THE beauty and splendour of Llyn Brenig was recently seen in two very contrasting ways, writes seasonal ranger JIM JENKINS.

For the first part of the week, we enjoyed some beautiful clear skies and warm

temperatures that was a joy to behold and made for some lovely fishing days. The lake reveals itself at its stunning best on these days and as you approach Llyn Brenig and it suddenly comes into view, it literally takes your breath away.

In contrast, by the end of the week, we saw some heavy showers and overcast skies, but even more spectacularly we had a really heavy storm on the Sunday which saw the skies being lit up by some incredible forked lightning that evoked images of the Norse gods throwing down bolts of burning light.

Needless to say, we didn’t let the boats go out until the storm had passed us by.

With the water temperature on the top of the lake at 14C, the lake has been

fishing really well once again, with the rod average standing at 4.1 fish per angler, which is certainly a very healthy average.

The fish were a little deeper during the week and an intermediate line was needed.

With the warmer weather, there were plenty of natural fly hatches around the lake encouraging the use of such flies as sedges and buzzers.

We had a fishing competition at the Brenig with Cefni Anglers coming to town and having a good day of fishing, with Ger and Steph winning the heaviest

boat at 20lbs 3ozs (combined bag weight) and Rhys claiming the heaviest fish at 2lbs 8ozs.

As I have been writing this report, a fisherman by the name of Jerry Owen, from Deganwy, has just walked into the fishing shop with a big smile on his face having landed a beautiful and enormous 12lbs rainbow trout, which should

technically be mentioned in next week’s fishing report, but I can’t resist including it this week as it is such a fantastic fish.

It was also caught on the top of the water using a dry fly and it fought like a tiger - or perhaps I should say like a Marlin - taking the line to the backing three times.

The fisherman did look rather exhausted come to think of it!

The biggest bag of the week was recorded by Mark Jones, from Bangor, and it weighed in at 11lbs 4ozs, while the biggest fish weighed in at 3lbs 8ozs, which was caught by Graham Rogers, from Wrexham.

Tom Baines, from Wigan, is definitely deserving of a mention as he caught a lovely 4lbs 8ozs brown trout while fishing in the Alwen, returning it safely back into the lake.

There are often brown trout caught in the Alwen, particularly near the top of the lake, but rarely is there one caught that is so big.

The top flies were cat’s whiskers, dabbler, cormorant, buzzers, black fritz, diawl bach, black pennel, zulu, tadpole, hawthorn, sedge and nymph, along with

various blobs and boobies.

We have a number of introduction to fly fishing sessions coming up, details of which can be obtained from the visitors' centre.

The hot spots for bank fishing have been Nant Glyn shore, the ring of stones, Tower Bay and the visitors' centre.

The hot spots for boat fishermen have been Nant Glyn shore, the ring of stones, Hafod Lom, Tower Bay, the dam and the visitors' centre.

Tight Lines.