LOCH SALMON-FISHING. 3*75 



The size and colour of salmon-flies do not vary nearly so 

 much in lochs as in rivers. One reason no doubt is, that there 

 are fewer changes in a loch ; another, that the loch season is 

 generally shorter. I have often found red palmers, or a red 

 body with " blae " wing, very acceptable to salmon in small 

 lochs ; in large lochs a green body and darker wing is a killing 

 fly ; but every tolerable fisherman ought to be able to find out 

 the fly of the water he frequents ; and if a stranger, he must 

 trust a good deal to his fishing guide. There is often a loch- 

 fly, which, take the season from end to end, you kill most 

 heavy fish with ; and yet there are many whole days in the 

 same year when that fly will be rejected for another very un- 

 like it. Neither is it a necessary consequence that the most 

 killing fly of one year should be also the most successful of 

 the next. On the contrary, I have experienced a complete 

 change in the favoured fly of the season, not only in lochs, but 

 in rivers. 



The most deadly fly of the river Falloch altered every season 

 of the three years I rented it ; and although a large minnow 

 was eagerly dashed at, both by white trout and heavy loch 

 ones which ascended from Loch Lomond, yet I invariably 

 fixed all the largest sea-trout with fly and the lightest tackle I 

 dared risk. A grilse -rod and the finest gut made a Falloch 

 trout of from 4 to 7 Ib. a good substitute for a 15 or 20 Ib. 

 salmon with ordinary tackle. The best Falloch run I had was 

 with a 4J-pounder hooked by the belly-fin. I had almost to 

 swim before landing him. 1 



The heaviest Falloch sea-trout taken by me were from 5 to 

 upwards of 7 Ib. ; but I have frequently captured them in 

 Loch Baa from 9 to 12 Ib. Like salmon, none of these Loch 

 Baa monsters ever ascended the feeding burns, although in 

 autumn one stream near the top of the loch was full of sea- 

 trout from 1 to 3 Ib. weight. My son, then a lad, used to 



1 In the autumn of 1863, my last season on the Falloch, I landed twenty 

 trout of an aggregate weight of 60 Ib. 



