Magical Menteith - 6 Flies And A 4 Day Average Of 26 Fish (2024)

Scotland's Lake Of Menteith is one of my favourite waters, as it always seems to offer every style of fly fishing on offer, dries, nymphs, lures. All tactics seem to consistently work here at the correct time of year to fish it.

The week was set for me to take 4 different anglers out fishing, and hopefully get a fish or two to the boat - This we certainly did, as our daily average was 23 fish.

I was extremely fortunate to get near tropical Scottish weather, with temperatures in the low 20's for all 4 days., and a consistent wind direction. This was the perfect set up I needed, as I new when seeing the forecast, things should be good !

I had set up 3 rods for each day, covering all methods I suspected would work, as well as some information gathering before my arrival. A fast glass line with a Flash Attack Neon Fab, and 3 diawl bachs, a floating line with a 4 cast buzzer set up, then a dry fly rod setup, with a single cul.

We started off at the Rookery, and my first cast with the fast glass, bought an arm wrenching take on the Neon Fab. This was followed by another quick fire take, and fish. It soon became apparent the fish were taking the fly, seconds after it landed, suggesting only one thing, the fish wanted the fly high in the water. This remained the case for the rest of the week.

Other areas we fished, The Plantation, Marlon Shore, Sam's Point, International Bay, all followed the same theme, fish wanted the fly within the top couple of feet.

The fast glass soon became a thing of the past, as the floating line soon became the perfect line, presenting the flies higher in the water. Tactics were now, a booby on the point, with a team of size 12 Diawl Bachs up the cast. Thanks to an earlier tip off from Ross Wilson, a Flash Attack UV/Black booby had worked well for him, so this was my first port of call for my point fly. Though I had buzzers ready to go on one rod. a few chucks soon told me, these were quite simply going to deep, so the cast was stripped, and another Diawl Bach set up, with the Neon fab on the point, was set up.

You could have been lured into thinking dry flies, as fish were moving all day. Though I had heard dries had been doing well, and others had caught well on dries that same week, for me, the fish were feeding just under the surface on many occasions, and not off it, and having switched to dries numerous times throughout the days, the fish were just not as keen to take it off the surface, as they appeared to be, just under the surface !

As we moved through the days, a similar pattern was occurring. Washing line set up would take fish instantly, and consistently, with all flies working. As the day moved on, switching the booby for a Neon fab, dropping the flies a little further down, kept the fishing consistent, and when things slowed off a little more, as the sun got higher, and it really warmed up, replacing the booby or fab, with a size 10 Lexus Legend Diawl Bach, kept the catch rate going, once more The fish were certainly dropping down a little mid afternoon.