Fishing by the mouth

[Thursoman]

Hello to you all, this is a brilliant forum. ;D
This is my first post so here goes.
Wondering if any of you have any advice on fishing by the rivers mouth.

Does the stage of tide make a big difference? I noticed 2 fly fishermen fishing when tide was completely out. Would this be because the river is so much narrower and more chance of getting a fish?


I have mainly fished for trout in the past but would love to have a go at catching a salmon on the fly.
One other thing would you get away with fishing for salmon on trout gear on a smallish river?

Any advice would be much appreciated I can tell you.
Chris

[hf]

thursoman

Welcome to the forum and I'm sure you'll get the advice you need from the guys.

I haven't fished for trout so can't give you definite answers about your gear. When I started out (on a smaller river) I was advised to get a 13 foot rod, wide arbor reel, floating line, leader etc. I was also given a few flies to help me on my way.

3 or 4 years later, I have now added to the gear I first bought: 15 foot rod for larger rivers and spring fishing, a proper wide arbor reel, intermediate line, and other accessories.

This is just the way it worked for me. The other guys though will help you out more as they have many more years experience of salmon and trout fishing.

All I would say is, "go for it"

Cheers

highlandfisher

[G Ritchie]

Certainly the experience I have of fishing tidal stretches shows that low tide is the most productive time for salmon. At this point the water has the lowest salinity levels and the river channel is smaller, so the fish are more concentrated.

[builnacraig]

thursoman said:

One other thing would you get away with fishing for salmon on trout gear on a smallish river?

Of course you would. Most of my salmon (mostly grilse) have been caught on a 10' single hand trout fly rod. A seven wt or higher is ideal. A good 10' rod will land a grilse in a five minutes or less and will give far better sport than catching the same fish on a 15'' rod. If you play them firmly they can be released no problem using that sort of tackle. Mind you if you expect to catch double figure fish you would want heavier tackle.

I would agree with Grahams comments about fishing in the channel at low tide. Also You usually need low river flows for these sort of places otherwise the fish will tend to run right through.

Builnacraig

[speyghillie]

Hi Chris,

I had a finnock ticket on the Speymouth Angling Association for a few years and we were restricted to a single handed rod, thigh waders, 6lb cast and size 10 hook. Any salmon or grilse had to be returned of course but this tackle certainly didn't restrict us to finnock.

I tied 'long winged' size 10 Silver Stoats and caught quite a few 'bigger' fish by accident.... the best time down there was fishing as the tide dropped back and summer in particular with low water was perfect.

Just add to your tackle as and when you can afford it but in the meantime, your trout gear would be sufficient but use 8lb + breaking strain leader.

Welcome to the forum by the way.

[salmonscotty16lb]

on the lower tay best tide times i found are 1hour before and 1 hour after the tide. fish start to get more active about 2hours before and can sneek through anytime after;)
sometimes on high tide there are fish moving everywhere but with the river flow seriously reduced it is pointless fishing:(
BUT scotty has a trick or 2 to try next season
will report and captures

[Thursoman]

Many, many thanks indeed to you all for spending the time to reply to me.
All your information is noted and very much appreciated. (;o)
Chris.