Arundell Shop: End of Season Sale

With just a couple of weeks of our season to go, we have reduced a load of great items for sale in the Cockpit - our tackle shop. We have the superb Guideline Exceed and LPXe rods reduced, for example a 15ft 10/11wt LPXe from £449.99 to £404.99 or the Exceed 9ft 7wt from £219.99 to £179.99. There are many other items with great reductions such as Costa Del Mar sunglasses and Redington rods so click here - TACKLE SHOP - to browse.

We've also just had a long-awaited delivery of Danielsson Reels arrive. These are priced with 30% off at the moment. Made in Sweden in small batches, these tend to go very quickly. These are unlikely to be available again until around April next year... you have been warned. Have a look on the shop website to see the range.

September Report

September continued very dry, with rivers at rock bottom levels, eventually relieved by some rain which was largely absorbed by the parched ground, but did give us a rise of a few inches on all rivers. The Tamar ran extremely dirty, but this water did encourage some fish to run, and we caught our first salmon since June. Charlie Yeoward released a 5 pound grilse from Quarry pool on the Tamar, taken on a black and yellow tube fly. More grilse were seen showing, so at last a few fish are on the move.

Sea trout night fishing provided 15 fish for September, with a few days to go as I write, and a total of 138 for the season to date. Best fish this month was one of 2 ¼ pounds for David Pilkington from beat 3, taken on a P.R. Decent numbers of sea trout were in our beats, and a couple were taken from the Thrushel by trout fishers.

Trout fishing perked up as temperatures slowly dropped, with nice hatches of stone flies and some late caddis keeping fish rising. 131 trout and 8 grayling were released by trout rods, with some excellent brownies up to 12 inches.

Prospects for the final fortnight of the salmon season are entirely dependant upon some real rain, rivers are still very low and a big spate would be most welcome.

David Pilkington

River Report

Despite a fleeting spell of wet weather, rivers have once again dropped back to summer lows. Shortly after the rain, regular rod Charlie Yeoward managed a grilse from Quarry Pool on a one-inch Black and Yellow tube. Trout fishing has perked up this month, as it usually does towards the season's end, and the sea trout are present in good numbers with several being caught both by night and by day on small wets and nymphs. Until we get a serious dose of the wet stuff, salmon fishing will be patchy at best! Our (rain) dancing shoes have all but worn out. Here's to hoping.

Tying Sea Trout Flies

With the season drawing to a close, it'll be soon time for winter nights at the fly tying vice. Here are three videos of hotel instructor Tim on how to tie some hotel night fishing favourites. The footage is filmed in HD video, so feel free to adjust the quality setting (bottom right-hand corner) to suit.

The hotel's Youtube channel can be found here:

Arundell Arms on Youtube

Tying the WMD

Tying the WMD Gurgler

Tying the Werewolf

River Report

Still plenty of sea trout on the Lyd, and they are starting to switch back to taking larger flies as the water temperature drops a little. Shoals of up to 20 fish were spotted yesterday in small pools, and fish were jumping every few minutes on the lower river in bright sunlight.
Today's overcast skies and cooler temperature should give anglers a few trout, although we really, really could do with a drop (I mean, deluge) of rain. This is going to be essential for any salmon fishing during autumn.

Rivers Update

Apologies for the lack of river updates of late... conditions have been pretty consistent, with a lack of rain over the last few weeks meaning that the rivers are still running low and clear. Salmon fishing is on hold for now due to low water. With a bit of luck, we will be treated to a deluge before the peak of the season in September and October (season ends Oct 14th). We will need several days of constant, heavy rain to give us the high water that salmon fishers crave. Here's hoping for an Autumn like 2010; following a large flood during late September, our anglers caught 42 salmon in just 12 days.

Sea trout fishing has been good during August. The fish were a little tricky during the very hot weather and extremely low water but, following some cooler weather, catches have picked up very well and most anglers have caught a fish or two. The current catch stands at 115 sea trout for the season, with September still to come. Smaller (size 6 and 8) wet flies such as the WMD and Pilk's Bumble have been responsible for most, though surface lures such as the Gurgler have also performed well. The Lyd has produced all of the fish of late - it is running relatively higher than the Tamar. However, congratulations must be given to Ashley Royston, a local night fisher who, while fishing a neighbouring fishery's water adjacent to 7A on the Tamar, landed and released a huge sea trout of around 9 1/2lb - a fish of a lifetime off the river.

Trout fishing has been very slow - typical for August - with only a few small fish being caught on the main rivers. The smaller streams such as the Wolf have faired much better. Anglers have had to fish hard using small goldhead nymphs and tiny dries to trick the wild browns that are very picky. With some cooler temperatures now, September fishing usually picks up with fish coming back onto the dries for a final flurry before the season closes at the end of the month.

We'll leave you with a shot of Home beat on the Lyd as darkness falls.... we hope to see you on the river soon.