DATE:                              Saturday 31st March
REPORT AUTHOR       Ben
NOTABLE CATCH:       27 fish for Ryan Feber
NOTABLE BAG              James Vann 5 fish for 14lb
BEST RAINBOW:          7lb for Mathew Pritt
BEST BROWN:              3lb 5oz for Andrew Swinglehurst
BEST BLUE:                   4lb 6oz for Doddy
BANK ROD AV:            5.2 fish per angler.
BOAT ROD AV:            5.7 fish per angler.
SPORT: There was a noticeable drop in temperature today and I expected to the sport to really reflect this. However we saw some great catches and some really nice fish caught with a mixture of rainbows, blues and browns all taking the fly. Fifteen anglers fished in our Spring Sweep Competition and this morning and when they left the jetty the conditions were great; overcast and almost flat calm. Fish could be seen rising out over open water sipping emerging buzzers from the surface. Some anglers were quick to take advantage of this and trout were caught on wet flies and mini lures drawn back through the surface film. After a short while a cool easterly wind built in strength, the buzzer hatch subsided and the trout moved from the surface. One angler in particular was on fire today. Ryan Feber started out with a midge tip line, cormorants on the droppers and a small booby to hold everything up on the point. Ryan retrieved with a steady figure of eight and fished around Gull Island and Curry’s Cast. He was catching steadily away all morning but as the wind picked up things slowed down, so he switched the same cast of flies to an intermediate line and started a slow roly poly retrieve. This was an inspired move as other anglers were trying to relocate the feeding trout Ryan was building a substantial lead over the other competitors. He finished the day with 27 trout successfully netted, which earned him 1st place in the Spring Sweep and £200. Well done Ryan brilliant angling. In second was Steve Smalley who had also followed the fish down, this time with a Di5 sinker. Steve finished with 11 trout and won £100. In 3rd place winning £70 and also with 11 trout was John Hood who stuck with nymphs all day. There were a lot of fish caught today out in open water as well as around the margins, this is a pattern that I would say is about a month ahead of time.
On the shore there were also some great catches. Dave Flitcroft took eight trout from Bell Point on buzzers. He started around in Newclose where he said that there were loads swimming for meters at a time with their dorsal out of the surface feeding right off the top, but they proved very tricky to catch. I think that this was probably because when they are so high in the water their window of vision is very small and it’s difficult to get them to see you fly. One trick is to slightly over cast your flies in front of them and then draw your chosen patterns across their path. Small wets such as bibios or spider spiders can be deadly fished this way.
The top rod off the shore today was John Lord who tempted 10 fish. He too was fishing buzzers from Bell Point.
Neither of the two fugitive trout were caught today and bounty for the next one brought to lodge has risen to £424.00. Tight Lines Ben

Double click the images below to see them full size.

I thought everyone had left the fishery! Dave Holoway made his way back from Grindies lawn with this stunning over wintered brownie! weighing in at 8lb, Dave took the fish on his black fritz Gladiator! good angling and not bad for his first outing of the season!!

DAVE HOLOWAY WITH AN OVER WINTERED 8lb BROWNIE WHAT A STUNNER!!

DATE:                                   Friday 30th March
REPORT AUTHOR           Matthew
NOTABLE CATCH:          9 fish for Bob Cooper, 5 for Steve Smalley, 7 Michael Greenalgh.
NOTABLE BAG                 Mick Whiteside 3 fish for 10lb
BEST RAINBOW:              4lb
BEST BROWN:                   3lb John Duff
BEST BLUE:                         4lb 8oz Mick Ashworth
BANK ROD AV:                2.6 fish per angler.
BOAT ROD AV:                3.5 fish per angler.
SPORT: I must say today has proved that little bit trickier. I think the fish were used to that scorching hot sun and todays shift to breezier cooler conditions made things a bit tricky. Bob Cooper went against the average with 9 fish to the boat. Sticking to nymphs and buzzers all day Bob found fish everywhere they took the boat. The only thing key was his line a midge tip. Boat partner Steve Smalley had a good outing too with 5 fish on similar tactics. To be fair the bank anglers saw more bag limits today with numerous anglers getting their 5 fish, and some. Michael Greenalgh had 7 to the net from Bell Point,  Ray Entwistle had 5 all coming in Hollins bay and all falling for his little black fritz. Things will settle back to normal and we should see the catches coming from all spots on the water this weekend. That warm spell certainly lifted the water temperature and has spread the fish right across the reservoir.
THE TWO FUGITIVE TROUT ARE STILL AT LARGE, THE FIRST ONE BROUGHT TO THE LODGE IS WORTH £380 AND THE POT WILL KEEP GROWING AND GROWING UNTIL IT IS CAUGHT. YOU’VE GOT TO BE IN IT TO WIN IT!   Tight lines Matthew

DATE:    Thursday 29th March,
REPORT AUTHOR    Paul.
NOTABLE CATCH:    12 fish each for Richard Hood and John Sykes.
NOTABLE BAG    5 fish weighing 22lb 4oz for Tom Fryer.
BEST RAINBOW:    10lb 6oz for Richard Hood.
BEST BROWN:    3lb for Dave Walton.
BEST BLUE:    Several weighing 2lb.
BANK ROD AV:    6.00 fish per angler.
BOAT ROD AV:    6.60 fish per angler.
SPORT: The great weather and great fishing continued today with good catches being recorded on the bank and the boats. From the bank Tom Fryer had a great day landing 7 good fish with the best weighing in at 9lb. Tom fished around Bell point to catch his fish and found a Montana nymph to be his best pattern. Also enjoying a good half day bank sport was Andy Berry who caught 6 fish. Andy decided to take a hike over onto the east bank where he found fish in several areas including the drain. Andy said there were plenty of fish over on the east bank and found the best fly to catch them was a dawson olive. Over in Newclose bay Frank Green was also amongst the trout landing 9 clean rainbows. Frank almost landed 10 fish but a double fell off at the net with a cats whisker in its jaw! Unlucky Frank. Alan Daniels continued his good run of form by catching 10 fish from Bell point. Alan caught all his fish on a black nomad. Alan said as well as the fish he landed he had lots of other pulls and fish on and then off.  On the boats there were also good catches recorded. Richard Hood landed 12 fish from several areas including currys cast and the willows. Included in Richards catch was a super 10lb 6oz rainbow that fell to a damsel fly that was given to him by a friend 5 minutes earlier! John Sykes also landed 12 trout from a boat. John Drifted all over the reservoir and caught fish in several locations but found the willows to be his most productive spot. Jimmy Brown fished around the northern shallows and landed a total of 18 fish. Jimmy found buzzers, diawl bach and various spider patterns effective. There is supposed to be a bit more cloud over the next few days so the fishing could be even better. See you on the water Paul.

Tom Fryer and his fin perfect rainbow caught on a montana nymph

DATE:                               Wednesday March 28th
REPORT AUTHOR        Ben
NOTABLE CATCH:        17 trout for Peter Andrews, 15 trout for Keith Landless, 13 trout for Bernard McBride
NOTABLE BAG                5 for 12lbs for Steve Ratcliffe & Phil Coulthard
BEST RAINBOW:           5lbs for Peter Andrews & Steve Mountain
BEST BROWN:               3lbs 8oz Mick Ashworth
BEST BLUE:                     1lb 12oz Phil Coulthard
BANK ROD AV:              7.00 fish per angler.
BOAT ROD AV:              6.44 fish per angler.
SPORT: What a beautiful day! It was flat calm this morning with clear blue skies. There was a slight chill first thing, but it very quickly warmed up and anglers were sat in their boats fishing in shirt sleeves. Lyndon and Mick Ashcroft returned to the lodge this afternoon with white marks on their faces where their sun glasses had been. I’m glad to say that it wasn’t just rays that they had been catching but they had landed 22 trout as well! They started by drifting near to Bell Point fishing floating lines, long leaders and a black n green fritz tin head on the point. They caught half a dozen fish here before they moved around to Newclose Bay, and this is where they had their best action. They said that if they had landed all the trout that had taken their flies, they could have doubled their final tally. They caught rainbows to 4lbs and browns 3lbs 8oz. They also caught fish at Willow Island and Grindy’s Lawn. Lyndon and Mick went against the flow today as they got most of their fish on lures. The majority of other anglers found nymphing with buzzers and diawl bachs to be the best tactic. Interestingly Lyndon and Mick had a lot more takes when the breeze was on the water and the takes died away when it returned to a flat calm. Anglers fishing with nymphs and buzzers found the exact opposite to be the case, with much more action in the flat calm. So there may be a call for having two rods set up so that you can adjust your tactics to the conditions. Top ‘nympher’ today was Peter Andrews who landed 17 trout on buzzers fished on the washing line. Peter’s best area was all around Willow Island and on Phil’s Flats. In the morning he found the trout willing to take his flies high in the water and twiddled back with a steady figure of eight retrieve. However, as the sun climbed in the sky and the breeze picked up, this stopped working. So he then slowed his retrieve right down, in fact his flies were almost static, and started to pick up fish a lot deeper down. Some of the trout, when caught, today regurgitated buzzers into the boat. The buzzers they were feeding on had a pale olive/tan abdomen with a dark brown thorax and they were a good size too, a ten or twelve would do nicely. The trout have started to spread right around the reservoir, this was shown today by the number of different hotspots named on the returns. Tony Taylor who took 11 rainbows on nymphs named Black House Bay as the best area, Bernard McBride who took 13 trout on a mix of nymphs and lures named The Alders, Grindy’s, The Willows and Cooks Creek and Paul Bebb who was guiding today with Steve Ratcliffe named Gull Island as their hot spot. They had 17 trout to the boat. The shore fished just as well as the boats. Keith and Rob Landless took 25 trout between them on buzzers fish around Hollins Bay and at Two Trees and Steve Mountain tempted 12 to buzzers from Bell Point. His best fish tipped the scales to 5lbs. There were lots of other good catches today so sorry if you didn’t get a mention. Just one last thing, there were quite a few olives hatching off today, they were seen at Curry’s Cast, over the Northern Shallows and I clocked them around the jetty. So if you can spare room on your cast, the old Greenwell’s Glory may be worth a swim. Tight Lines Ben
Ps Pictured below is David Notman’s 13lb rainbow caught yesterday. Thank you for emailing us the Photo.

David Notman with a belting 13lb rainbow trout