Salmon Fishing Scotlands Spate Rivers

Click the names for more details on each. Borgie - one of the most attractive of all the highland streams. It flows into Torrisdale Bay, two miles west of the Navar. Naver - One of the North's best salmon rivers, but very difficult to get onto. Halladale - The Halladale is about 15 miles long and rises just to the north east of Kinbrace. It is a spate river and fishing is mostly for salmon although there are some trout lochs within the catchment. After a lean time in the s the river now averages about salmon a year. The Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar, run most Scottish rivers of any size, making their way from the marine feeding grounds in the North Atlantic into Scotland's rivers and upstream to reach the spawning redds by late autumn, covering distances of hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles, often against the odds, through strong flows, rough rapids and barely surmountable waterfalls in the process, hence its Latin name Salar, the "leaper".

The salmon runs in Scotland, i. Some Scottish rivers begin their fishing season as early as mid January, while most have started by mid February.

Book Fishing

Some salmon rivers, for example the River Spey, close at the end of September, while others, e. The majority of Scotland's salmon fishing rivers are open until the end of October.

• Salmon Rivers.
• Fishing For Scottish Salmon.
• .
• Spring Salmon Fishing Scotland - Scotia Fishing!
• Freedom!

Scotland offers the visiting salmon angler a good choice of fishing, on rivers of varying character and size, most offering excellent fly fishing water at varying times of the season. Many of Scotland's smaller rivers will rely on summer rain to bring salmon in from the sea, while others may have to wait till September or October for the main salmon run. Salmon fly selections available online from Grays of Kilsyth.

Salmon Fishing in Scotland

Salmon and sea trout fishing rights on Scottish rivers and lochs are generally owned and managed by sporting estates or other riparian owners and regulated through District Salmon Fishery Boards. A good deal of Scotland's salmon fishing including, incidentally, much of the coastal saltwater salmon and sea trout fishing , is owned by the Crown Estates, some of it let to angling associations.

Some salmon beats are let through fishing hotels.

A national rod licence is not required in Scotland. So salmon fishing in Scotland may be accessible through private let, in conjunction with hotel accommodation or by purchasing a permit from an angling association or fishing club by the day, week or season. The best of the salmon fishing is generally very expensive, let to long term tenants or retained for the private use of the owners. Then it's down into the valley of the great river Spey.

Salmon Fishing - North of Scotland

All the while, though, on that long journey northwards, the traveller is perhaps unaware of the hidden treasures, the many salmon rivers, large and small, which lie to left and right, unseen from the busy roads. The following pages will try to uncover some of those hidden treasures, those rivers and streams that lie just a little way off the beaten track.

With the aid of detailed maps, I hope to give useful information on the salmon rivers of Scotland, large and small. I have organised the information as best I can by dividing the country, as shown on the map, into four main regions - North, Central, South and the Islands. Like the child in the sweetshop, though, the salmon angler in Scotland is faced with a difficult choice. The detailed maps on this website have been reproduced with the permission of Collins Bartholomew. In addition to the information provided here, I would recommend that anyone planning a fishing or walking trip in Scotland should equip themselves with a compass and the appropriate Ordnance Survey map.

The most useful of the O.

For each of the lochs and rivers listed here, I have given the relevant O. For a comprehensive guide to fishing on the lochs and rivers of Scotland, I would recommend that you invest in a copy of Bruce Sandison's excellent book:. Size isn't everything in salmon fishing. Those who find the large Scottish rivers like Tweed and Tay a bit daunting, who prefer the intimacy and variety of the smaller streams, will find much that appeals in the north.

While there are some sizeable rivers like the Conon and Beauly, whose flow regime is now moderated by Hydro-electric schemes and therefore less dependent on rainfall, sport on most of the northern spate rivers of Scotland is very dependent on summer rain to bring salmon in from the sea.