish of 20lb+ and it all looked perfect with scattered cloud and a fair bit of wind. I normally tackle up and have a couple of chucks in the hut pool from the right bank before heading up river. I walked down to the tail of the pool to throw the size 4 mepp up along the inside bend, as I drew the spinner out of the deep water up to the shallow pool table all looked great, i was feeling lucky. On what was probably my 3rd or forth cast I felt that tell tale 'tap tap' followed almost immediately by an arm wrenching pull, i knew this was well hooked and not a dreaded 'head shaker' due to its strength and speed i knew this was a good fish. It powered around the pool but like most Frome Salmon did not try to leave the pool at first until it zipped down to the tail of the pool where my route would be very difficult if it continued. I managed to turn it thankfully. Immediately it headed right up to the head of the pool and started to swim up the streamy water leaving me to run around the pool in order to prevent the braid from snagging on the far bank. This sudden burst of energy appeared to tire the fish a little and i started to get things under control. When I saw it I knew I would have to make a good job of netting it as it was quite large. Once in the net I removed the double hooked mepp and held it in the water to release, as the banks here are high I kept the fish in the water throughout and after a couple of minutes the fish swam away strongly.

It was a lovely looking fish of easily 16lb. I fished on for a while but with no further luck although I was happy in the knowledge that maybe, things are looking up for my dismal record in the hut pool!