Tim Small at Lechlade writes:
A Happy New Year to you all! I am sorry there has been such a delay since the last report, I managed to get away for two weeks over Christmas and have been paying for it ever since.
We still need a lot of rain this Spring to top up the water table but, despite only about half an inch of precipitation while I was away, the river has come right back up to near normal winter levels and the fish on the farm are now happy and feeding hard. We do get a certain amount of “compensatory growth” so they are piling on the weight. We are finding plenty of fish up to 20lb and some very nice, big brownies. Average size on Bushyleaze is well up and will be for some considerable time. Average size is going up on Lechlade with every day that passes and should be 7-8 pounds with a lot of much bigger fish. There are still some of last years brownies coming out, all in double figures.
The aeration is at long last turned off on the farm, that was costing us several thousand pounds a month. Mercifully, the weather was mild between Christmas and New Year and we saw plenty of anglers through the door. Thank you. A year ago we were frozen over. I was in Colorado for Christmas, clear sky’s and minus 20C but my fishing buddies still insisted I go out with them. We drove out to the middle of a 200-acre lake, along with about 40 other anglers, drilled a hole in 18in of ice and caught perfect, wild rainbows, about 12 ounces each, and one salmon! I thought this was probably going to be a very boring, silly past time, but it was very enjoyabale. There were custom built Winnebagos on the ice, with removable panels in the floor and all modern comforts! I was just as happy sitting on a cold box of beer in shirt sleeves! The enormous, occasional, huge cracking ice sound was a bit disconcerting but no one else seemed to take any notice! I was thinking I should have done this at Bushyleaze last year….Can you imagine the Health and Safety implications??!
The return of river flows here is slightly baffling but having observed Cotswold rivers and aquifers for nearly 40 years now there is a fairly plausible and interesting reason. The Cotswolds have two aquifers, the inferior oolite, which reacts pretty fast to rainfall, and the great oolite, which stores long term excess of rain. Cotswold geology is pretty strange and these two different layers actually reach the surface in different places because of geological formations, formed in the ice age. So, although the water table is still very depleted around here, a lot of the lakes and wells are way down, there are some rivers, fed by the great oolite, that are running well. This aquifer covers an area from The Welsh Mountains right over to the Alps. Who got buckets of rain over the Christmas period? The Welsh. Sadly, this aquaifer recedes very quickly in the Spring which is why we need so much “surface” water now but it is a blessing all the same. Both fisheries are still crystal clear, so I would imagine that the ‘Cotswold flow’ is still not there but temperatures and conditions mean the fish are hungry and happy and ready to play. Ideal for stalking and fish are more than happy to take dry flies on Bushyleaze. On the warmer days there have been plenty of hatches of buzzers.
You really should bag up if you come along, we are so top heavy on the farm that we are being very generous with our stocking, putting good amounts of fish in almost every day. Lechlade seems to be working well with short tailed, gold-head damsel nymphs. There is not a lot of fry bashing going on so small to medium sized nymphs are the order of the day. ‘H’ is still catching on semi submerged Daddys. You can have great fun on Bushy, using small dry flies. Buzzers, damsel nymphs and GRHE’s are all good too.
I will get back to regular monthly reports at the beginning of next month but here are the rather belated results for December:
Lechlade saw 415 Anglers catch 857 fish. 65% were between 6-8lb and 35% were between 10-13lb. Best fish went to Mr Corrigham at 14.4lb on Boxing Day and Mr Knight had a 14.3 Brownie early in December. (This month’s biggest is already at just under 17lb, for Mr Mason). There were several 40lb+ bags.
Bushyleaze saw 263 rods catch 1,075 fish, at an average of 3.5lb! To me that looks like everyone bagged up. There were a host of fish between 6-7lb.
Remember, if you go on to the website it is worth refreshing the pages, in case your computer has a memory. The online booking page has finally died a death, because of various legalities, but you can phone in and book in advance or order gift vouchers. There is still a calendar that shows the dates, on both waters, that we are closed.
We hope to see many of you soon and thank those of you who came over the Christmas period. Unless something horrendous happens, there will be no price increases this year. Tackle sales are well down so we may have some good offers coming up before the end of March. I am sure that our prices are competitive with other retail suppliers and most of the internet. Remember you get personal service and a proper back up if something goes wrong.
Hoping for a great year, We will look forward to seeing you.
Tight lines,
Tim, Rob, Ben and Charlotte ... and soon-to-be Beth, who will take over marketing and Corporate… and look after me!
