You may have noticed that I have been very quiet for some time on the subject of my own local river, the Río Guadalhorce. The simple truth is that it has been through some hard times in recent years but there are signs now, happily, that it is beginning to pull through. The river dried out in the summer of 2023 following a period of drought and the fish dropped back into whatever deeper pools they could find, or down towards the estuary.

Most of the large fish died when the river dried out. Some of this I was a witness to myself, and the effects of the drought were further compounded by a significant fish kill the following year.

I kept quiet about all of this, here on the blog, because I did not have the heart to report on it. I love these rivers and it is painful to see them suffer in this way. It seemed that there were more than enough grim things making it into the news. Who wants to hear about more?

I am writing now though, because things are picking up. Last year I saw almost no fish in the Guadalhorce beyond tiddlers in the margins but this year there are every signs that things are getting better. My brother Sean and I came across good numbers of carp when we visited the stretch of the Guadalhorce just upstream of Estación de Cártama. These were no monsters, being only a couple of pounds apiece but, significantly, they were next generation coming through after the larger fish had perished. Sean and I are only human so we could not resist the urge to catch a few on the fly but all were safely returned.

But what about the barbel? We saw no clear signs at all of them. We had seen many small fish shoaling a few kilometers further upstream of the Cártama stretch and, despite offering them our smallest nymphs, we had no takers and could not identify them.

On Sunday I ventured again to the same place to see if I could solve this mystery. Using the smallest perdigon I had in my fly box I managed to catch about twenty and was delighted to see that they were gypsy barbel.

The summer is drawing to a close now and I am hoping that autumn and winter rains will be generous. The fish are making a comeback and, though I don´t want to count my chickens, there is good reason for optimism.

The carp are making a comeback!
Modest though it is, I was over the moon to catch this little gypsy barbel. I am hoping that they will thrive and grow over the next few years.
Shortly before I took this photo I saw some European bee-eaters landing in the river and then taking off again. They have a long flight ahead to their wintering grounds in West Africa. Most have left already. This is a prettier departure lounge than the one in Málaga airport!