September salmon on the river Ayr

I recently wet a line on my home water on the river Ayr in hope of catching an end of season, or “back end”, Atlantic salmon. Disappointingly, my trip to Aberdeenshire to fish the river Dee had been cancelled due to the unseasonal high temperatures we saw in the UK at the beginning of the month. I was desperate to get out on the river, and with some much needed heavier rain arriving later in the month pushing river levels up, I knew this would start encouraging fish upstream from the estuary at Ayr and setting them on their spawning journey.

There had been reports of fish being caught on my beat at Mauchline & Ballochmyle as well as other beats further downstream so I was somewhat hopeful. With the SEPA river gage sitting at 0.3m at the village of Catrine, it was sounding like perfect fly water so I headed down to Ayrshire in the hope that the river wasn’t too coloured.

Feeling relieved that the water clarity was fine on my arrival, I setup with my single handed 10ft 7wt line, 5ft intermediate tip and a size 8 red single flamethrower pattern fly. I fished from Catrine downstream to just above the lower beat boundary at Barskimming bridge without seeing a single fish.

By now the rain had started and as I began to become increasingly soaked having my last few casts near the bridge before heading home, suddenly the line went tight and those initial surges of a decent fish ensued. It was the feeling that all salmon anglers chase year after year…