A Day with Stan Headley for 'Trout & Salmon'
In late July 2010, I took Stan Headley out for the day on Loch Eye for a feature for Trout & Salmon magazine (we even made the cover!). It's a bit of a cliché but when describing the loch to others, we often say that the fishing can be dour for long periods, and then it's as if someone turns the light switch on and there are fish everywhere. After a very quiet first couple of hours that day I was about to invoke Plan B with a move to another drift, when suddenly things started to happen…!
Over the next few hours, we experienced some terrific fishing to the wets. Nothing so unusual in that. What was different though was that we had a photographer in the boat to record everything – well at least until he had got all the shots he needed, and started fishing himself.
In all, we caught around 23 lovely wild brownies (things got a bit hectic, so this is plus or minus), of which 13 were over 1¼ lbs. We lost a few as well; a fish of about 3 lbs comes to mind that I tried to ‘tail walk’ for the camera with a less than successful outcome – no photo & no fish! R.D.
Read the full article: The Trout & Salmon Magazine feature is available for Download here (PDF format 2.5MB).
Click on any image to see a larger version in a 'pop-up window'.
| 10:50 a.m. |
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A late start to the day, but we're now fishing. Nice wind from the West (WNW), a nice wave too, but a bit bright. A couple of good fish swirled away from the boat, but otherwise it was quiet and we only caught a few small fish in the morning. © Chris Gregory |
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| 12:46 p.m. |
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Chris our photographer joins Stan (& his dog) and myself in the boat - cosy. The cloud rolls in, and grey overcast conditions prevail. At last, the first decent rod-bender as Stan hooks up. © Chris Gregory |
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| 12:47 p.m. |
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Fish 1, safely in the net. There's no close up of this one though as the first decent brownie of the day was laid out on Stan's tackle box for a pic, but then decided it had had enough, flapped and found its way back into the loch! © Chris Gregory |
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| 13:10 p.m. |
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Fish 2 (probably 3 actually as I thought Stan landed the first 2 fish). © Chris Gregory |
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| 13:47 p.m. |
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Fish 3 - I can't believe we waited over half an hour for this next fish? Maybe nothing met our photographer's high standards! © Chris Gregory |
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| 13:47 p.m. |
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Fish 3 - what a belter this one was though! And a great photo. © Chris Gregory |
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| 13:47 p.m. |
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Fish 3 - another great photo. © Chris Gregory |
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| 13:55 p.m. |
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Fish 4 - another pretty fish. © Chris Gregory |
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| 14:30 p.m. |
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Fish 5 - another for Stan. Did we stop for lunch before this? © Chris Gregory |
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| 14:44 p.m. |
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Fish 6 - coming to the net. © Chris Gregory |
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| 14:44 p.m. |
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Fish 6 - an amazing photo! No prizes for spotting that's a Loch Ordie! © Chris Gregory |
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| 14:45 p.m. |
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Fish 6 - and here it is. © Chris Gregory |
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| 15:00 p.m. |
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Fish 7 - another fantastic shot. © Chris Gregory |
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| 15:00 p.m. |
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Fish 7 - In the net... © Chris Gregory |
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| 15:01 p.m. |
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Fish 7 - ... and in the boat. © Chris Gregory |
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| 15:13 p.m. |
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Fish 8 - Aha! Here's our photographer Chris Gregory with his hands on his personal best wild brown trout. Under the supervision of his guide (and stand-in photographer) he had hooked but lost a very similar fish just 5 minutes earlier. © TroutQuest |
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| 15:26 p.m. |
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Fish 9 - Terrific shot! Not absolutely sure if we landed this one, because just a minute later... © Chris Gregory |
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| 15:27 p.m. |
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Fish 10 - ... maybe we had a double hook up, it's definitely a different fish (& fly) - it's all just a blur! © Chris Gregory |
All photos provided courtesy of Chris Gregory Photography
