If you've been monitoring the river level, you'd have been quite bored as it hadn't changed from 30+ for quite a while, until Thursday. Then it suddenly dropped, rather like a pothole in the road, with which you'll be very familiar, down to 22/23 cm. No doubt this was because they switched off the pumped water from Bewl (which comes in at the top of Beat 2a), as a result of the heavy rain the night before, and presumably because the Medway was quite full enough without its input from the Teise. Happily, the level is back up to 30+ again as of yesterday evening.
I was fishing Beat 3a on Thursday, so it made it a little more interesting, but it was still fishing fairly well. I managed a couple of Rainbows on Alpaca nymphs, though one got away as I was unhooking it, but I had taken the water temperature earlier, and as it was 17.1 degrees, the Rainbow would not have had a problem being returned. Indeed, I watched him feeding again in the same small pool about 15 minutes later.
I check the temperature as part of the monthly water testing at Harpers Footbridge, under the Angling Trust's Water Quality Monitoring Network. I'm happy to report no adverse measurements during the past year, unlike the Medway's Grom tributary which seems to have all sorts of problems. I'm conscious that some other members probably test the river temperature as well from time to time, so it would be very interesting to hear the results when you do, so that we can keep a good handle on that aspect of the river. Do email me at teiseaoa@gmail.com if you'd like to send in your readings, or indeed any other comments or tips, or why not just put the reading in your Catch Return? It all helps.
Talking of helping, we've had a lot of complimentary comments about the great work done on 2a recently, so it's nice to know it's appreciated.
Tight Lines
Peter
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