Storms were forecast to hit around midday do I headed over to the Mersey River for a quick spin session before it hit. Started of with the #1 Aglia furia and picked up a very tiny brown trout on the very first cast, it was that small I didn't bother to photographed it. The less these little trout are handle the better their survival rate is. From there I decided to head downstream for some three hundred meters and fish my way back upstream. As I made my way over a very rocky old back water I spotted a few cormorants fly over head which wasn't a good sign, then when I arrived to where I was about to start fishing two more of them took off from the edge of the river.

Then I headed the rumble of thunder in the distance s I though I had better get my act together and get stuck into flicking the Aglia Furia around.. It took two cast when I had my second trout on and soon in hand and back in the river, it was another little fish. Four casts later into the headwater I was onto another small brown, another cast back into that same piece of water saw my for small trout of the day taken on the Furia. These were only small browns, but it's better than nothing that's for sure. I headed a little further downstream and started casting the Furia up and across the river then letting it drift with the flow when a solid rainbow took the spinner. It put up a great fight all the way into the net, it was a beautifully coloured 'bow that went just on 410 grams.

After a quick photo it was soon back in the river. Form here I fished my way back upstream without seeing another fish for at least four hundred meters when I finally had a couple of follows from another rainbow. But it would take the lure, not only that the thunder was getting much closer and it had started raining so I decided to head back to the car.. On the way back I noticed a few small duns hovering above the water and small trout started jumping from the river trying to get hold of them. I made my way across the river and headed up a small steam the flowed into the Mersey, it was here I noticed a trout rise and sip something from the surface. I cast the lure a few feet past past where I spotted the trout and slowly retrieved the lure while keeping the rod tip high to keep the spinner close to the surface. It didn't take all that long when the Furia was taken by a solid medium size brown.

I took a punt on having a go at catching that brown too because normally when they're surface feeding they rarely take a lure. By keeping the spinner close to the surface was what did the trick on sucking that fish in. Like the rainbow it was back in the water in quick time after a quick photo. The rain had stopped as had the thunder, then the sun broke through making it quite steamy. It was still very black towards the North and the wind had picked up from that direction too. My mind was already made up, I kept heading back to the car and called it a day. It was a good decision, I just made it to the car when the sky opened up and the rain set in as did the lightning show.

Adrian Webb (meppstas)

Another small brown caught here

Rainbow trout falls to the Aglia Furia

Rainbow trout picked up here

Ready for release

Small brown caught here

Small brown trout