Lost in time

With my annual august trip to south Uist only a matter of weeks away, preparation was in full swing. I cleaned all my rods, reels and fly lines. Fly boxes double checked and a plan put together to re tie the ones that had seen better days. And—possibly—come up with the latest killer pattern.
Then, a quick phone call to South Uist ghillie Ian Kennedy to find out how his season had been going soon swung round to the topic of flies!

Ian Kennedy

Now, for anybody who may not know who Ian is, he is the son of the late captain John Kennedy. John is the author of 70 lochs: a guide to fly fishing in South Uist. He’s the mastermind behind the clan chief, machair claret and green french partridge flies. John also took over the management the South Uist estates fishing in 1984. He ran it successfully through the Lochboisdale Hotel for around 25 years. The Kennedys may be regarded by some as fly fishing “royality” in the outer hebrides. Ian proceeded to tell me about one of his father’s flies that had resurfaced recently. It had fallen out of “fashion” and never quite took the same “grip” of fly fishing scene as the afore mentioned.

The Tartan

It’s a fly designed for salmon and sea trout loch style fishing. It’s copper bodied with golden pheasant topping tail. This is a leggy pattern, with a peacock Blue neck head hackle and dyed red guinea fowl. It has everything that makes for a good Uist pattern.The fly had been named the “Tartan” and an original that had been tied by john possibly around 30 years ago had been produced from a fly box by one off Ian’s regular clients. Ian reminisced on how successful this fly had been and that he had retied the pattern for his own box and had been catching well on it. This had me on the edge of my chair. Ian follows firmly in the foot steps of his father and anything he talks about should be listened to. 

We agreed that Ian would send me a photo of the tartan for closer inspection. With loch Fada, one of South Uist’s premier salmon and sea trout lochs on my rota, I set about whipping up a few.

Tying Them Up

As most fly tiers will agree, there’s very little that hits the scene that stands out as being dramatically different or something that will revolutionize our fly tying or the way we fish our flies. Most new patterns are merely an adaptation of something else. Possibly a change in color, the addition of hopper style “legs” or something as simple as adding jungle cock to a fly to change its look. One thing is for sure though—as fly tiers we will still continue to try and reinvent the wheel.

One thing that struck me about the Tartan was its copper tinsel body. This got me thinking! Had I ever caught a fish on a copper tinsel body fly? I have on silver, gold, and various hues of holographic tinsel, but never on a copper body. In reality, this is possibly just due to the fact I’ve never really tied any copper bodied flies. There are several flies out there that look similar to the tartan, however, let’s not forget this pattern is 30+ years old.

The prestigious history of this fly had lit a fire in my belly. A determination to succeed with this fly grew strong within me.
Apart from adding a claret palmered body hackle to the fly, I had kept it as close to the original pattern Ian had showed me.

Fishing The Lochs

My fishing companion Brian and I arrived in South Uist on the Saturday, the following day saw us afloat on Dun an Cillie. This turned out to be a very success day with over 20 countable trout to the boat. Monday was grogarry, my favorite of all the estate Machair lochs. Indeen, another day finished with a double figure haul of fish to nearly 3lbs. With Tuesday being a slow day with not a great deal to show for our efforts on upper Kildonan, we were keen to get on Fada the following day.

Loch Fada

Loch Fada is part of the howmore system. The river howmore runs for around 500 yds before splitting to the left and heading to the east through school, castle and then finally into druidibeg. Historically not many people have fished the river. This may be because it’s short and the lochs are more prolific. The right split heads south west into roag. One end has the roag burn that connects to upper roag, the opposite a short channel and causeway to Fada.

We agreed to meet Ian Kennedy on the Wednesday morning at the entrance to the field we would be crossing to reach Fada. This is where owning a VW campervan has its downsides. Rough terrain would make the short trip across the field difficult in the van. So, we loaded up Ian’s 4×4 with our gear. On arrival at the boat station we were met by a stiff breeze of around 20mph coming from the south, things were looking good!

Rigging Up

I tackled up with my 10’ #6 sage R8 and Rio Gold floating line. To that I attached a leader of Fulling Mill Masterclass Fluorocarbon in 10.7 lb around 16 ft in length with a 3 fly cast. Then, a Willie Gunn Muddler on the top, a leggy teal blue and silver in the middle and the Tartan on the point.
We motored up into the wind and Ian positioned the boat above the west bay, a well known hot spot. Ian himself has had sea trout to 12lbs in this area. We hugged the rocky banking closely making short casts and dibbling the top dropper through the waves. As we entered the opening of the west bay my line pulled tight and i was in! Would it be on John Kennedy’s forgotten pattern? Not this time! A lively sea trout around 2.8lbs had taken the leggy teal blue and silver in the middle. It was played hard and brought to hand quickly. The fish looked like it had been in the system for possibly around 10 days. Most likely it came in on the last lift in water. we carried on and drifted out the west bay, seeing a few large sea trout moving but not connecting to anything else.

Moving Locations

With the wind picking up we decided to move to the far end off the loch into an area know as valentines bay. Several years ago I had connected with a very large sea trout here only for it to break me off. Again we hugged the rocky shoreline stripping our flies quickly as the boat guided by Ian was pushed along in a wind now topping around 25mph. It was Brian’s turn this time as he lifted into another decent sea trout. A fish of around 2.4lb that took his top dropper teased through the waves.

We carried on down the east shore and into the burn mouth. Again we had seen a few very large sea trout moving. It felt it was only a matter of time before one of us would connect with one. As we reached the weed bed on the east bay a fish crashed through the waves hunting down my well greased muddler. Another solid sea trout graced the bottom of the boat after a short spirited fight. We felt sure this was another fish that had come in just over a week ago. I was now sitting at a 2 out of 3 score on my cast with the Tartan still to prove its worth.

With the wind still picking up and at times probably pushing around 30mph we made several more drifts around the west side off the loch with Brian picking up another decent sea trout over 2lbs and with time ticking away we decided to head back over to the weed bed on the east bay. This proved to be a good move.

Lost In Time

First drift and the water erupted as I hung the flies close to the boat. It was clear from the start this was a much better fish as it tore off heading across the loch. All of a sudden, it swung round and heading south, taking all my fly line and some of the backing. Ian spun the boat round to face the fish as it made several leaps to show us its size. It put up a tremendous battle before Ian slipped the net under our prize. It was a beautiful hebridean sea trout of just over 4lbs. But the icing on the cake was it had taken the tartan on the point. The fly “lost in time” had proved its worth and produce the goods.

Then, we fished on for a few hours, but the weather got worse so we decided to call it a day. Ian’s car was packed with our gear to make the short trip back across the fields. One last glance was made across Fada, and I tipped my hat to captain john Kennedy. What a trip to South Uist it was!

To read more articles but Paul Clydesdale, check him out on our blog.

Paul Clydesdale

Paul is a celebrate pike angler and fly tier, spending much of his season chasing large pike. When he's not after pike, he targets trout around the UK.

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