Born to Fish Forced to Work

By Roger Beale

The 2012 season saw 1384 Wild Brown Trout caught to the Born to Fish boat in Caithness and Sunderland.
This is the sporting and working story of Roger’s 70 years of fly fishing that started at Glenforsa, the Isle of Mull in the west of Scotland in 1942, then moving to Africa Rhodesia Brahman cattle farming with some extraordary duck shooting. Then a fly fishing school and lodge in the west of Ireland and now in Caithness today enjoying the best wild trout fishing he has found in 70 years.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Roger Beale
• Release date: Feb 17, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301303984

Roger Beale

Born in Essex, educated at Ampleforth College, Yorkshire, brought up at Glenforsa, Isle of Mull, went to Rhodesia Cattle Ranching until 1984. Then started the Practical Fly Fishing School in Connemara, Ireland. Later Started Old-Print.com Limited with Brenda as their retirement fund. Now at Glenforsa, Halkirk, Caithness where the wild trout fishing is the best he has had in 70 years of fly fishing.PostscriptI found this interesting article in one of old-print’s books from 1897 as you will see the casting method for fly fishing has not changed in one hundred years.

Book preview

*****

Born to Fish

Forced to Work

By Roger Beale

*****

Copyright © 2012 Roger Beale

All rights reserved. ISBN:

Smashwords Edition

Formatting services provided by

Mother Spider Marketing at

http://www.motherspider.com

*****

Dedication

This book is dedicated to all the friends who have fished with me over the last 70 years in Scotland and Ireland. Sadly many have passed on but they were able to impart to me many years of their experiences.

*****

Contents

Acknowedgements

Prologue

1942-1952 Glenforsa

1952-1983 Rhodesia

Holidays out of Africa

Douneish, Ireland

Glenforsa, Caithness

Wild Trout Management

NIWF Fly Fishing Lesson

Helpful Links

Tight Lines

About The Author

*****

Acknowledgements

To all my fishing partners today who put up with me for many days each season. And to my wife Brenda, whose support at home allows me to take so many days off work to go fishing.

*****

Prologue

Well, the 2012 fishing season is finished now in Caithness and Sutherland. It was a cold season with very little fly life, which made us work hard for our wild trout. Despite this, we had 1384 wild brown trout in our boat. The fish were 10" or better; the best was 6lb 2oz, with another of 2lb 12oz, several more over the 2lb mark and many over 1lb .

I fished with several partners, all of whom have contributed to the boat’s total.

My thanks go to my wife Brenda and the others (in no specific order) – Jim Linton Orkney, Kenny Mackenzie and Alistair Taylor from Thurso, David Bond and Gordon Warren from Halkirk, Charlie MacNeil from Lairg and Anna Mayer from Ullapool. Last but not least, our octogenarian, Peter Bryan from Jersey

Fishing for 111 days, starting on March 15th and ending on October 6th, the following four lochs were fished in Caithness with the Dounreay Fly Fishing Association: Calder, Watten, Sempster and Seilge (Big House Estate). Lochs also in Caithness include Ruard (Latheron Estate) and Toffingal (Hugo Ross). In Sutherland we fished Ruthair (Archentoul Estate) and Seltill; and Lier and Coal from the Forsinard Hotel.

Mostly we were fishing an intermediate tip line known as the NIWF BUG Tip designed by myself to make casting easier in any of the winds we have in Caithness or Sutherland.

We also were using five wet flies on a cast with the top fly tied directly to the loop in the braid at the end of the line.

This top fly on the braid, just 5-6 inches from the line, accounted for more than 50% of the wild trout we caught.

This shows that wild brown trout are not gut shy and there is no need to use long and difficult-to-handle leaders.

Also the nylon used most was MAXIMA Chameleon 10lb, which does not make too many tangles even in a 20mph wind! A 10’ or a 10’6" rod completes the tackle used. For comfort we had conference chairs in the boat, thus enabling the angler to sit broadside to the action – usually two in the smaller boats with three chairs and anglers in the larger boats on the lochs. This extra comfort allows the angler to concentrate on the fishing, being less tired and more alert when a wild trout takes on the top.

What you have just read is really the end of this book; the end of the story of my Fishing, Shooting and Farming life spanning some 77 plus years.

My aim is to try to instill as much pleasure in fly fishing in my readers as I have enjoyed over the 70 years of my fly fishing experiences.

*****

1. 1942-1952 Glenforsa

It all started when I was seven years old. My first sporting memory was being led, wading, across the Forsa River at dusk by my father. My father had taken me hind stalking on the Glenforsa Estate that cold January day in 1942.

He had killed his hind but I do not remember much about the stalk, only the river crossing on the way home. The water was very cold and well over my little knees. The rifle he had borrowed from Colonel Gardine, who was the owner at that time, was a double-barrelled .303; I cannot remember the maker’s name, though. My clear memory of this rifle must reveal the beginning of my interest in sporting guns.

We, the whole family, were spending the Christmas holidays at the Salen Hotel on the Isle of Mull, while Father was negotiating and inspecting the Glenforsa Estate before he purchased it, hence the days of hind stalking.

I had to return to school at the end of the holidays to Gilling Castle, the preparatory school for Ampleforth College in Yorkshire.

By the Easter holidays, the family was in residence at Glenforsa House, with the whole estate of 15000 acres for a seven-year- old boy to run around on. What a delight that was for me; and it seems that it shaped my life from then on as I developed an interest in fishing, shooting, stalking and farming.

This record of my life will be mostly about fly fishing, which I am still actively pursuing 70 years later. My shooting days were over when I left Rhodesia in 1984, and I shot my last stag in 2008 with 52 years between the last two stags. Farming I left in 1984 when I sold my interest in R B Ranchers before leaving Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia, for Connemara on the west coast of Ireland for more fishing.

My father, Roy Beale was a grocer, running the family business, Green Stores with 110 shops around the city; he commuted most weekends from London to Mull. Mother, Isabelle was a full-time mother to us all; George, Ann, John, Roger and Walter. As we grew up, I was the only one taking full advantage of the sporting facilities of the estate and the only one to take up fishing.

I had a large number of uncles and aunts and many cousins who all seemed to invade Glenforsa during the school holidays. I remember sitting down in the dining room with 18 of us at the table. The children had to take turns in the daily chores, with 18 places to lay at the table and all the washing up afterwards.

In August 1942, Father had guests to stay and one of them was Monsignor Canon Bickford, who was a keen fisherman, and it was he who lent me one of his rods and showed me how to fish. The rod was a hardy 6’ split cane and it was set up as a dry fly outfit. So I started dry fly fishing, a habit that carried on for the next 25 years. It was a slow start as it was five days before I caught my first little trout, but from then on I was hooked!

The Forsa River was a typical highland spate salmon river and not conducive to trout, although our keeper