Best week with 426 plus fish

Despite most of two days being lost to flooding, the Tweed online catch score last week was the best so far this year at 426 salmon, most probably over 600 salmon for the river as a whole. Proof, if it were needed, that too much water is a whole lot better, for fishing, than too little, except, of course, for those who miss out on the flood days themselves.

As for next week, it is a messy weather picture for the first two days, with thunderstorms possible anywhere, reasonably settled thereafter and never too hot or sunny. It could be another good week, especially if fresh fish continue to come in off the early autumnal big tides in Berwick of the next few days

Lower Birgham 

Another great week last week. Started the week seeing alot of fish. Landing a good few but also loosing a few. The fish picking up the fly, running for a couple of seconds and then having second thoughts and dropping it. But great to have so much activity early on. Tuesday was similar with lots of fish seen but they stayed on better. And we landed 7 including some fresh grilse and bigger silver autumn fish. As the week went on the weather and mainly wind got worse. Making standing up hard work let alone trying to fish in it. But we still were in and amongst the fish. With the river rising on Thursday it was pretty much a wash out for Friday and Saturday. So all in all a very good week considering the conditions. We landed 19 salmon and 2 sea trout. It’s been great to still be catching silver fish, let’s hope it keeps like this.

Carham Beat

Monday, we started the week with the gauge at 6" and 63f water temp. We landed 5 fish, all on fly. All the fish were between 3lb and 8lb and caught in the morning. Tuesday, we were at 8" and 62f water temp. We had a small lift of water, which seemed to unsettle the fish. We only managed 1 fish but had a few other tentative offers. Wednesday, we were at 6" and 60f water temp. 2 fish were caught on fly in the evening. The hot, bright weather during the day made the evening a more practical time to fish. Thursday, we were at 6" and 60f again. 3 fish were landed between 7lb and 11lbs, all on fly. Friday, due to heavy rain on Thursday, we were up to 2'6" on the gauge. The lift brought a fair bit of colour with it. We gave it a go in the afternoon with the fly and spinner, but touched nothing. Saturday, we were down to 1'2" and 58f. The water was still carrying quite a bit of colour, so some of the rods fished the fly, and some spun, we ended up with 13 salmon/grilse for the day. There was a mixture of fresh and older fish up to 18lbs. Small numbers of fish were still showing, but not as frequently as the previous week. The over head conditions were pretty good again with a fair bit of cloud cover during the week except on Wednesday when it was bright and sunny. Small black and yellow bottle tubes on short intermediate or slow sink tips were working well, and flying c and xrap were the successful spinners. 

Boleside

A very unsettled week on the Tweed system with fluctuating river conditions however we managed to land 5 Salmon and 7 Sea Trout. The best was a 13lber by 14 year old Jacob Ellis in the Boatpool. We started to see a number of fish come through late yesterday so hopefully the river will settle and we can get a hold of a few. With the rising water we resorted to slow sink tip and decent 1 1/2 inch conehead. In Cascade or Posh Tosh. Fingers crossed for the next few days.

Catches

For a comprehensive view of catches, visit Tweed Fishing Section on the River Tweed website. If you are viewing the catches page on a mobile phone, please view the page in landscape mode for the best experience.

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Tight lines

Anne Woodcock

Email anne@tweedfoundation.org.uk

Mobile 07540 834852 

The Tweed Foundation Annual Auction will go live in November. If you would like to donate an auction lot to support the work of the foundation and education program, TweedStart, please email anne@tweedfoundation.org.uk