Fishing for the truth about angling in Scotland
IT HAS had a gestation period longer longer than the celebrated spiny dogfish, but at last Scotland’s Marine Bill has been passed, promising the birth of a new era for our seas and the prospect of, potentiallly, a brighter future for all the creatures that live in them and the people whose livelihoods depend on…
Continue ReadingI HAVE nothing against Robson Green personally. As an actor he has turned in some compelling performances in the likes of Casualty, Soldier, Soldier and Wire in the Blood. He certainly generates a quickening of pulses among the ladies apparently, though clearly the lad from Dudley on Tyneside maybe falls short of setting up any…
Continue ReadingACTOR and comedian Billy Connolly today formally opened the Aberdeenshire Dee’s salmon season where fishery administrators are optimistic that rod catches will maintain 2009’s record-breaking results. Connolly, who began his interest in fishing as a youngster on the canal in Glasgow, and now owns Candacraig House in Strathdon, toasted the river with a tipple of…
Continue ReadingTHE Scottish Government was today urged to act rapidly to forestall severe increases in sea lice infestation expected to hit marine salmon farms in the West Highlands and islands. Fears also emerged that Scotland could become a “dumping ground’’ for bad practice by multinational salmon producers if our parasite control regulations were not harmonised with…
Continue ReadingSOME OF the most stringent salmon conservation measures ever seen in Scotland are being introduced on the River Tay this season.
Continue ReadingTHE WINNER of this year’s prestigious Savills Malloch Trophy is Fort William angler Sandy Walker with a 32lb sea-liced cock salmon taken on the River Lochy in late June. The veteran Inverlochy AC member caught the fish in the river’s tidal Tailrace pool on a home-tied Waddington. It took him 1.5 hrs to land and…
Continue ReadingIT DIDNT take too long since my last article, to track down the elusive fly-tyer credited with creating one of Scotland’s most famous salmon patterns, the Garry Dog. Also known as the Minister’s Dog, Yellow Dog or simply Garry, a chance meeting with the grandson of a Borders’ minister, brought me the background to the…
Continue ReadingRevealed, the origin of one of Scotland’s most famous salmon flies – the Garry Dog
Continue ReadingIF YOU weren’t watching More4 at 10:00 tonight you missed a real treat – the first UK television screening of The End of the Line, Rupert Murray’s remarkable documentary film which is changing the way people think about the future of the world’s sea fish populations. Immensely watchable; immensely frightening, it charts the activities of…
Continue ReadingENVIRONMENT minister Richard Lochhead has won cautious praise for following up quickly on his pledge to create a Scottish sea angling strategy group. Steve Bastiman, chairman of the Scottish Sea Angling Conservation Network (SSACN), the principal campaigners for Government action to protect and revitalise inshore fish stocks, revealed today that it has had a preliminary…
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