Sogid: Vast improvement for the second year running
A maiden salmon for a young angler and he has gnawed off the adipose fin for consumption as the trardition will have it. Photo by Sogsmenn.
Sogid, Icelands biggest clear water river, has had an excellent start to the season. It os one of the late rivers yet it has produced a great July and higher totals than usual. Usually the rivers prime time would be starting from here on, yet the river has already produced a total not far from the season totals some years ago. There are reasons for this....
Late last week the Angling Club of Reykjavík let it be known that Sogid had produced over 250 salmon which means that the river is now close to 300. In some of the bad years some years ago, the river would struggle to reach that total over the whole season. The Angling clubs buyout of free catching salmon nets in the glacial Olfusa have led to the Sog improving dramatically as a salmon river. This has been going on for the last two years and there was a marked improvement already last year. This year things are looking even better.Sogid is big and difficult to fish in places. Many of its pools need heavy current wading. But it is a challange many anglers relish and some of the locals have grown to fish it like experts. One rod fishing the top-of-the-river beat of Sydri Bru hooked nine salmon in a single day recently, and landed seven, as well as hooking and landing a 9 pound sea trout.
Most of the Sog salmon are big grilse which is in fact a shame as this was one of Iceland‘s best big fish rivers in the days of old. But things are like this now, the mws‘s have been in decline while grilse runs have become bigger. Still, there have quite a few mws‘s been caught on Sogid this season, although the 20 pound barries has yet to be broken.
