The last 2 weeks have seen the arrival of good numbers of salmon. The upper river had its best week with 20 then last week that was surpassed again with nearer 30 fish off including the Association water tally. However, due to the very wintry weather all the action is happening on the lower river apart from a handful of fish getting caught over the falls and the Association water has proved to be as good a beat as the rest. Since Peter Macmillan landed the first fish in mid April, another 10 have been caught, Graham McCulloch has hit a purple patch landing 4 sealiced fish, Alistair Jappy 2, William Jappy, Keith Macdonald and Jim Forsyth one each and Mark Slight grassed a clonking 18 pounder from the Flat pool.

Coneheads and copper tubes generally fished on sinking tips are doing the damage with the odd fish taken on a stripped Sunray shadow. Temps are due to stay on the cold side so it looks like more of the same tactically for a week or two yet.

As usual, we have all the killer flies accessories and advice required to help you catch fish so give us a call. If you don't get through, please email or text on 07554510036 and I'll get right back to you asap.

Helmsdale Co are in the process of moving exclusively online and growing our internet side. We will still be offering almost all the equipment that is currently online including Rods and gear from Loop, Hardy, Simms, Mackenzie etc so call us for any quote and don't forget that we have the biggest and most innovative local and international salmon fly selection available online. We have pioneering many new fly trends and successful patterns like RS SuperSnaelda, Solar Monkey, Skullheads, Feeler flies on tubes and doubles and many more and we have our fly designs flies in all the big tackle stores including Sportfish and Glasgow Angling centre etc but for advice on using or ordering these call Ron ( who designed them ) direct or shop online right here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

Helmsdale Co are always ahead of the game in fly design.......

Here is one of our latest superb new designs which is constantly selling out, the RS SuperSquid and you can buy them here right now, just hit the button on a range of patterns - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/new-rs-supersquid-flaming.html

New seatrout killers like these, RS CDC Nightmare, these are unbeatable for hooking those nippy fish

We have stocked up again with many of your big fly favourites. Check some of them out from the list below.

Red Frances tungsten & copper tubes, 1", 0.5", 0.25"

Flamethrower Copper tubes 1" 0.75" & 0.5"

Pot bellied Pig tungsten and copper in Cascade, Willie Gunn and Black and Silver in 0.5" & 0.25"

Cascade Gold and silver doubles in 8s & 10s

Cascade Shrimp in 0.5" tungsten tubes

Baby TDs in aluminium 0.5"

Loads of superb Black and Yellow Monkeys in Copper, Aluminium and on Loop bottle tubes 0.25, 0,5 & 1"

Red Frances Gold doubles 10, 12, 14s

Scandi Cascade Green Butt and Red Butt Salar doubles in 9s & 11s

Willie Gunn Special copper tubes in 1" & 1.5"

Get stuck in before stocks are sold out again!

Tight lines

The Helmsdale has perked up a little recently with the last 2 weeks breaking into double figures. Regular David Macleod and his party had the best of w/c April 4th as he shared 4 super fish with daughter Kirsty Ann fishing Borrobol rods. John Sutherland added no 5 at the end of the week from Upper Carew on beat 2 below.The RS Solar Monkey took 4 of the 5 fish and the week ended with around 12 fish reported from the river as a whole.

Last week saw superb water and beat 6 started to prove it's worth providing most of the action as fish paused below the Falls of Kildonan. Fish are now running well over the falls and rods will soon start to focus heavily on the upper beats. Local Peter Macmillan finally got the Association water off the Mark landing a solid 10 pounder in sewerage pool on one of our deadly Alistair coneheads. The week ended with around 20 fish off.

Peter Macmillan with the first fish off the Association water

Our deadly Alistair conehead

Don't forget we have some great new flies online not just for the UK but for Russia, Scandinavia and Iceland who's fishing is about to explode into action again. Our new range of Solar Monkeys and SuperSnaelda are proving hugely popular as are our lethal SuperSquid doubles. May is only a short cast away, temperatures are slowly on the rise so we are fast approaching ( in my opinion ) the most exciting salmon fishing of the season. Big powerful fish will be entering all UK rivers and we have many options at our disposal to hook them as river temps hit the magic 50 degree mark. Look out for head and tailing fish which may be resting briefly and get your fly over them quickly, be prepared to strip a Sunray shadow tube if fish are around but seemingly uninterested in your standard offerings or fish short intermediate and slow sinking tips teamed up with conehead tubes or large doubles in Park Shrimp, Flamethrower, Cascade, Willie Gunn or our new SuperSquid. Classic floating lines will soon be the norm again as we try to cover large swathes of likely looking water with long slick casting so make sure you have your line cleaned and lubed up for the summer to keep your casting sharp.

As usual Ron personally welcomes calls for advice and he will make sure you are primed for action with the right kit and expert knowledge for your fishing trip or situation.

LAST MINUTE Rods are available on the river Forss this week - £40 per rod. If interested please contact, the water is up. Sat gone.

A better week on the Helmsdale has seen 9 off so far with some lovely fish in the teens of pounds and Achentoul rods have caught the first fish over the falls from Suisgil pool on beat 2 above. Hopefully this is the sign of a more significant run materialising.

However, the big news in salmon fishing recently was the capture of a huge fish from the Hampshire Avon. Mr Peter Fine fishing his Saturday rod got hold of and landed a monster measuring 48". The fish was finally estimated around mid forties and was caught in Edwards pool. After the excitement settled for Peter, he carried on fishing and duly landed another cracking 20 pounder on the same fly. The killer fly was an aluminium 1.5" Park Shrimp, how do we know this?, because Peter buys them from us!

Peters monster fish returned

The wee 20 pounder

The deadly Park Shrimp tube. You can buy them here right now - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/park-shrimp-aluminium-tube.html

Very little to say this week other than "where have all the fish gone"!? Amazingly Paul Smit fishing Kildonan rods is the only angler to land a fish so far this week, and a beauty it was. Lower Caen was the pool beat 1, RS Monkey conehead was the fly and the gleaming fish weighed in at 16lbs before release. The river was dropping settled and clear all week and good things were expected...thats fishing! 11 off the river so far, that's around 25 less than last year to same point.

Luckily I can brighten up the week with some awesome new flies we have designed and are unleashing on the fishing world! An amazing new range of RS SuperSquid doubles (5) and an RS Solar SuperSnaelda range (3). Read all about them individually by clicking through to our homepage right here - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

Our Solar Monkey range continues to out sell all other flies right now apart from the ever popular RS SuperSnaelda and that's what has given us the inspiration to add the Solar concept to some of our RS SuperSnaelda. These flies definitely work great, check out the bar of silver tempted below on the first Solar SS trial...

RS Cascade SuperSquid, No 1 in the range of these subtle "Intruder" style flies - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/new-rs-supersquid-cascade.html

RS Solar SuperSnaelda, No 1 in our new range of 3 with more to come - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/rs-solar-supersnaelda.html

Check out the Vid here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3KFJeMbngw

Solar SuperSnaelda instantly landed this bar of silver.

Best selling RS Solar Monkey - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/solar-monkey-black-yellow-pro-choice.html

Stop press!! 2 more fish taken today (Friday 11th ) from beat 5, Martin Grant Kildonan rods (Ewes Neuk ) and beat 6 10lbs Swirl pool Achentoul rods.

There are 8 fish off the Helmsdale. Richard Breakell landed the only fish last week (no 4, 10lbs) on Kilphedir pool at around 2ft. One of our Cascade Alistair Tiger Coneheads did the trick fished off a full intermediate - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/tiger-tail-cascade-alistair-c/h.html

Richards pristine springer from Kilphedir pool

This week has picked up slightly and another 4 fish have been recorded. Suisgill rods got the week off to a great start with a cracking 19lbs thumper from Lower Caen. Achentoul rods struck again in Oasis beat 3, Alan Shannahan 9lbs and on the same day regular visitor Andrew Thomas nailed a super 15.5 pounder, again from Lower Caen beat 1. Borrobol rods caught up with one in Poachers pool beat 4 to take the tally to 8. The river has been fairly settled all week around the 1ft mark with daily snowmelt keeping things very nicely topped up.

The Association water is yet to produce a fish, I have been dropping in during occasional lunchbreaks but no sign of life, it's just a matter of time as the water is in great shape as you can see from the pic.

Check out our homepage for the latest flies and rods on the market....The new Mackenzie and Loop SX are sure to take the market by storm! and see some of our new Grizzle Monkey flies (below ) which are flying off the shelves! http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/new-willie-gunn-grizzle-monkey.html

As usual, call us for that personal expert service....Ron will set you up with the best gear available and talk you personally through it. If the phones are busy please drop me an email and i'll get right back.

The team from Mackenzie DTX have teamed up with Professor Gary Savage, former Formula One World Team Champion and one of the world’s leading experts in carbon and composites to bring to market what has to be regarded as the most advanced fly rod ever made! With Professor Savage's help, Scott Mackenzie and his team have designed and built a world first - a fly rod incorporating a new super material called Graphene!

So what is Graphene? The Mackenzie FX1 flyrod is the first double-handed salmon rod to use Graphene, a Nobel Prize winning material that is set to revolutionise carbon-composite engineering. Discovered at the University of Manchester in 2004, Graphene is the strongest and stiffest material known to man. It is up to 300 times stronger than steel, even stronger than diamond, and 30 times stronger than Kevlar - the material used for bullet proof vests! Graphene recently revolutionised the tennis world after Head launched a new tennis racket using the material, now used used by Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic.

Single walled Graphene Nanotube                     Multi walled Graphene Nanotube

The way it is used in the manufacture of the Mackenzie FX1 blank is in the form of multi-walled carbon nanotubes - 1 atom thick sheets of hexagonally bonded carbon formed into tubes and added to a state of the art resin. Being 32 times stiffer than steel per unit mass. The sub-microscopic cylinders of carbon on a weight-for-weight basis are at least 120, and up to 300 times stronger than steel and 30 times stronger than Kevlar!

Scanning Tunnel Electron Micrograph of Graphene Nanotubes - red dots are carbon atoms!

Approximately 1/50,000th the width of a human hair, Graphene nanotubes can stretch considerably rather like plasticine before breaking, up to 14 percent of their normal length. Their aspect ratio (length/diameter) can be up to 130,000,000:1. To illustrate this, if we think of a carbon nanotube as a piece of spaghetti (typically 2mm in diameter) then, at this scale, the tube would be 66km long!

The Mackenzie FX1 rod blank is impregnated with this resin incorporating a weave of this new Graphene nanotube material. The rod flexes deeply during the cast and recovers quickly and powerfully. This fast recovery makes it easier to cast further with little effort, yet retains the 'feel' that is so important in a Salmon fly rod, especially if your casting is not on top form.

As well as being the first rod to incorporate Graphene, the blanks are produced using a further unique process where the blanks are cured inside a high pressure Auto Clave, a machine normally used to make parts for the F1 motor racing and aerospace industries. This extra process removes as much air as possible from between the carbon layers in the blank as it is cured that would normally remain trapped during the normal rod making process, creating a much stronger blank which means the FX1 rods are extremely strong and durable. With these new manufacturing processes, the new Mackenzie FX1 Graphene Salmon rods are at the forefront of global design and composite engineering using new materials and techniques currently being developed for aerospace applications 7 to 10 years in advance everyone else!

The Mackenzie FX1 range will be available from late-March and will initially include 13 ft 8 wt, 14 ft 9 wt and 15 ft 10 wt models, covering almost any situation the Salmon angler will find in the UK and abroad. The rods have been designed to handle all types of lines, from longer traditional Spey lines to short Scandi and Skagit style shooting-heads. The rods themselves are made in the UK, and feature the very best craftsmanship and fittings money can buy! Top grade Portuguese cork handles have been specially chosen and are made to a length and style to allow casters of all styles and abilities to use the rod in comfort.

Genuine Fuji SiC stripper rings with an ultra hard, ultra smooth, silicon carbide coating that will never wear and Titanium recoil snake guides that spring back into shape if knocked or bent grace the blank with smart orange tipped, gloss black whippings. A unique custom made ALPS down locking reel seat keeps your favourite reel securely in place. The finish on the FX1 Graphene blank itself features a self healing PTFE silicon coating meaning any scratches can simply be rubbed smooth, and with the addition of the Graphene resin system and high pressure autoclaving process that removes almost all the air from the blank, you wont find a better, stronger blank on the market today!

Helmsdale Co first fish competition for the Archie Foundation has now been won and has raised £602.50 for the Raigmore Childrens ward Highland Appeal. Many thanks to all the Anglers who donated. Robert Orr from Inverurie picked the correct pool (Upper Caen) and was drawn as the lucky winner of a superb new Loop Cross SX 14ft salmon rod.
Big thank you to Gordon Sim & Loop Europe for donating the prize.

http://www.looptackle.com/fly-rods/cross-sx-series/
https://www.justgiving.com/Ronald-Sutherland/

On the fishing front things are still quiet. We are stuck on 3 fish off, Alistair Jappy caught No 3 last Saturday in Upper Torrish for Badanloch rods at 9lbs. The fly was one of our Black & yellow Tigertail tubes 1" copper which you can buy here now - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/tiger-tail-black-yellow.html

The Brora river is off the mark with a 9lbs fish from the Magazine pool, North bank and there are odd fish off the Naver, Forss, Borgie and Shin and a few off Loch Ness and Morriston river. The Helmsdale Association water is looking good and with plenty availability there should be a fish off soon. A bottle of award winning Old Pulteny whisky and a £50 Angling Club voucher awaits the captor of this fish. There are a few Angling Club calendars left to be snapped up too and they are on sale at the tackle shop, stunning local pictures to grace any office...email us if you want one posted, cost £6 + postage.

The springers are in! No 2 came off on Monday 8th. Malcolm Fisher shows off a stunning 20 pounder from Upper Caen. He was fishing a Willie Gunn Bottle tube on Suisgill rods. Thurso Ghillie Pat Nicol was luckily on hand to net the fish and take a great pic before the fish was returned.

The Rev Eric Paterson from Golspie has once again had the pleasure of catching ( and returning ) the first fish off the Helmsdale river. Upper Caen pool was the spot ( again for Eric ) and his trusty RS Mylar Willie Gunn was the fly on a 1.5" copper tube. Eric was given the fly as a gift by local Sonny Jappy the day before and advised "that's the fly for tomorrow" Eric duly listened and swam it through his favourite spot on beat 1 where there was an obliging fresh run 7 pounder waiting to pounce.

Eric wins the the Simms primaloft Gore-tex jacket, Bridge Hotel trophy and a bottle of our fine local Clynelish.

We now have to work out who has all picked the pool where the fish was caught and draw the winner of our Archie Foundation competition. A top of the range Loop rod awaits the winner of that...

A delighted Eric Paterson with his first fish pic

Johnny (Hardy) Sutherland presents Eric with his prizes

The chrome tide fresh fish of 7lbs

Rs Mylar Gold Bodied Willie Gunn inhaled