THE settled weather conditions have continued to improve the sport on all the local waters with the trout excelling themselves at Embsay Reservoir.

Fly anglers have enjoyed the best sport with brown, rainbow and tiger trout which have been taking the good hatches of sedge flies close in to the shore, which, incidentally, is receding due to the lower water level.

Bait anglers have been getting among the fish but nothing of any note has been caught of late.

Roach and ide are the mainstay of catches at Whinnygill Reservoir with fish up to around the 450g mark.

A few smaller brown trout have been caught with the best fish topping the 1 kg mark.

Some big carp can be observed and are willing to take ground bait and loose feed but shy away from anything containing a hook.

Fly fishermen are also catching some good brownies on the River Aire and in quite large quantities.

Smaller fish are turning up which indicates that the natural fish are having success in spawning now that restocking with diploid trout has been banned from 2015.

The warm weather has also brought the first hatches of May fly.

The Skipton Angling Association will be running a couple of Taster Days with a difference on the canal commencing on the May 27.

Prospective new anglers will be paired up with a member in a match and the venue will be the canal near Sawley Street with the draw at 10am.

Income from rod licence money is used for many things and the Environment Agency has issued details of how some of it will be spent to maintain and increase the brown trout population on tributaries of the upper Aire at Otterburn and Airton and to mitigate the effects of flood management between Keighley and Shipley.

Rod licence checking is currently being undertaken at several places in the area and to date there have been proceedings taken against 42 anglers out of the 1,387 checked.

Fines and costs can make fishing without a licence an expensive mistake when they can be easily obtained via the Post Office or online at www.gov.uk/get-a-fishing-licence