It may be summer but it did not feel like it on the river as far as the fishing was concerned. All rods struggled to find fish in a taking mood. Conditions were not the best but good water levels certainly made the river look very fishy indeed. A good spate on the Sunday set the river up as good as one could expect for the week ahead but things remained a little unsettled and thundery. A few grilse were indeed caught and spotted but they were very few and far between.

Achentoul rods bumped into a pod on beat 6 Tuesday and landed 2, lost 3, they were well conditioned fish of 3 & 4 lbs. The rest of the week remained rather uneventful and no fish to my knowledge were caught on the Association water. However, Saturday produced a few and took the tally up to around 35 for the week. It's quite unseasonable right now with a clear gap between the last of the late springers and better summer fish and the arrival of the grilse run. 

Prospects for next week should be reasonable as long as the rain holds off and fish come in but the forecast is telling us different. Low pressures are lined up to hit once again from the West on Monday/Tuesday and the river is sure to rise at some point again. Midweek is cooling down markedly with the wind backing Northerly and another deluge looks set to hit on Friday.

So, in the event of little action to report from the river I have some superb new flies to show you to perk up the viewing and spirit here! We have designed some awesome looking new RS Tiger flies just in time for the summer run (hopefully). The double version of these flies have been tied on the famous Loop doubles for ultimate strength and hooking power. Green & blue are big colours abroad especially in Iceland, Norway & Russia and now even the Swedes are hammering Baltic salmon on these colours. Don't forget that blue and green flies have caught many huge fish over the years in the UK, Green Highlander and Silver Wilkinson were big favourites for decades and should not have fallen out of fashion... These cutting edge new takes on the old themes make for very aggressive looking flies and the fish hit them hard! We hope you like them, you can buy them here right now - http://www.helmsdalecompany.com/

RS Kola Tiger Blue tube

RS Kola Tiger Green tube

RS Kola Tiger Blue Loop double

RS Kola Tiger Green Loop double

Another pic of one of our other deadly tubes, the Cascade Alistair. as you can see, fish inhale them well!