Tag Archives: Grilse

Update to the 18th March

Tags : Braelangwell Carron Fishing Grilse Highlands Kyle of Sutherland Kyle of Sutherland Fisheries River Carron Salmon Salmon fishing Scotland Scottish rivers spring fishing springers Sutherland

The first two fish of the season at Braelangwell were caught by Finlay on the 7th and 9th of March. Both were from the Morail weighing 11lb and 14lb.

The week of the 11th produced 3 salmon for the week. on the 13th Ronald Gardiner caught a 7lber from the Boat pool with 3ft on the gauge. On the 15th Graeme Robertson caught a 8lb salmon from the Rock pool with 3ft on the gauge and then Jean Matterson caught a cracking 14lber from the Morail after the river had dropped back to 2ft 3.

Gruiniards, over the river caught 1 and we hear of another 4 at least off the river so the Carron must be on 18 to 20 salmon so far for the season

Quick cast today

Tags : Braelangwell Carron Fishing Grilse Highlands Kyle of Sutherland Kyle of Sutherland Fisheries River Carron Salmon Salmon fishing Scotland Scottish rivers spring fishing springers Sutherland

We had another mild day today I thought it was worth fishing the Morail. The river was running at 1’9″ dropping to 1’6″ and the water temp was a ridiculously high 42.8f (6c). There could well be a salmon somewhere in the beat now.

Opening day

Tags : Braelangwell Carron Fishing Grilse Highlands Kyle of Sutherland Kyle of Sutherland Fisheries River Carron Salmon Salmon fishing Scotland Scottish rivers spring fishing springers Sutherland

The kyle of Sutherland rivers opened today.

We had a westerly breeze and the gauge was only reading minus 7″. The air temp was 48f (9c) and the water a ridiculously warm 41f (5c) There is one rod out for a couple of hours at Braelangwell today.

What a difference from the opening day of 2010 when there was 16 inches of ice on the Morail shown in the photo with Finlay fishing Eskimo style on the Morail.

Catches from the Kyle of Sutherland last year

Tags : Braelangwell Carron Fishing Grilse Highlands Kyle of Sutherland Kyle of Sutherland Fisheries River Carron Salmon Salmon fishing Scotland Scottish rivers spring fishing springers Sutherland

The district fishery board have released the combined catch figures from the Kyle catchment and they certainly seem to buck the trend for the rest of the country.  

The Carron had a slow start because of the beast from the East but soon caught up with a very respectable figure of around 218 to the end of April compared to 78 caught on the neighboring Oykel. We don’t have a total figure yet for the Carron but the catchment, which includes the Oykel, Cassley, Shin Evelix and the fishing in the Kyle was 2914 salmon and grilse. This compares with 2506 in 2017. The average from 1952 to 2017 is 2700. It was also the first time in 20 years that the catchment caught over 1000 fish for September with 1192 in the book. Yes, the summer was awful, and the spring and September saved us, but the fish must have been there. 

Finlay and Jim Gilmore only managed a day counting redds at Deanichbut what they found was very encouraging. They saw more fish and activity of spawning than had been seen since at least 2013 possibly the very good year of 2010. Alladale estate don’t normally fish but as conditions were right in September and an experienced guest was there they had a go and caught over 20 one week. All were returned unharmed.  

— 

Finlay McCulloch

Braelangwell estate

Ardgay

01863755321

07711633150

2018 season

Tags : Braelangwell Carron Fishing Grilse Highlands Kyle of Sutherland Kyle of Sutherland Fisheries River Carron Salmon Salmon fishing Scotland Scottish rivers spring fishing springers Sutherland

The 2018 season started out very well. The lower beats initially seeing some fantastic sport. An example was Gledfield catching 23 for a week to their 2 rods. We at Braelangwell caught 30 for April with an average weight of a fraction over 9lb. As May came in the water started dropping off but we still managed 23 for the month. What seemed to be missing was the big multi sea winter fish that would normally come in May but I’ll come back to that.

The biggest fish of the spring was a fine 16lber to Cisa Grey caught from the Washerwoman in April.
The Carron below the Morail falls caught over 230 springers to the end of April (Just over 6 miles) and there were some caught above showing that not everywhere was suffering from lack of fish. The spokesmen for the big rivers were saying that the fishing was a disaster in Scotland which was really hacking off to us above Inverness as there was some really good sport to be had.

Like pretty much everyone else we suffered from very low water for June, July and August and we only caught 25 salmon for this period. A lot of experienced people were comparing this summer to 1976 but from our fishing book they had an odd rise back then and as many fish were caught for July 76 alone. The highest water temperature recorded at Braelangwell was 73.4f.

We finally saw the weather break in September but the water didn’t really cool down until the week of the 10th when it hit 50f which seems to turn the fish back on. We ended the month with 61 salmon and grilse. The biggest to Stewart Walker at 20lb from Gruinards run.

We ended our season with 88 salmon and 53 grilse out of that only one salmon was killed because it could not be revived.
Going back to the May fish, Due to the low water it seems that a good number of fish made their way over the Glencalvie falls. Looking into the gorge in the low water you could clearly see good big salmon in the pools so it seems the big multi sea fish were there they just went through. The head keeper at Alladale also confirmed this by letting us know that he is seeing more fish up there than he has seen for years.