2018 04 27 2 Leven River 2 45 kgs 6256 headHit the Leven River again this morning and had a great start to the spin session. On my last trip here I had a follow and a few hits from one very nice large and solid brown. I was a little worried that day as I thought had he taken it and done the crocodile roll I would see the fine 4 lb mono giving way. It's not so much as the line breaking, it's the knot where it will break as that's the weakest point. Even it it didn't roll the size of that fish was enough to test out the knot any way.

Today I went back to the same area where I had seen that large brown, this time I have a 6 lb leader set up to the little GagaGoon MI Perch hard body lure. It wasn't all that long when that large brown came out from a shallow flat water (a little further upstream from last time here) and had three goes at the lure and like the other day it missed taking the lure.. I watched the big bugger move off and went in behind a large rock in the river. I couldn't see him at all after that so I decided to cast the lure downstream past the rock then slowly retrieve the lure up past where I felt it was sitting.

As the lure passed the rock I saw the fish appear and I watched it slowly move in on the lure, it was then I stopped my retrieve and let the suspending lure drift back a little bit before slowly moving it forward as well as giving it a light twitch.. That's when the brown took it and all hell let loose, it was off in one big rush and took off downstream taking plenty of line with it. Now I'm out there in the middle of the river in the fast water and wondering if I'm going to land this beautiful brown. With the adrenalin running pretty high I just kept enough pressure on it and slowly edged my way to the shallow and more open side of the river. It took around five minutes before I finally felt I was in control of this fish & now had it in close enough to slip the net under it.

My only problem now was that I only had my small shallow net with me and this fish will not fit in it.. Any way I slipped the net under it and it did lay in the net for a few seconds before playing up and jumping out & back into the river where it took off once more. It wasn't all that long before it eventually tired and I eased it onto the river bank.. A couple of quick photos of this beauty, then I laid it in the net and it stayed still long enough to weigh it, I placed it back in the river and made sure it was okay before watching it slowly swim off.. It was my best trout taken in a river for the season and my PB for this river.. It went 2.45 kgs ( 5lbs 6ozs ) after deducting the weight of the landing net.

I didn't care if I caught another trout after catching that fish as that was enough to make my day, one of the best this season. I put another GagaGoon MI Perch lure on due to the rear treble hooks being damaged on the one that caught this brown...It took me another thirty five minutes before I caught another trout, this one was a solid 480 gram brown and like the trout of a few days ago it was in the best of condition.. Shorty after I picked up another brown and not long after that one I had my forth trout of the morning in the net. I had reached the end of the fast water so it was time to head back to the car and try another fast water stretch further upstream.

I passed a small back water near where I was about to get out of the river so I flicked the lure into it and picked up a small 280 gram brown in it. Once I reached the other area I was to fish I had a twenty minute walk to where I was to enter the river and start my next spin session in the river. The first cast resulted in a quick hook up but lost it as it leapt from the river, than a few casts later I picked up a nice 510 gram brown. From here on and over the following hour & a half all I managed was three more trout from four hook ups as well as having a few hits & misses. With nine browns caught & released and catching my best brown trout for the season it was a pretty reasonably few hours spent in the Leven River today.

Adrian Webb


2018 04 27 2 Leven River 2 45 kgs 6256

Leven River 2 45 kgs

 

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