The first day of the New Year was a good day, bright and dry with some light wind at times. It was mostly dry and mild for the first week which continued for a bit after returning to work from holiday on the 7thÂ
The river level kept dropping back and was at a good height for the opening day of the rod fishing season, this turned out to be the best start to a season for a long time with some good spring fish being caught throughout the system.
We are seeing more of the seals on the river down on the estuary just now, they all seem to be doing alright for a feed making the most of the kelts that are dropping back down the system after spawning.
The otter, kingfisher and the dipper have been regular visitors to the burn behind the bothy, and we have seen a few flocks of Waxwings again along the Carse. Teal numbers are good in our area just now but Goldeneye and Redshank numbers are poor this year, we did have a sighting of a Woodcock on the 23rd and 16 snipe dropping onto the marsh on the 17th.
There was a bit of snow later on in the month but it soon shifted when it got a bit milder again. We got on with some routine maintenance of our kit in the workshop during the worst of the weather, with the saws and strimmers all getting a bit of a service.
Some more of the old nest boxes which had been blown down in the bad weather were also gathered up, repaired and given a lick of Cuprinol before being put back up in the woods again for the birds. Our old Ford tractor also got a bit of work done to it this month, with a drive shaft having to be replaced after the original one gave up on us!
Another job that was taken care of over the winter was a new stern being put onto one of our older rod cobbles; this work was carried out by Jim Davidson (retired) who was a boat builder with the Tay Salmon Fisheries Company in the 1950s.
By the end of the month we had a good show of snowdrops out in the wood, the last week saw the weather closed in; bringing heavy rain, gales and a good bit of spate out on the river.
This sort of weather always leaves some work for the chainsaws to tidy up after it!