Locations

Traditional loch style at its best, with wild browns averaging just under a pound and enough two and three pounders to keep you honest. Fly only, and better from a boat.

One of the few Scottish waters where you can buy a day permit for pike and trout online, with a protection order, a hatchery and a clear set of byelaws behind it.

Wild fish, huge water and very few other anglers. The Highlands ask more of you in planning than in casting, and the trade is worth it.

Pike, perch, roach and bream in Dumfries and Galloway, with a permit and access situation that genuinely needs checking before you travel.

The south west is Scotland’s coarse fishing corner, and it is badly underrated by anglers who drive straight past it on the way north.

Over a thousand acres of wild brown trout water between Denny and Fintry, and since 2021 you cannot buy a day ticket. Here is what that means if you were planning to fish it.

Around 70 acres near Dunkeld, holding rainbow, blue and brown trout, fished from boat and bank. Access runs through the angling association rather than over the counter.

Boat only, fly only, wild brown trout. Loch Leven is the water that gave loch-style fishing its name, and it still asks proper questions of an angler.

Boat-only, stocked weekly, and twenty minutes from Stirling. Lake of Menteith is where I send anglers who want their day out to involve catching fish.

The belt of water between Stirling and Dunkeld holds some of the most consistent stillwater trout fishing in Britain. Here is how the main venues differ and which one suits which angler.