The rods are out and the river has dropped to a great height, unfortunately the first 3 days have provided no action apart from kelts. Its just a matter of time and you can bet that Andy (Torrish) Sutherland will sniff out a springer befor long!

Don't forget to order your flies right here as we have everything you need to catch & return that priceless spring salmon. We also have a great new range of Gaelforce sinking tips which are now even stronger and come in new 30lbs sizes in 10 & 15ft and up to 8ips. These will get your fly right down to the fish in the cold spring water. Grab them here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/gaelforce-equalizer-sink-tips.html

Unfortunately the opening day was a washout. The river started rising very early in the morning and only settled in the afternoon at around 5ft. No fish were reported apart from a few kelts. Hopefully the weather will settle and give anglers a chance from Monday 13th.

Dont forget that the fishing is free and open to the public for the next 2 weeks.

Our best spring fly - the RS Mylar Willie Gunn tube, unbeatable but we only tie them special order.

RS Silver Wilkinson, another one of Rons great designs and you won't be too surprised to hear that it has accounted for many spring salmon from all over the Northern hemisphere, not just UK. Grab some here when you have the chance - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-silver-wilkinson-copper-tube.html

The free fishing at the opening of the Helmsdale salmon season has once again been extended. For the first time, the river will be open to the public for two weeks beginning on Saturday 11th through to Saturday the 26th. The mild weather conditions recently is sure draw in one or two of the fabled early Helmsdale runners so its a great chance to hook up and win the Bridge Hotel trophy. To get on the water you just need to register at Glencoast on the Main St who will also be running their popular opening day Gin tasting event from 3 - 5pm hosted by Ice & Fire distillery.

The Sutherland schools pipe band will be on the march as usual from 9.30am to entertain and local junior angler Findlay Adams will have the honour of launching the traditional first cast of the season a few yards above the Telford bridge around 10am.

The long range weather forecast is looking very good for a completely ice free river which should have plenty water after good spells of rain.

For past opening day reports and loads of interesting archive info please check out our archive fishing reports on the left of the page.

You will ofcourse need the right killer flies and we have them all right here, proven tubes which have already caught January springers. Rons recommendations are RS Solar Monkey conehead, Morangie, Willie Gunn and Alistair TigerTail. Buying them is easy, just click here and get stuck in! http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

RS Solar Monkey, buy it here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/solar-monkey-black-yellow-pro-choice.html

RS Willie Gunn Special yellow, buy here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-willie-gunn-special-yellow-rons-favourite.html

Torrish Morangie, buy it here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/torrish-morangie-copper-tube.html

Salmon anglers love their flies and usually can't have enough of them....especially ours! So we have some perfect double leaf boxed selections made up for him and her especially for Christmas with our best selling patterns.

You have the choice of a half or full selection on either selection, either way they are great stocking fillers....check them out, anglers love them and these are very exclusive, you cannot get them anywhere else!

Check them out below and grab them right here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

His two leafs

Her 2 leafs

Last week we emailed our huge customer database and sign ups to our fishing report to inform of our annual fly "bogof" deal. Your email may or may not have been received by you for any number of reasons as some bounce back to us and do not get delivered occasionally. To qualify you must put "bogof" in the comments section when ordering and purchase over £30 worth of flies excluding selections and brooches.
Simply put, our bogof means "buy one get one free" and that means lots of free flies! whatever you buy, we add another the same or similar. but don't waste time as this deal can clean us out of many of your favourite patterns.

You can start benefiting from our deal and receiving your free flies right here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

Believe it or not, Christmas is only around 9 weeks away as I write so this is a great time to grab some of our hugely popular flies for prezzies, we also have superb boxed selections and if you would like you can simply contact us an we can make them up with flies of your choice for gifts, tailored for certain rivers etc.

One of the many anglers who always have success on our flies is Guy Hemsley and recently he proved this again on the Brora with some clonking fish during his annual October week ( 9 to his own rod ) on the lower Brora. His party finished with 26 for the week fishing mainly large tubes in Willie Gunn and Red Frances patterns.

One of Guys thumping fish from the very picturesque Beech Tree pool estimated at around 20lbs

Its fly-tying season and we have some amazing very long Chinese goat in stock along with many other materials you need to create all sorts of deadly new salmon flies. This Goat hair is the closest material you will see to the fabled tapered monkey hair used in many of our favourite long winged flies. This is as good as it gets for Sunray Shadow, Collie and Monkey patterns - its over a foot long! and you can buy it here right now - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/long-chinese-goat-hair.html

The Helmsdale season has closed for another year and in the last week around 40 fish were accounted for in unsettled conditions. Spring was ok, the rest of the season nothing to write home about. Next season? well salmon have a habit of surprising us and keeping us on our toes so who knows what lies ahead. We do know one thing, unless the fly is in the water we will not know if they are there or not in any numbers so anglers will all be out as usual hoping for that magic rod bending moment.

On a more exciting note, I have added another superb new fly to the Helmsdale collection, RS Golden Willie Gunn Krill, check it out and buy it here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-golden-willie-gunn-krill-pro-choice.html

RS Golden Willie Gunn Krill - buy 3 get 1 free in our special introductory offer.

Ok so its time to stock up on deadly autumn flies if you still have fishing on the horizon which many of you will have. The Tweed will produce until end November along with many more destinations in the Uk. We have all the best Autumn killers right here....

The Helmsdale is on its last legs and the penultimate week still produced around 60 fish with pretty stale warm conditions. As per usual it is the anglers who can adapt best to stimulate fish which will catch most. Skating sunrays, deploying the hitch and also depth charging copper and tungsten Frances flies, these tactics will work for the next 2 months unless big water makes it all a little easier. As temps drop flies will increase in size and density, below are some pics of the best. You can grab them all and more on slte.....and from Twisted Thistle Fochabers.

RS Ally Monkey

RS Red/Gold SuperSnaelda

RS Allys SuperSquid

Deadly Micro flies selection

The new lethal Zelda fly, doubles & tubes

Our latest deal gives you a half dozen of our best killer flies free when you purchase any Loop, Gaelforce or Carron lines. Treat yourself to a superslick line upgrade with a real quality line and we will send you some deadly autumn flies. Click here to grab your deal - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/salmon-lines/backing.html

The Helmsdale had around 160 fish off last week, one of the better weeks with good water. So far it has been a tough season with no records broken but like most rivers, there have been decent weeks.

This week we have our Willie Gunn Firetail on offer so if you want to try this cracking fly now is your chance to grab some at a discount price, please click here to buy - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-willie-gunn-firetail.html

We also have loads of deadly autumn coneheads and tubes which will get you right down in front of fish, red Frances are as good as any.

Willie Gunn Firetail below, one of our top flies this season, superb in coloured water on a sinking tip especially in autumn. We also have all the tips you need.

Latest - over 100 fish off last week w/c 5th August, best week of the season. Visitor Will Marshall hooked 4 in one day and landed the best of them at 10lbs sea-liced on the Association water...

After an unusually quiet week of around only 20 fish off the whole river 3rd week of July it has picked up but the fishing is far from record breaking. Recent forestry clearance has blackened the water and the fish are not impressed. On a more positive note there seem to be good numbers of fish in the river but they are just a little more difficult to catch. August could be a big month but the peak of the summer run may well be past. The Association water is still well worth a cast as usual as Adam Macdonald proved last week picking up 2 on Monday, there were around 10 off for the week.

We are now offering for the first time an opportunity to order your favourite flies in any size for delivery in 2020. We have some major killers out of stock right now and are in the process of retying them all. Please contact us and order your absolute "Go To" flies in multiples of 6 per size and we will get you on our list. Please contact asap if you can to secure your deadly stock, an example of a huge quick seller was our micro SuperSnaelda range....and Naked Kinermony Patriot doubles in smaller sizes.

The rivers are up again as we speak so its a great chance to catch some salmon wherever you fish in the UK, our Naked Alistair coneheads would be a very highly recommended tubefly in the peaty water for starters but we have so many more. You can buy them here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-naked-alistair.html

Things are picking up at long last on the Helmsdale but there are no record numbers. The grilse run has arrived and last week produced around 60 plus one pink salmon on the beats. The Association water had 4 fish one day, it is picking away and well worth a day ticket at this time of the year.

Salmon are being caught in good numbers everywhere now and our huge range of flies are accounting for many of them. below are a couple of our most successful. From our new collection the RS Allys Supersquid has been a revelation. Based on the legendary Allys Shrimp Rons specialist tweaking has taken it to a whole new level and you should grab some for your summer and autumn box, they are simply deadly.

Another superb killer has been our Cascade Monkey silver tungsten conehead which we have in a range of sizes down to a stunning micro tube.

Cascade Monkey

RS Allys SuperSquid