Well that's it for another season! For me it has been my worst season possibly ever! Just 2 sewin despite a great deal of time and effort. As I am soon to retire I will have think hard and long in order to decide whether it is viable for me to travel the 100 miles to fish the Towy. It will be a difficult decision to make as it currently costs me the best part of £35 in fuel alone for each trip I make! I do love the river and its inhabitants (that is the wildlife) and in particular this year I have managed to get some wonderful images of the birds which is compensation for such poor fishing I suppose.
What saddens me most is the lack of passion and willingness of many anglers on the river to get off their arses and do something about the problem! Just look at the Sea-Trout Forum for instance - what a waste of time that is? Many members of my own angling club will rarely be seen on the river despite living close by to it and as for supporting conservation initiatives or political lobbying then I don't think there is much of that going on. Just the other day I was talking to Colin the farmer where I camp out and he was telling me that he has hardly seen any cars parked up at the end of his lane this year! So it just shows how desperate the fishing is. Despite managing the LAL Blog I have not had a single fishing report that I can think of from any members other than my good friends Rodney, John, Chris and Tim! Nobody else seems to care! Such a shame!
I have to say I have met some strange visitors this year! I was talking to a new member (allegedly so) by where I camp out this summer as I was tackling up. Whilst we were talking I heard the otter coming up river and alerted him to this. His response was 'if I had my shotgun with me I would take the bast..d out, accusing the otter of taking all the fish out of the river'! Nut case or what? Very weird! I have even had another knob, actually a 'posh knob' who fishes Crewel Pool, threaten to sort me out if he catches me fishing his pool. This was a reaction he gave to a joke I made whilst chatting with him and his fellow anglers one evening whilst they were sat outside their hut. I said something like 'make sure you leave me some sewin for when I come back up from the bottom in the early hours of the morning'. Sad!
On a more positive note the wildlife seems to be holding its own pretty well. A lovely pair of kingfishers have been around every day and I managed to get some nice shots of them. Also plenty of Red Kites and Buzzards have been seen. Only last week I got shots of Cormorants gallore (too many probably), Gooseanders, Grey Wagtails, Common Sandpiper, Wren, Sparrowhawk, Dipper not to mention our treasured Otters and of course a 'not so treasured' Mink! Worryingly I noticed a Cormorant catch at least 4 fish in a couple of hours! Multiply that out and you will see that Cormorants could be part of our problem! Interestingly I have observed all our silly juvenile Gooseanders on many occasions for many hours and I can honestly say that I have not seen any of them catch a single fish! Don't know what they live on but I can't see it being fish!!
Oh well better get back to my fly tying vice as its the only vice I have these days! Looking forward to better fishing days perhaps!
Tight lines!
kingfisher