The Devon Angling Association

Well only four weeks or so of the trout season to go!

The general consensus is that the trout fishing on the river has been pretty good, in part I guess from the generally wet summer that has all but passed (though you would never guess it with this week’s weather 🙂 ).

There has been quite a few large trout caught the full length of the river to all techniques. I have had a lot of success in the last couple of weeks with small dries cast upstream in to the main food lines or skittering a large sedge pattern across the surface.

There have been few reports to date of Sea Trout and no Salmon (despite a number of decent spates with fish entering the other rivers including that Allan & Carron). Hopefully we can enjoy the settled weather for a week and then get a decent spate!

This year will see an attempt to recover scale samples of some of the Devon salmon caught. These will be used to investigate the genetic make up of Devon Salmon and allow comparison with Salmon elsewhere in the Forth catchment

The generally high water has resulted in the Fisheries Trust contractor been unable to programme the improvements to Dollar Weir  this year, so it has been postponed till next year. On a more positive note the OLP with the support of the landowner have undertaken significant bank stabilisation work upstream of Dollar Weir which will help protect the river and the new footpath on the south bank.

Best of luck for the rest of the season 🙂

The hard start to the season continued well into May , even seeing the Ochils plastered in fresh snow at the start of the month. Thankfully June has brought warmer and more settled weather, but very little in the way of meaningful rain and once again the Devon is running very low and relying on the compensation flows from Castlehill Reservoir.

The impoundment of the Devon in Glendevon, has many negative impacts on the river not least removing for much of the year the variations in flow which is vital for the eco-systems of a river. In a prolonged dry spell however it is a blessing as it provides a steady flow with the minimum permitted released volume. By late June, on the Fossoway section of the river, the impact of the prolonged draw down in groundwater levels and the reduction of flow from the only significant tributary below the dam (the Glendey Burn) can be see in the tide mark on this boulder:

Unfortunately in these conditions this means the upper parts of the river don’t get the benefit of a decent flush, that the river gets below the Cauldron Linn. This  is illustrated when you see the impact of Friday nights deluge on the two Sepa river gauges:

At the Castlehill gauge, a 15mm rise in level is recorded

At the Glenochil gauge, a 600mm rise in level is recorded

As for the fishing?

Well in May in my experience it was grim; the best of the fish falling to the bait anglers such as Bryan and his young charge

Fishing Red Bridge stretch

Trout of 1lb 6oz

The best of the action for the fly was with periodic hatches of Hawthorns or Olives and being in the right spot at that time. As the weather improved through June, so has the fishing for the fly angler. As of yet there have been no reports of Sea Trout in the river. I haven’t met many anglers on the river but those I have had have either been utterly frustrated by super spooky fish in the low water or utterly enthralled by regular rising trout. I have had a couple of evening sessions where I have failed miserably to land a specimen trout but have had plenty of cracking wee wild fish caught with the dry fly

Typical June Brown Trout from the Devon