Encouraging run of fish

After a distinct absence on the river banks I decided it was high time I banked a fish. The spring tides were upon us and after a sunny weekend the Monday morning with some cloud cover looked like there could be an opportunity of intercepting a fish.

The problem was, I had to drive to a conference and had a colleague with me. We agreed on an early start to enable us to get to the river for a couple of hours en route. Once there, we tackled up and quickly made our way to the river, it looked very fishy with a slight tinge and the level still at a good height from recent rain.

I put Ben on a good run to fish up whilst making my way below a hot spot so I could slowly make my way up to it, I fished through a spot that often holds Sea Trout, Halfway through the retrieve  a solid shape shot out of the depths to intercept the spinner just as it was coming into view.  After a good fight a lovely fresh fish of about 8-9lb was safely in the net. It was quickly un-hooked and recovered quickly and swam off strongly.

Having caught a fish from a spot that is not considered a lie further re-enforced my view that every inch of water should be fished when fishing the Frome. Needless to say once I got to the hot spot nothing happened.

Feeling quite content I concentrated on trying to get Ben into a fish. We reached a spot that was a well known lie although I had never taken a fish from there. Once he was briefed on how to fish the pool I moved on to a far more likely looking bit. Within a couple of minutes there was a shriek from behind me. Ben had hooked a fish from exactly where the lie was supposed to be. It was a lovely proportioned fish and looked to be in the 16lb bracket. It put a good fight with a couple of scary moments in the weed but after a fair bit of running up and down the fish was safely netted. It was a lovely deep fish and very fresh. I got into the shallows and held the fish in the faster water to recover, after a few minutes it swam away strongly. To say Ben was ecstatic would be an understatement, to say I was somewhat peeved would be an even bigger one!

Having thought that Ben had pushed his good fortune to the edge (if not slightly over it) I asked if he wanted to try for a Sea Trout as there were clearly some decent ones in our beat. Once he agreed a number 3 Mepp was tied on and he was duly sent to a 'Salmonless' Sea Trout run. This left me to concentrate on catching a bigger fish, (luckily I'm not a competitive person). As I concentrated on finding my biggie there was another shout from Ben. Hoping he was into a Sea trout I was most disappointed to realise it was another Salmon, this time about 14b! As I complemented him through gritted teeth my mood was getting progressively worse by the minute as the strong fish surged downstream splashing about the promising stretch I was working my way up to. Once all of my favourite spots had been thoroughly sabotaged the fish started to tire and was landed.

We continued to fish for another hour or so and I had a fish take but not stick and we both had numerous follows a tugs from Sea Trout but the sun was now strong and the clock was ticking. We reluctantly called it a day and headed off to our conference.

Having had a lovely fresh fish and being 'off the mark' I should have been really happy, I was, but the voices in my head were cursing that  'Bloody jammy B***er', there was only on thing for it. A call was made to the one person I knew would be even more jealous than me, needless to say I
felt much better after regailing him with the story of our morning!