Neil Dalrymple is both a salmon and trout angler and has a natural interest in the environment and freshwater habitat. Neil Dalrymple is a member of the Denbigh and Clwyd Angling Club and also the Corwen and District Angling Club. Most of his fishing is on the river Dee and iver Clwyd but occasionally fishes in others rivers in Snowdonia, North Wales and the river Teifi in South West Wales. Neil Dalrymple uses some of the fish that he catches e.g. salmon, trout, pike and grayling as models for his ceramic sculptures. Neil Dalrymple's fish are exhibited around the United Kingdom in galleries and can often be seen at the annual Country Landowners Association (CLA) Game Fair.
Cock and hen salmon.
70cmL
Two salmon resting at tail of a salmon pool on their upstream journey.
Move mouse over image to see other side of sculpture.
Female salmon.
50cmL
Salmon fresh run from the sea are silvery grey with blues and mauves.
Salmon.
50cmLx30cmH
When a fresh run salmon is moving up a river it head and tails rather than jumps.
Male and female grayling.
35cmL
The male has a large dorsal fin. The river Dee in North Wales is famous for its grayling.
Brown trout.
35cmL
This trout was commissioned for an angler who caught the fish in Anglesey, North Wales and Neil copied it in clay.
Leaping salmon and sea trout.
28cmLx27cmH
Salmon and sea trout can be observed leaping over waterfalls when the rivers are in spate on their spawning run in late summer and autumn. It is one of a series that capture the energy of this scene.
Sea Trout.
40cmL
This sea trout was commissioned from a 3lb fish the client caught in the river Clwyd in North Wales.
Salmon Circle.
40cmWx19cmH
The inspiration for this sculpture came from Neil seeing salmon swimming in this circular formation whilst fishing in North Wales.
Seatrout
60cmL
Seatrout are usually fished for with a fly at dusk and into the night.
Prince of Wales honours Orri Vigfusson with one of Neil's sculptures. Orri is the Icelandic salmon conservationist who negotiated the buyout of Faroese and Greenland high sea salmon fisheries. Prince Charles presented him with one of his sculptures of a cock and hen Atlantic salmon which had been specially commissioned by the Salmon and Trout Association. The ceremony took place at a reception held in Orri Vigfusson’s honour at St James’s Palace in 1995.
"In 1994 I was thrilled to receive a superb sculpture that had been specially created by Neil Dalrymple. It is one of my most treasured possessions, both for its beauty and the fact that it was commissioned jointly by the Salmon and Trout Association and the Atlantic Salmon Trust and presented to me by Prince Charles in appreciation for my work in the conservation of Atlantic salmon. The sculpture was on display at Keflavik, Iceland's international mid-Atlantic airport, for several years but it now lives in the living room of my home in Reykjavik where it has pride of place."
Orri Vigfússon