WITH the weather not playing ball at the moment due to unseasonal low temperatures, anglers are once again deserting the bank side on most of the local waters until there is an improvement.

Whinnygill Reservoir to the east of Skipton is still attracting a few anglers and some decent sized fish are being caught in reasonable numbers.

Recent catches have included roach and ide to about 450g and bream to about the 600g mark.

Other species are conspicuous by their absence and it will be some time before tench are being brought to the net.

Reports from Embsay Reservoir seem to suggest that the sport could be better with the rainbow stock fish providing most of the sport.

Tigers are scarce and brownies are difficult to locate as they have been from the start of the season.

On the River Aire, the water is back down to near summer level and the anglers that have been fishing have had to contend with a cold northerly wind for some time which has not been helpful at all.

Brown trout are being caught on the fly and worm but not in any quantity or size.

Perhaps the best fishing recently has been on the canal, where the bream are congregating for spawning.

One angler recently had four big fish on the maggot that were estimated to weigh about 7.3kg.

The swim certainly held more fish and the next day produced a fish approaching the 2.3kg mark.

Skipton Summer League competitors will be hoping to get amongst similar sized bream when they fish the second match in this year’s series of eight matches this Sunday.

The Bay Horse length of the canal on Keighley, Skipton, will be the venue and the draw will be held at 7am with four hours of fishing.

This match will be the last when new registrations are accepted.

With a forecast of a continuation of the cool weather but with wetter conditions, it looks like the main beneficiary will be the river providing there is not too much rain.

A bonus for all waters would be at least a rise to normal seasonal temperatures at some time in the near future.