Before I get started on what’s been happening more recently, I’d better quickly catch up with events towards the back end of October, as I had a return trip to Chew Valley for the pike towards the end of the month.
As on the previous trip my regular fishing partner Ian and I had two consecutive days’ bank fishing, so we decided to make an early start in a popular ‘banker’ area for the first day, and then make plans for the second day based on whatever happened on day one. Having arrived I was waiting for it to get light enough to send the bait boat out with a big deadbait on the second rod when the first rod – that I’d not long cast out, with a smelt impaled on the trebles – signalled a run.
It’s all very exciting stuff whenever you get a run on Chew, as it might be a jack of less than 4lb, or it could potentially be a monster pike of over 40! Unfortunately it didn’t seem that there was an awful lot of weight associated with whatever I’d hooked and as I carefully steered it around the various weed beds I assumed I’d hooked a small jack as it allowed itself to be gradually wound in towards the bank. I’d left the landing net by the water’s edge as I had waded out a few feet to enable me to simply ‘chin’ my jack, but as it got within a couple of yards of me it suddenly started to wake up a bit and wanted to head back out into open water. With a short line and still rather fresh pike on the end it ended up doing a bit of a tailwalk in shallows and I was suddenly presented with a better look at what I’d hooked.
My estimates of a small jack were quickly revised to a definite ‘double’ and then, remembering that this was a trout water pike that might be very fat for its length, I looked down the bank towards where Ian was still getting himself organized to see if he wanted to lend a hand with landing it!
I guessed that Ian was blissfully unaware that I’d even had a run as it looked as though he had his back to me and was rummaging about with his kit so, not wanting to shout down the bank, I took a few paces back so that I could grab the net. Once I’d got the pike safely scooped up it looked to be around the mid double mark and a check on the scales confirmed a weight of 15lb; after a quick picture of the fish on the mat, giving the trace and hooks a quick check and attaching another smelt I re-cast to the same area.
It’s important to make the most of any potential feeding spells as the Chew Valley pike are similar in their habits to pike in most waters, as they often display short but intensive feeding periods, with relatively long, quiet spells in between. I could have grabbed Ian’s attention and got him over to take some proper trophy shots of the pike I’d just landed, but then we’d both be spending a while doing that rather than getting baits into the water during a feeding period and potentially missing out on catching something twice the size – or even larger!
As it was that one run was the sum total of the day’s action for both of us.
We were already aware that the weather was due to deteriorate during the weekend and that the following day (Sunday) could get quite stormy in certain parts of the country. As the day progressed some ominous grey clouds started to develop along the skyline and we had a visit from one of the bailiffs who informed us that the boat fishing for the following day had already been cancelled due to the stormy forecast. He went on to tell us that he’d be advising all the bank anglers that were due on the following day to head for certain areas that would provide some shelter from the very strong wind and rain that was on its way.
We really didn’t fancy the idea of being amongst a large group of pike anglers all herded together into one or two crowded areas and, fortunately, our enquiries to the office to see if our tickets could be swapped for another day next year were met with a positive response.
So our two day trip was reduced to just the one day, but at least we’ve got a day next year to look forward to.
I also managed to fit in a couple of day trips pike fishing at Bluebell Lakes; the fishery is very well known for the quality of carp fishing, but there is also a well documented history of some very big pike over the years.
The owner of the fishery, Tony Bridgefoot, knows that big pike are delicate and has recognized the importance of not over pressurizing the stocks if quality fishing is to be maintained over a sustained period. With this in mind he has allowed very little pike fishing on Swan and Kingfisher Lakes in recent years and asked me to organize a limited pike fishing syndicate on both pits for this winter. This would ensure that only experienced pike anglers, with the right kit and correct attitude towards pike conservation, would be allowed to fish.
With the mild weather I think most of the syndicate have had other species to concentrate on and not much pike fishing has actually taken place but the lads who have made the effort have landed several doubles to 18lb and I landed a handful of fish to low doubles.
I also decided that this winter I’d have another crack at trying to catch a dace of a pound or more. True 1lb dace are very rare creatures indeed and I’ve longed to add a dace of this size to my PB list. I’ve had various unsuccessful attempts over the years, including a serious effort a while back that I detailed in my very first ‘Specialist Scene’ feature for FishingMagic.
P
erhaps describing these attempts as ‘unsuccessful’ is a bit misleading, as I’ve caught some lovely fish, with dace to 14oz, and enjoyed some great fishing, but that 1lb dace has yet to grace my landing net. I could only manage a short afternoon session for my first attempt back at the same venue, but I did manage to catch a few fish, with the best dace looking to be around the 8oz mark. I couldn’t wait for a return trip when I could give one of my favorite swims a full day’s effort, but due to a silly mistake on my part the next trip had to be radically re-planned.
I’d decided to renew the line on the spare spool of my trotting reel in case I wanted to swap over if I started to get amongst the barbel and chub, which I often did while trotting for the dace. Therefore the night before the trip I took the reel out to put the new line on; unfortunately I forgot to put the reel back into my rucksack the following morning and it wasn’t until I’d started to tackle up by the river when I discovered my mistake…
Not really fancying the drive back home to collect my missing reel I started to think about alternative targets and methods.
On my last trip I’d seen a large perch come out of the snaggy margins downstream of me to look at any small fish that I had hooked and had to bring back upstream past its lair. It never actually attacked any of my hooked fish, but it was full of aggression and would suddenly appear out of the depths to menace anything small enough, including some smaller perch around the 6oz mark.
This particular perch looked as though it could go over 3lb so just in case another opportunity presented itself I’d popped a ledger rod, a Baitrunner loaded with 10lb line and some suitable hooks into my kit after the first trip and this looked to be the ideal time to put it to good use.
I clearly needed to obtain some suitable bait first though and, although it all looked a bit odd, I was able to fashion a crude trotting outfit using the heavy line and an Avon-style float teamed with my small hooks on light hook lengths. Fortunately it was good enough to catch a handful of small greedy gudgeon… just the job!
The first gudgeon, suspended on suitable tackle, lasted all of two minutes before the float disappeared! A quick strike resulted in a nice perch, clearly not the big fish I’d seen before, but nonetheless a pleasing fish just an once or two shy of 2lb. Over the next hour and a half I had another three perch from the same spot with the two best weighing a couple of ounces over 2lb, but they were all clearly quite a bit smaller than the big one that had shown itself the previous trip.
With the perch bites drying up and my bait supplies looking decidedly worse for wear, rather than flogging away for potentially diminishing results I decided that another radical re-plan was in order, especially as some of the tackle I had with me would be well suited to a bit of chub fishing. Rather than fish for the smaller chub on the venue I was already on I decided to pack up and take a somewhat roundabout route home which would include a favorite chub stretch of the River Ouse and a quick stop at a corner shop or garage on route would supply a fresh loaf for bait.
With the success of the impromptu perch fishing buoying up my confidence and enthusiasm, it was a bit of a disappointment to then arrive at my chosen stretch and find that the recent rain had fed loads of extra water into the river and turned it into a coffee colored mess – great for barbel – had there been any decent fish left in the stretch – but not good for chub.
Not to be deterred, I decided to have a look at another stretch a few miles away that held a nice big slack in these conditions, which could be worth fishing. Unfortunately the second choice also looked wrong and decidedly un-chubby. The slack water was there alright but it was full of rubbish and not quite right; sometimes you just know when it’s worth trying to stick it out and when it’s best to call it quits and this was one occasion when trying to make the most of a bad job didn’t look worthwhile.
Fortunately my next trip for the dace all went pretty much according to plan and I was able to spend a day trotting a stick float through the swim to slowly amass a very pleasing mixed bag of fish. With roach, dace, chub, barbel, gudgeon, perch and some minnows all showing a liking for a single red maggot or caster on a size 18.
There were enough dace of around 8oz to provide some hope of a big one turning up, but the largest of the day ended up being 10oz. The roach were very pleasing too, with quite a few on, or just over, the 1lb mark. When I’m catching nice dace and roach at the same time I often start to imagine how difficult, but how amazing, it would be to achieve the ‘holy grail’ of river angling and catch a 1lb dace and 2lb roach brace in the same sitting.
I’m finding it challenging enough to catch a 1lb plus dace as it is, never mind trying to achieve the seemingly impossible magical brace, but it’s always good to dream. What did occur to me on this trip however was that I might be able to get a photograph of a sort of ‘halfway-house’ to the magical brace and take a shot of a dace of half a pound or more together with a 1lb plus roach. With this in mind I retained the next good dace that I caught in my submerged landing net to see if I could get a nice roach to go with it for a photograph.
As luck would have it the very next trot through resulted in a good roach that I carefully netted to ensure that the dace already in the net didn’t swim off and I had the subjects for my little brace shot. If memory serves me right the dace weighed 8oz and the roach 1lb 2oz.
To round off the month I had a day boat fishing for zander on Grafham Water with my good friend, legendary ‘all-rounder’ Bob Church. However the word count for this particular piece is creeping up, so I’d better save the details of what happened for my next monthly feature…
So, until then…happy New Year and happy fishing!
