[Matthew Riley]

I have booked a hotel for 5 days  in Monymusk in late July , and will be using this as a base for exploring the Don.  I currently live in France and have never fished Scotland although my family (Murray) came from there to the US along time ago.  Can anyone recommend a good beat/beats for trout fishing?  Also how long in advance does one need to reserve a beat?

Tight lines

Matt

[Mike Barrio]

Hi Matt, welcome to the forum 

Monymusk is nice and central and there is plenty of good water on the Monymusk beats, you will also be in a good position to explore Inverure, Kemnay, Alford and further upstream.

I would have a look round the pages within our website to get a feel for things, starting at the Don page https://www.fishingthefly.co.uk/river-don.html. My preferred beats are more about the surroundings and scenery than the fishing, there are nice fish to be found throughout the Don.

You will find info about permits for fishing club beats on those pages ( these can be fished by visitors ) and for booking other beats throughout the river follow the link on that page to the Fishpal website https://www.fishpal.com/Scotland/Don/.

The annual topics in this section of the forum are also worth a browse, for example 'River Don 2023'.

What type of fishing do you enjoy? Let us know and the forum members will hopefully come up with a few suggestions.

Best wishes
Mike

[Matthew Riley]

Thanks for you response Mike.

I am looking for wadable and scenic brown trout fishing with a preference for fishing the dry.   I will check out the section on the Don on the Forum.  Any advice would be appreciated especially regarding rod length and weight.  Here in Brittany France  we fish 7-8 foot 3/4 weight stuff because the streams are super small, but it looks as if the Don is a tad bit larger than that.

[Sandy Nelson]

HI Matthew

On the upper river (Alford upstream)  a 7 to 8ft 3 or 4wt is ideal for dryfly. You might feel you need a 9ft 4 or 5wt for much of the middle and lower river just to get some reach for casting a bit further when necessary, just depends what you are comfortable with. I tend to have a 8ft 3/4wt and 9ft 4/5wt to hand and i mostly fish the mid to upper river. I do enjoy taking out a 7ft 3wt or 7ft 6" 4wt glass on the upper bits, where you can do a lot of pocket picking and never need to cast very far. Some of the beats can be quite exposed and a 5wt is handy for dealing with the wind.
You can wade a good bit of the water on most beats and can often get close to the fish. I'm mostly fishing dries although small tungsten nymphs (16-18) in the fast water can be a productive method in summer time.
July can be a tricky month during the day, with lots of terrestrials forming the bulk of the diet, evenings will be much more productive with sedges, BWO's and spinner falls. Early mornings can be very good. But a lot will depend on the water level and temperature.
Last season the water temp was over 20degrees from the first week in July to early September, but if we get some rain then it drops quickly and can bring the fish out the doldrums. So fingers crossed we don't get too hot and dry a summer so the river keeps some decent levels.