I had a cast out on the River Don yesterday after work and was fortunate enough to bump into this nice, wee grilse. Not the biggest fish by any means but I was delighted to get another Don fish under my belt for this season. The river was sitting at 1ft 5in on the Haughton gauge and was carrying a peat stain which was decent fishing conditions for the beat.
A River Don salmon poses for a quick photo before being safely released to continue her journey.
The salmon fishing on the River Don has been pretty slow in recent seasons but the river is maintaining good river levels at the moment with rain coming almost daily so hopefully this will bring in some fish and get the older ones moving. I'll certainly look forward to seeing what the remaining few weeks of the season bring for the river.
I have been on a bit of a roll recently and have been fortunate enough to land a few salmon for my time spent on the river. I landed a cracking cock salmon yesterday which was roughly around the 12lb mark and today I landed a hen salmon around 15lb. Both fish were in their spawning colours and were safely returned to the river.
A cracking male salmon in his full spawning outfit taken on a Black Snaelda at Ballogie.
A still from GoPro camera of the fish in mid air shortly before landing it.
A video from my GoPro camera which captured the action of playing the fish pictured above.
Although these fish are heavily coloured, you can only catch what takes your fly. If I could choose, I'd certainly take a nice clean sea licer over an old hen fish any day of the week but these fish are as equally important as the fresh run ones and careful handing is paramount to ensure they are returned to the river with minimal fuss.
Underwater release.
Hopefully these fish will make it to the spawning grounds safely in the next few weeks and do what nature intended them to do. The more salmon that make it onto the redds can only be a good thing and this will ensure the river populations maintain a healthy level.
A big, old hen salmon from the River Dee today. Estimated at 15lb. A Red Frances did the trick this time.
