It's a bit of a dour day.  No rain so far, but it's cloudy and very humid.  The river is now past its best, but just about fishable on the better pools.  It seemed to fish well last night and prompted Gavin P to email me with further observation apropos whether we have an increasing population of young trout or young salmon.  Gavin tells me that:

With you having raised the question of possible miss identification of some of our Ribble young fish, and last night having fished the pool across  from the Crown pub it made me look a little closer at the fish we where catching. The 3 fish that I caught where most certainly trout and comparing the pictures posted on the club web site named home grown it was interesting to note that the fish last night and others all show quiet remarkably long pectoral fins compared to the example picture of a trout par. These fish are different from the Wharfe fish in my experience which show rounded stubbier fins in this area probably due to them being stocked fish or on the other hand the trout on the Wharfe perhaps do not have to endure the spate conditions that the fish in the upper Ribble often have to put up with.

The finage on our Ribble fish if this was the only means of identification then it would be difficult to tell both juveniles apart. With you commenting on identification I looked to see if I had a trout parr picture as small as the young salmon picture that I have posted. It might be possible that some member might have in there albums a picture of a small trout parr from the Ribble so that comparison can be made between the two more closely.

This might be going over old ground put good pictures on the club site must be off benefit to all who fish

So it seems pretty certain that the young fish that have been so abundant this season are wild brown trout.

For a long time now I have been going on about "Anglers' Evenings" the three volume collection of papers published by the club in its early years.  For those of you who don't have a copy and have never read these fascinating insights into the minds of our earliest forebears here is a treat.  If you go to http://www.archive.org/stream/anglersevngs00manciala/anglersevngs00manciala_djvu.txt  and http://www.archive.org/stream/anglerseveningsp00manciala/anglerseveningsp00manciala_djvu.txt 
you will find the complete text of the first and third volumes of these books.  The second volume is there to.  If you look to the left of the website page you will see a button marked "view other formats" click on that and you will see a little flashing book.  If you click on the book you can open a facsimile copy of the volume complete with pictures. It looks as if you can also open and save the books as a PDF document.  Thanks to David M for spotting this site and alerting me to its whereabouts.  I have put these links on the club website.

Ian