Last Saturday saw the second angling Open Day on the Peeblesshire Trout Fishing Associations waters, the event being successfully held for the first time last year. The purpose of the day is to collect catch record data for the Upper Tweed and, having now held the event two years running, it is hoped that it will become a regular annual event which will help to provide a long-term data set for the area.
Catching at Holylee

Sixteen anglers participated this year, with a good mix of Tweed locals and visiting anglers from different parts of Scotland and Northern England. The Peeblesshire Trout Fishing Association kindly provided complimentary day tickets for the anglers. The Tweed Foundation's Tweed Trout & Grayling Biologist, Kenny Galt, was on hand throughout the day to collect the results and interpretation is shown below.

The 16 anglers fished for a total of 96 hours within the Peeblesshire Trout Fishing Association waters in overcast, low water conditions.


Another angler fishing on the picturesque Holylee beat on Upper Tweed

Results

55 Undersize trout (under 20cms) were caught
34 Oversize Brown Trout (over 20cms, or 8") were caught
6 Grayling were caught

The biggest Brown Trout was 41cms
The biggest Grayling was 48cms
The best catch of the day was 6 Brown Trout over 20cms, 4 Grayling and 12 undersize trout

Kenny noted, "Despite the fishing seeming to be difficult at times, the average catch per angler was higher than last year mainly because the catch of trout over 20cms was higher, although most of these additional fish were between 20 and 25cms (8" - 10")."

He continued, "Although the above table is just a summary, the catches are also starting to provide particularly good fish size data that can be compared with other parts of the Tweed system."

It is hoped that, in addition to the Peebles event being a regular one, this type of survey can be carried out later this year in other areas of the Tweed and, if you'd like to register your interest in participating in future events, please email Kenny Galt at:

kgalt@tweedfoundation.org.uk