A Friendly Competition

The Colonsay Boat & letter as found at a Croft around 1960

     For scores of years people have enjoyed sport and competition when pursuing the pastime of fly fishing. For some this has become very serious and professionalised but the best version of competitive fishing for us will always be the gentle and fun scramble for bragging rights among friends on a trip together. 

 By the late 1800’s Colonsay was something of a sporting estate for privileged visitors, whom upon invitation and approval by the Laird, would rent the sport for a period of weeks or months. This was much more than acquiring permission and paying to fish – no, this type of arrangement usually involved taking over the House, servants and gamekeepers, being waited on hand and foot and having unlimited access to all the fishing and shooting available on the Island.

  Alfred Erskine Gathorne-Hardy, a Tory MP and son of prominent statesman Lord Cranbrook,,was a notable sportsman who along with his friends and acquaintances, was a regular visitor to Colonsay. Though very different in terms of wealth and position, Gathorne-Hardy wrote of his great enjoyment of the friendly competitiveness he had with his acquaintances. Wagers, as well as bragging-rights added spice to their sport, and it is very likely that a trophy or cup would have been put up for the winners. Post war periods saw a return to sport, like angling, by not just the gentry, but ordinary people also and while for most the hospitality would have been somewhat humbler the competitive edge was similarly enjoyed among friends. 

   Today we keep the tradition alive with annual visits to fish Colonsay’s trout lochs. The ‘Colonsay Boat’ is awarded to the most successful angler over the period of the visit. The trophy consists of a brass fly reel, circa 1950, apparently found in mud on a Loch side, mounted on an end of timber from an Island croft roof, removed during renovation. The timber has been roughly shaped to resemble the bow of a fishing boat. The ‘Colonsay Boat’ is most likely from the mid 1960’s and was given to us by a now deceased, elderly Islander and friend.  

   A fitting testimony to the winner of our friendly contests, the ‘Colonsay Boat’ has a growing folklore of fishy tales, near misses and lots of laughter and happiness.

                                               The Colonsay Fly Fishers.