After a covid stricken year in 2020 (but one of our highest catches to date) the virus tried to resurface and have another effect on the fishing, this time however it wouldn’t be the restrictions of travel but one of the driest on record. Guests put in such a good effort in really tough conditions hooking a total of 80 fish in 124 days, managing to land a steady 45 migratory fish, the amount of lost fish was entirely down to having to resort to super low summer conditions, resorting to size 16’s and super long leaders.
Again it was great to see so many familiar faces returning for another season along with a lot of new faces in search of their first silver. We finally got going in May due to a few more covid restrictions being in place and it couldn’t of started any better, my first 2 guests Paul and Helen had an incredible 2 days fishing, landing an early season sea trout of a lifetime and a beautiful spring salmon from both the Dilston and Warden beats on the Tyne, as always a quick couple of photos and the fish were returned.
Throughout June and July we battled with higher than normal temperatures and drought, kielder reservoir was an absolute godsend, constantly topping the river system up to help the fish migrate upstream along with increasing the amount of dissolved oxygen in the water. We still managed to get amongst some great fish by persevering and adjusting our tactics to suit the changing conditions, here are a few of the lucky captures.
Unfortunately the warm weather continued throughout August with the odd cooler break and small scattered showers which freshened up the rivers. The salmon were now well throughout the system and in better numbers and the catches showed, the leviathans still alluded us but we still managed some solid fish to the net.
September finally arrived but again the rain did not, we did however start to experience slightly cooler conditions dropping the temperature of the water to a more manageable level where salmon would actually snap at the fly. I personally managed to get some hours on the water after a busy summer guiding, refining my tactics down including trying some new combinations resulted in a few really good sized salmon. Guests also faired better with the change in conditions and a few first migratory fish were landed.
Eventually the rain came in October, and plenty of it. It’s amazing what a little bit of rain can do to a river, the flow, the temperature and the sheer amount of fish was such a refreshing sight and the catches improved dramatically. So even tho October was a great success and pulled the numbers round, the season throughout all the river beats and many other river systems was a one to remember for all the wrong reasons.
