Chairman and Secretary's report for 2025 Season

Published on 2nd February 2026

Chairman and Secretary’s Report for Season 2025.

The year started with two weeks of snow, ice and freezing temps, this seems to be the way of it over the past few years.

Early in the year regular committee meetings were held, planning out the way forward for the forthcoming season.

Boats, roads, access paths and general maintenance to our equipment stored at Balloan steading was planned to be completed before the fishing season started and ongoing throughout the year.

There has been a couple of issues with the boats - a keel strip needed to be replaced on one boat; also, during the season the Loch Brora boat broke free from the moorings due to the connection from the anchor to the buoy parting. The anchor was recovered by some skilled salvage operation and the moorings made secure again.

The access road to Loch Lannsaidh is beginning to show signs of wear and tear mainly due to the ongoing work being carried out by Scottish Water in the area.

Rumours of Scottish Water abstracting more water from Loch Lannsaidh rather than Loch Laoigh, if this goes ahead, may well cause us difficulties when launching and recovering the boats from Lannsaidh.

Some cutting and strimming of the vegetation around Loch Lannsaidh has taken place to help anglers find a path to follow around the lochside and making casting from the bank easier by removing obstructions.

The catch and keep fishing at Loch Lagain in May resulted in 50 fish being relocated to Loch Ghuibhais. This was a good result considering the weather conditions experienced over the weekend.

Although not officially notified, it appears that Skibo has bought 1000 acres of land around Loch Ghuibhais that was previously owned by Margaret Thomson. The association are awaiting confirmation of the transaction as access to the loch through locked gates could be problematic.

The stocking of Loch Lannsaidh throughout the year went ahead with rainbows weighing in the region of 2-3lbs. Due to the increased weight of the fish being introduced to the loch it was decided to reduce the bag limit to two stocked fish per angler. With the increased weight of the fish stocked the committee recommends that line with a minimum breaking strain of 6lbs be used on Lannsaidh.

Richard our Secretary / Treasurer once again has had a busy season administering the running of the association. He is aware that some members have difficulty logging on to the website. If any member has issues with the website contact Richard and he will endeavour to sort out any problem experienced. The web site is still an ongoing project with Richard frequently in contact with the site developer requesting changes and improvements required to suit our needs.

The Association is run by a committed group of like-minded people who are the committee, on occasions help is required from the membership to assist with tasks that require some manpower such as launching and recovering the boats from the lochs, cleaning the hulls of the boats prior to winter storing, cutting back whin bushes and vegetation on access roads and paths, filling in pot holes on access roads.

Richard emailed the adult male members under 65 living in the IV25 postcode, requesting volunteers - 26 were contacted, 5 replied 21 did not respond. I hope that if and when the request is made this season (2026) there will be more willing to offer their services, as not many of the present committee are under the age of 65.

Michael the Competition Convenor, as in previous years, organised the club championship, the Clarkson outing and the evening competitions on Lannsaidh for the Stan Tuer trophy, his report on the website will reveal who all the winners are.

The financial report produced by Richard and audited by Jo Johnston, shows the Association to be in a healthy financial position. Thanks to Richard for his due diligence and attention to detail.

The Eagle Hotel staff continue to issue keys for the various lochs, a service that is greatly appreciated. As in previous years this was also the venue for the dinner after the club championship on Loch Brora, where the competitors were well fed and well looked after by Eric and Suzi’s team.

The season end membership numbers are very similar to the previous season. There is a total of 204 members, 95 of which are local and 109 away members. The previous season we had a total of 201 members made up of 95 local and 106 away members.

Finally, thanks to the volunteer committee members who give up their time to provide the membership with affordable fishing and excellent facilities.

Tight lines.

Hamish Macrae.