Just like the old days

Well with the river out of sorts again I decided to go on the lake complex again but this time would be doing something I hadnt done for nearly 20 years . having just taken delivery of a new matchbox seat box .

I also went in my tackle store and dug out my old Dam telesnatcher whip thats has a 2m telescopic top 4 and then 4 x 1m add on sections and also dug out what was left of my pole rigs , now the whip I have had around 30 years and won me alot of money on matches on the canals of South Yorkshire in the early 80's to around 1990 . At that time been single I was fishing matches saturday and sunday on the Witham or Trent and midweekers on the cut .

My choice of bait was to be liquidised bread and bread punch and so on the morning I got up and to prepare my bread I cut the crusts of 6 slices and microwaved each of them for 10 seconds and then lightly rolled them with a rolling pin and then placed them into a plastic bag and seal it . As I was planning a trip to the Trent on monday , flooding permitting , I also had my match and tip rods in the van and drove to the bait farm for some maggots both for the river and as back up in case the bread failed .

I got to the complex and had a look at a couple of the smaller lakes and decided on the 1 acre one and Set about getting my gear on and getting my gear out , I took the decision to only take the whip , reasoning that way I would have to give it a good go but if it didnt work I could return to the van and get the match rod .

As I was about to set off to my chosen swim I met up with the Owner of Woodland Waters Malc and one of the bailiffs Dave and had a chat about what I was planning to do and how I would be both reporting on various web pages and of course on here and was given permission to use a keepnet which they dont normally allow on the smaller lake which I thanked them for and assured them the fish would be looked after and wouldnt be keeping them in it long .

I got to the swim I fancied ( purely on the cold wind be less obvious there and got my seat box level and got everything sorted round it .

Setting the bait tray and getting all the bits needed on it , including my old Image punch board and Drennan bread punches out I also put some maggots in a bot tub just in case .

The one thing I hadnt manage to locate was my ground bait punch with is great as it punches liquidised bread lovely into a small pellet about the size of a small egg and on landing on the water floats for a few seconds then explodes and sinks slowly through the water column . So I had to squeeze small nuggets by hand . On plumbing up I discovered I had the usual 3 feet with little variation and decided to fish at 4 meters and also feed a little down the margin for later .It took all of 30 seconds for the first bite and action was constant for the first hour but I wasnt fishing as efficient as I used to and started to adjust things and change it . I was picking roach up regularly , nothing massive mostly fish of 4 - 6 oz . The second hour I was getting more and more happy with how things were going but would have liked a rig to hand set up but didnt have one but will next time . I suddenly started to get strange bites that  couldnt hit and made a slight change to the depth and immediately started to make contact with the culprits which turned out to be skimmer bream in the 6oz to a pound . after taking around a dozen of them they just disappeared and I quickly added 2 rudd . I then lifted into something that was obviously something that was a little angrier and thought perhaps one of the stocked carp had shown up and with no elastic but a very flexible and forgiving flicktip I took my time and to my a surprise a tench of around 1lb came to the net , which looked very upset about it .

After 10 mins of no further bites I put another nugget of bait in and decided to see if anything was at home in the inside and was only using the 2m telescopic sections but had 3 quick roach and then was attached to another angry fish that I seemed to sense was one of the perch I had targeted last year that I had caught to 2lb 4oz but know have gone over 3lb and after another tense tussle I netted a lovely fish of 1lb 10oz .

I took half dozen more quick perch from the inside all around 4oz -6oz and then went back on the 4m line and began adding more roach but slightly better fish in the 6oz -8oz topped by this 10ozer .

I am pretty good at guessing individual fish weights but always have been useless at estimating my total weight much to the annoyance of folk fishing in matches near me and so after 4 hours and using 4 full slies of bread and guessing 80 bites or so to a slice a thought perhaps I had 12lb or so in the net but on going to lift it out I found it nearer 15-20lb !!!!

I thoroughly enjoyed the session and know I could have had more but was out of practice , I had discussed this time of fishing during the summer last year and how much I used to enjoy it and I was right . I am currently trying to find out if the stories I have been told about a canal near here are true and if they are I may be be back on a familar style again .

January's gone hope things improve

Well the first month of 2014 has been and gone and am glad to see the back of it .
Usually January is my favourite month for chub as the rivers are low and clear and of course we have frost and cold weather . Not this year as we all know winter has gone mental and its mild for the time of year and very very wet . My first session of any description didnt happen til the 14th , I couldnt get my barbel head on and so decided to risk a session on the Trent after work , knowing the river was about to supposed to start dropping I chanced a cheesepaste session but as soon as I arrived I knew things were not right . The river was a good 2 feet above what the last station reading off the EA site which is strange as the stations further upstream were dropping . On looking at the river things began to take shape as the river was carrying a very brown colour and had great lumps of brown foam on it .

I have fished the Trent in severe flood conditions and seen all sorts come down it from dead animals to whole trees and even fridges and still caught but today even though it wasnt as high it really didnt look right and I could only think of 2 possible causes , 1 was the sugar beet factory had flushed its tanks out which it aint supposed to do but does and 2nd they had flushed the sewage works upstream and released all the extra water from Nottingham . Either way after 2 hours and the river coming up a few more inches I never had a sign and my first session of the year was a blank !!!!

My next chance of getting out was a few days later and the river was still high and didnt look inviting and I decided to have a session for roach on the specimen lake . I decided on a new approach , while sticking to one rod with the maggot and heli rig on my other I choose to try some 8mm pineapple boillies and a ground bait mix consisting of roach 2000 , crushed pineapple boillies and pineapple frenzy liquid .

The swim I choose was the one I had shared with Mark Reid back in November thinking that since the fish appeared t lay up there for the day I had a good chance of finding a fish to take the boillie . However things didnt pan out to well and when it got to 3.45pm and I hadnt had a sign my first ever blank on this venue looked like happening but then in 45 minutes I had 9 roach all on the maggot rod ranging between 10oz and topped by a 1lb 2oz one , I also had a single drop on the boillie rod that never developed .

3 days later and I am back at the specimen lake and on arriving we have a sharp frost which had me thinking it could be a good day for roach .

I choose to fish the opposite end of the lake where I know in these conditions the fish can come at any time due to the deeper water . While setting up I saw 2 kingfishers and my confidence was sky high . I went with the same 2 set ups as previous session and settled back and waited and waited and waited , all the time a pair of grebes worked my end of the lake and despite not seeing them catch anything its usually a dsign of fish been around but it had finally happened and I blanked for the first time on here and never even saw a sign of a fish , shouldnt complain after been on here for the last 3 winters . The only things that took and interest in my bait was a cheeky wren who helped itself to my maggots and this pair that waited for me to throw them some .

My final session  of the month was an after worker on a yet again rising Trent .The journey there was something else , I left work with light winds and broken blue sky , as I approached the hill that lead to the Trent valley the sky darkened and a few large spots of rain hit the windscreen as I hit the hill the wind went mental and sleet and hill bounced down and visibility dropped to 20 yards , it stayed like this for the next 4 or 5 miles and then stopped and on arriving at the river I was back to blue sky and no wind !!! This time I decided to fish for a bit with the red maggots I had left . I picked my swim with care and found the nice crease and slack I was looking for .

Knowing this swim from normal levels , I knew I could fish the margin just beyond the reeds sticking out and it would be snag free and fish would be laid up in that area . For an hour I cast the feeder and no sign was forthcoming I then had what can only be describes a a tremor on the quiver tip and then nothing on retrieving the rig both maggots were smashed , this happened on the next 3 casts and on the 4th I took and chance and struck and my blank was avoided as a roach of around 4-6oz was landed , not huge but welcome .

The very next cast and a slightly more deliberate bite brought me another fish but this time it was one of the all too rare now Trent gudgeon .

Thinking I might have a few more I recast and thought I felt a spot of rain and noticed the wind was picking up which would make spotting the tremor bites harder to spot but that was to be the least of my worries and the wind again went mental and spun into my face and the rain turned to torrential hail !!!!!!!!!! Now I must start using my brolly or at least taking it on these sessions and I may have been able to continue , as it was I beat a hasty retreat to the van and by the time I got there I was drenched and couldnt feel my hands . So there you have it January gone and lets hope the rest of the year improves . My next session is penciled in for 2 days time on a very high Trent but this time it will be barbel rods and garlic spam .