What a Catch!

An account of a tumultuous battle between man and fish - by Jonathon Backhouse.

I was invited by friends to join them on their annual fishing trip to the North Esk to try and help me realise my ambition with my new rod in three days intensive fly fishing on the Milden stretch.

Arriving on Wednesday night, I fished all day Thursday from 8 in the morning until 11 at night using a variety of flies and variations of leader length with sinking and intermediate tippets, but persisting with a floating 8 weight line.  I had no luck all day! However, on the morning of Saturday 27 June although the water was up and carrying a little bit of colour it had not yet fully coloured and there were signs of fish movement in the pools.  By about 11 am my colleague, Martin Gabbutt and I started fishing the Dalforth pool where we saw fish moving and jumping to reassure us that we had a chance.

On about my third cast I felt the fish take the fly.  Historically I have been a trout fisherman and used to striking very quickly when a fly is taken but on this occasion having been lectured on holding my nerve I slowly raised the rod tip and I believe I felt the fish move with the fly in his mouth and as the rod tip came to 12 o'clock I felt the fly take hold. At this point, of course, I had no idea of the size of fish I would catch and had been told that I should expect fish around 7 or 8 pounds.  I had a 17.5 lb breaking strain leader on my line and therefore felt confident to manage more or less anything I would catch.

The fish did not move and for quite some time, in spite of me putting significant pressure on it, the fish just stayed where it had been hooked.  Eventually the fish moved down the pool reassuring me that I was not snagged on the bottom which I had begun to suspect. The fish swam perhaps 10 yards and then turned once again into the current and sat still.  At this point, I still had the excess fly line in my left hand and was not "on the reel".  I kept the pressure on the fish with my rod high and significantly bent under the weight of the fish.

Finally, it dawned on the fish that something wasn't right and it began to run, first of all it aimed for a submerged rock that I knew was there because my friend had lost a fish the previous day due to the same rock.  I put even more pressure on the fish sideways to steer it away from the rock and persuade it that there was an easier direction in which it could swim.  It worked and the fish began to swim back towards to me. By this time I had the fish on the reel and was winding for all I was worth.  Of course, at the moment the fish was within about 30-40 yards of me, perhaps less.  The pool at Dalforth is hourglass shaped and we were in the top part of the hourglass.

The fish realised that he was stuck at the end of a line and ran!

The reel I was using was a Leader Rimfly reel I bought approximately 20 years ago at the Tackle Shop on Rutland Water for about £14.00, I have actually had to repair this reel recently.  For the first time in my ownership of this reel, it was screaming under the load of this running salmon.  Before I knew where I was I was well into my backing and the fish was 100 yards away in the lower half of the hourglass.

I still had not seen the fish and therefore had no idea of its size, never having caught one on fly before, my biggest previous fish being a 7.5 lbs brown trout on a reservoir, I did not know whether this was a normal fight for an average weight of fish or something unusual. After several more runs up and down the lower half of the pool, with my rapping my knuckles trying to slow the spinning reel to put more pressure on the fish, and having waded back to the bank and followed it into the second half of the hourglass, the fish finally showed itself but was still too far for me to see it, I realised it was tiring. 

My colleague who had grabbed the net asked me if I would like him to try and net it.  Of course I agreed and he made his way onto the shallow bank downstream towards the fish.

The fish saw him coming and ran again.  Eventually it did surface and was looking tired.  It happened to be pretty close to Martin and he got it in the net safely.  At this point he said to me "you've got a really big fish".

We both weighed the fish on both my scale and Martin on his to confirm its weight at 20.5 lbs.  Unfortunately, neither of us had a camera with us, so I was not able to take a picture until later that evening, by which time I had gutted the fish.  I have emailed this picture to Richard Baker as instructed.  I have measured the fish, it is 38 inches from nose to fork of tail, 39 inches from nose to point of tail.  I have a photograph of this if you wish.

Perhaps my catching this fish should encourage all anglers who do not necessarily have the best tackle, that they can still have a wonderful experience and catch excellent fish. Mind you, I think I need a double handed rod if I am lucky enough to get this chance again, my arm has barely recovered!