Why is it that heading off on a fishing trip with more flies than you ever need, you drop into a fly fishing shop and you feel that just a few more might be useful? I can’t help myself and after leaving John Norris in Penrith with just a few more, Emma, my wife, and I are heading up the M6 towards Scotland and the river Deveron when a thought strikes me.
We have made the long drive from the bottom of the UK in Devon to pretty much the top to north of Aberdeen. We are chasing salmon that have made the long journey to their home rivers to spawn and as the M6 turns into the M74 we watch cars of all sizes heading north in the same direction as us with fishing nets on show in the boots of estates and 4x4s as they pass us. It seems Sunday is the day that anglers who will be casting flies and spinners on the numerous Scottish rivers are making their own migration in search of salmon.
The Deveron may not be one of the first rivers named when anglers talk about the Scottish salmon rivers but it is one that I love dearly. I haven’t fished any of the big names and I am sure they are everything I dream they are but the Deveron has a strong place in my heart.
It rises in the Grampians and runs for 60 miles entering Moray Firth at Banff. As we pass through Aberdeen on to our final destination we pass the names of beats I have memorised from a well read map of the river.
The river has been low and Emma and I fish the water hard the first day as we always do. Finishing tired and fishless, but happy. We have seen fish move and covered them but nothing today. The catch book in one of the huts tells us that the last 10 days has yielded two fish to a spinner.
You can look at things like this a couple of ways. You could get morose and think you haven’t a chance and nothing is happening or as we do that the odds must be stacking in our favour.
We decided to take things a little easier the next day but we have a lot of water to cover and make sure we do. Emma has been a constant companion on my salmon trips and at home we’ll often share a rod but on the Deveron she fishes long and hard and I often sit back and watch her. I love her attitude to it all. She enjoys everything about it and is one of those people who genuinely feels catching a fish is a bonus. She takes great pride in fly choice and making well made Spey Casts that are worthy of a salmon. She has quickly got into the rhythm of a double hander and I give her a big thumbs up as I pour a cup of tea.
We both never feel depressed at lack of numbers and as long as we feel we have fished the water at the end of the day then we can do no more. In the bar at the hotel where we are staying there is a large party who haven’t seen a fish either but are in fine spirits!
The pattern continues for the next few days but on Thursday Emma decides on a black Ally’s shrimp, ties it on and heads down a pool. It is a little uneven at the head and I decide to keep her company and offer a hand in case it is needed. We are discussing varying angles between 90 degrees and 45 and how it affects the speed of the fly when the line goes tight and Emma lifts. We see it is a large resident fish that has taken hold and after a brief tussle it comes off. I feel terrible for her but she really doesn't mind. She really doesn't.
I follow her down the run but all is quiet. Later that night we are all pleased to hear our host has had three salmon on a spinner from the highest and most beautiful beat of where we fish and the guests further upstream have landed one too. Our party is of five with one of the guests heading off home the next day. I listened as our host told him how he’d caught the fish. He’d cast against the far bank, counted to 4 and then retrieved. I took this all in.
Next day Emma had 2 fish roll over her fly but had not connected. We’d seen deer, red squirrel, osprey, kingfishers and a seal that we’d spooked at the very bottom beat.
Our last afternoon was at the very top beat. Emma fished out of her skin and again had 3 fish roll at her fly. She’d varied angles, retrieves, just about everything and it had been just about perfect. I’d still had nothing but decided to fish the deeper slower pool that our host had success in a few days previously. I didn’t have a spinning rod to fish it with though. It isn’t a snobbish thing, we just don’t bring one as we enjoy working the water with a fly, that’s all.
It was case of improvising. I had brought a single handed rod with an intermediate line and a strong leader of about 6 feet. I tied a cone head sunray shadow onto this, cast across the pool and pulled it back at a speed I thought this would equate to about the speed of a spinner. First few casts and nothing happened but on the 5th or 6th I saw a flash of silver. 7th cast and the same. I left it just a few minutes and repeated and this time the line went tight. I didn’t see the take but felt it and the salmon was on. It was a strong, silver fish of 12lb or so. I called Emma who brought the camera and net. If I had to trust just one person to net a fish for me it would be her. She is calm and doesn't make any rash lunges with a net and after I’d got the fish under control she made another text- book netting.
Emma later rolled another fish and it was me who had to get HER off of the water and on the way back to the hotel she said she had to leave as it would have been another couple of hours before she stopped.
It was the end of another year on the Deveron and I would have loved Emma to have had a fish but she was genuinely not bothered. We were thrilled to hear that our hosts wife had a 5lb bar of silver her last day, her first on a fly!
It was an early start the next day and a long 11 hour drive as we migrated back down the M6 and home.