River Dee Fishing Report – Week 28 commencing 3rd August 2026
Dee rods and ghillies enjoyed the first full week of August, landing 141 salmon and grilse. Sea trout catches improved too, with 23 reported compared with just six the previous week, including 11 on Friday alone.
“Much more like it” was the common refrain up and down the valley.
The weather played its part, which is not a common observation of mine. Cooler temperatures, plenty of cloud cover and the odd shower combined to produce favourable conditions that coincided with a welcome run of fish. Who could have predicted such outrageous fortune?
The week unfolded nicely. Monday opened with 11 salmon, rising to 16 on Tuesday before easing back to 10 on Wednesday. From there, catches gathered momentum. Twenty fish were reported on Thursday before the river really hit its stride, with 47 salmon landed on Friday and a further 37 on Saturday as fresh fish continued to enter the system.
Pleasingly, catches were well distributed across the lower and middle river. Lower Crathes, Banchory, Little Blackhall & Inchmarlo, Upper Drum & Lower Durris, Crathes Castle, Tilbouries & Middle Drum and several others all enjoyed improved sport, making for a much healthier spread of catches than we have seen in recent weeks.
With the welcome problem of too many successes and too little space to report them all, here are just a few of the week’s highlights.
Nicol Paton reports that his rods at Tilbouries and Birse were amongst the action once again.
“Tilbouries continued to fish well last week with success for our syndicate members and day rods. Graeme Bone managed a fish of around 8lbs on Friday and a sea trout. Local angler Mark Loch was very unlucky, losing two fish, while on Saturday regular visitor to the beat, Alan Ward enjoyed a fantastic day, landing three salmon including a very fresh fish. Alan also reported losing another two. At Birse, frustratingly, the rise trickled away very quickly. Nevertheless, we managed to tempt three grilse and a sea trout.”
Park enjoyed a very good week, accounting for 49 salmon. Proprietor William Foster noted:
“There were many highlights during the week. Summer regular John Lawson and his team all had fish, with David Solomon having a particularly productive time. Grant Faulds, fishing for salmon for the first time with regular rod Colin Maclean, landed two grilse on Monday before completing a hat-trick on Tuesday. All-season regular Neil Mitchell started the week with an 8lb fish from the Long Pool and continued to add salmon of 8–10lbs to the score sheet. Summer regulars Anthony Wood and Dave Mercer also enjoyed success, landing our first big fish of the season with salmon of 17lbs and 16lbs from the Upper Kirks and Durris respectively.
Friday was a red-letter day as every rod landed a fish. All-season regular Joe O’Sullivan finished with three grilse and two sea trout from the Upper and Lower Kirks. We landed 14 salmon and two sea trout for the day. It was a pleasure to see the rods enjoying such good sport; the Dee needs more weeks like this.”
Upper Blackhall reported six salmon, with success for Will Shropshire, Ben Richardson and Monty Randle from the Green Spout and Corner Pool. Nick Drake added a grilse and a sea trout, while regular rod Jim Lomax rounded off the week with a fresh 10lb salmon and a grilse on Saturday.
Chris White’s party enjoyed consistent sport at Dess, finishing the week with 11 salmon.
All in all, it was a good week. Nothing extraordinary, just the sort of steady late summer sport we have been hoping for.
Outlook
The coming week looks set to begin in a similar vein, with Monday and Tuesday remaining relatively cool and mostly cloudy. By midweek, however, high pressure is expected to strengthen, bringing temperatures back into the mid-20s on Wednesday and Thursday. There is some prospect of afternoon showers or thunderstorms later on Thursday before temperatures ease back towards more comfortable levels by Friday and into next weekend.
Whether enough rain falls to produce a meaningful lift in river levels remains the key question. At the very least, the cooler, cloudier conditions should prove more favourable than those we have endured recently, and last week’s improvement in catches should give rods plenty of encouragement.
The ghillies will each have their own thoughts on fly choice, but a selection of small dressed doubles, Silver Stoats, Crathies, small Cascades, Flamethrowers and similar patterns should cover most eventualities. Full floating lines and a range of polyleaders remain the basic staple.
As ever, listen to your ghillie.
Ross Macdonald