Here's Austrian doctor Fritz Seifert with a the perfect endorsement to his well presented fly. This Spring fish weighed 15lbs and was caught at the March Pool on the River Tay which is directly opposite the mouth of the River Tummel. I took this salmon capture shot as Fritz's salmon guide that day. Many international fishers like to come salmon fishing in Scotland each year.

This young lady was part of a family salmon fishing group who had never fished before for salmon. This salmon is being momentarily held over the landing net in the March Pool on the Kinnaird salmon beat. Look at the perfectly cur green grassy riverbank which makes the salmon fishing easy.

A heart racing close up inspection with one of these fine Atlantic salmon and will remain in your memory banks for an entire lifetime. This perfect Summer salmon came to a deadly Jock's Shrimp salmon fly and was caught near to the River Tummel/Tay confluence which is located not too far away from Pitlochry in Perthshire. Note the fish friendly fine mesh of the landing net behind the salmon.

Here's a lovely Summer salmon which took a fly in the neck of the Mike's Run Pool of the River Tummel which is a tributary river of the River Tay in Highland Perthshire. Look at the perfect proportions of this fine fish. This shot was taken moments before the fish was released from the landing net.

This professional guide from the River Dee is holding 1 or 3 salmon landed that August day. John Fyfe came down from the River Dee to be guided by Jock Monteith who is renowned for his excellent guiding abilities. This salmon was caught on the Upper Kinnaird salmon beat at the Daffodil Lie Pool which is immediately downstream of the Logierait Bridge which is clearly visible in this picture.

This fine Scottish Summer salmon is lying in the fine meshed McLean 32 inch landing net on the riverbed cobble stones in the shallow water margins. A salmon fishing holiday guest of mine was the fortunate salmon fisher who hooked and landed this salmon on the River Tay near the mouth of the River Tummel while I was working as his personal salmon fishing guide.

Consistently Catching Salmon

By Jock Monteith 5th September 2025

It always amazes me when I look at a photograph of any salmon I've played a part in the capture of and how easy it is to replay almost the entire fight in my head without the assistance of Youtube!

This was one such perfect Spring salmon from the Tay which was caught during the month of May.

Salmon Fishing Learning Curve

There is a learning curve required to be able to go to any salmon beat and quickly work out exactly where and when the best chances of catching a salmon are and then action a 'water coverage' plan to make sure all salmon lie boxes get ticked prior to the end of the fishing day. As a professional salmon guide and former head ghillie on the River Tay I was fortunate to have the time to focus on these delicate often untaught tactical aspects of the pursuit and become highly efficient in all Tay salmon fishing tactical approaches mastering exactly where to locate salmon in the varying water conditions during the Spring, Summer & Autumn months and deploy the best tactical approaches over them to give the guests the best chance of a fish.

Professional Salmon Guide Objective

When guiding for guests my objective was always to teach quickly and effectively enough for the guest to be able to cast well enough, move properly through a pool between casts & know exactly to hook a salmon on their own (if the opportunity arose) and I'd make sure this was achieved within the first hour of the fishing day so as to get the focus on 'water coverage' as quickly as possible. As a professional guide, witnessing a guest hooking and landing their first ever salmon would create the biggest sense of satisfaction and on many occasions this would happen on day one of a guest's salmon fishing introduction which for those of you who've been in the game long enough will know is good going. On other occasions if the salmon were not behaving properly for the guests some professional guide 'back up' assistance would be required to save the day!

A Deeper Longer And Slower Salmon Fly

I recall many such incidents where brand new salmon fishing guests on their first day (with no prior experience) managed the entire task themselves and also where no ghillie/guide help was needed but I recall one 'ghillie assist' day on the River Tay after a guest had landed his third Autumn salmon (that I'd hooked while fishing down behind him) he turned to me and asked what he was doing wrong! The reality of the situation was he was doing everything right but the salmon were just sitting further out and deeper than anyone could be able to effectively cover on day one of their salmon fishing introduction and only a longer, deeper and better controlled salmon fly was working. However by 5pm the guest had become a true master with the skills involved in successfully playing salmon!

Salmon Lie Identification

Once a new salmon fishing guest had mastered the basics of how to use a salmon rod and fish through a salmon pool and know exactly how to react to the take from a salmon I'd always be watching the river as well as keeping a close eye on the guest. Salmon often make the mistake of showing their exact holding positions that I'd always take a riverbank marker against. Once you know where a salmon is positioned in any pool it only requires a dozen or so casts to see if it's a 'cooperator' or not which can easily make you look a lot better than you are and especially if the location of that fish was not seen by others!

A Perfect Quick Spring Salmon

The perfect Spring salmon being played in this video was hooked, played & landed by one of my great Austrian client's who used to come every year to Scotland in pursuit of River Tay salmon. That particular morning was day 1 of his 3 day fishing trip and I knew exactly where the salmon were holding which he hooked after a correct and stealthy approach to their holding position on the 'superb' and often totally un-fished right hand bank of the March Pool on Upper Kinnaird which didn't take any more than a few minutes after starting to fish. Straight away it took the pressure off me as his guide for him to catch such a perfect fish at the very start of his first fishing day.

Becoming A Top All Round Salmon Guide

In this business there's no real way to short circuit the learning curve involved other than acquiring good old long term professional riverbank experience and many great salmon guides I'm fortunate to work with are highly tuned into some or all of these various different tactical approaches. On the River Tay where often 'thinking outside of the box' and deploying multiple different tactical fishing approaches with maximised daily water coverage always being the top priority I'm fortunate to work with a select few who are highly effective at teaching some or all of these salmon fishing skills or sometimes delivering pre-hooked salmon to guests on the fly, spinner, harled, anchored up or sometimes even with the good old garden fly when the going gets really tough!