Credits: Article and images by Colin Alexander Smith @ Quill & Pad. See the original article here - https://quillandpad.com/2024/11/18/catching-my-first-wild-trout-fly-fishing-in-scotland/
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Falls of Feugh
One of the most spectacular sights for anglers and tourists alike can be found further inland. About 100 yards before joining the Dee at Banchory, the Water of Feugh crashes down a ravine made up of a series of steeply angled rock faces and pools.
The Falls of Feugh at Banchory
An old stone bridge and a modern viewing platform cross the river, normally about 30ft above where migratory salmon congregate in October each year to make their way up to the spawning grounds.
When the rivers are in spate, however, the water level can rise to the level of the bridge, and the viewing platform was closed briefly in November 2022 as the water was lapping over it.
Observing the salmon there can be engrossing as there is a large, weir-like angled wall of water pouring over a huge rock in the centre of the river, which the salmon try to leap over into the pool above.
But it is too high even for the biggest fish, and it is only after they have figured out that there is an accessible channel up to the left of this rock that they make it to the next level.
Beginnings
I was first introduced to fishing at the age of seven by my father, casting baited hooks on a hand-held spool of line into the Persian Gulf from an oil services jetty.
My father showed me that I would know when I had hooked a fish because I would feel a sharp tug on the line, which I duly noted. After a while of anxiously waiting for the first tug, my attention wandered and I began dreamily gazing off into the horizon, just a few miles beyond which lay the coast of Iran.
My father crept up behind me and gave the line three sharp tugs. I nearly fell off the jetty with surprise, much to his amusement. But his approximation of a large fish taking my hook was remarkably realistic, and I am reminded of it each time I hook a fish today.
I have also noticed recently that more often than not, it is only after I have given up all hope of catching a fish, my attention wanders elsewhere and my retrieve slows almost to a halt, that a trout finally strikes my fly.
We soon progressed to proper rods and reels, and usually brought a couple of sole-like flatfish home for my mother to cook for lunch. My best friend’s father was a professional diver who would take us snorkelling and spearfishing at weekends, also gathering large pieces coral to be sun-bleached and used as decorations.
I shall never forget the overpowering sickly-sweet smell of the heap of dying coral piled up in the back of his car on the way home (in the days before car air-conditioning, or environmental considerations for that matter).
Also, at low tide we used to extract limpets from their shells with a penknife and dangle them on hooks in the rock pools to entice Moray eels from their lairs, a high-risk activity that makes me wince when I think of it.
The author hunting Moray eel, c1969. He still has that fishing rod.
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Credits: Article and images by Colin Alexander Smith @ Quill & Pad. See the original article here - https://quillandpad.com/2024/11/18/catching-my-first-wild-trout-fly-fishing-in-scotland/
