Home Features Diaries Biggest Eden Chub for Two Years

Biggest Eden Chub for Two Years

February 1, 2005

Caption (click for bigger picture)

After a coaching session for grayling on the river Eden on Sunday I was looking forward to having a full day’s fishing to myself on the river on Monday. I had planned to start the day fishing for salmon, and then try for grayling and chub later in the day.

Having dropped my son and daughter off for the school bus I continued on to the river. Upon arrival I found I had not been as well organised as I had thought, I had forgotten my fishing waistcoat with all my small items of tackle, hooks, line, shot, Polaroid glasses, fishing hat, etc, in it. I wasn’t too concerned as the rods were already set up ready for action in the back of the car and only needed assembling and I managed to find some spare items of tackle in a box I carry for just such occasions; I even managed to find a woolly hat amongst the assorted debris in the car. With an icy breeze blowing upstream I was more grateful for this than the spare items of tackle.

I did miss the Polaroid’s though, although there was still plenty of water in the river following the devastating floods we have experienced on the Eden the river was quite clear and the Polaroid’s would have helped me see through the surface glare and pick out any changes in the river bed and possibly a fish or two.

This was my first visit to this particular stretch of the Eden since the floods. On my last visit on the 3rd January I had landed a dozen grayling to approximately 1 1/2 lb and as I wandered down the path through the woods I caught my first glimpse of just how much the floods had changed the character of the river. A lot of bank had been washed away and the tail of the pool I intended to fish for salmon seemed broader, willows had been washed away downstream and even on the sections of bank that had not been damaged, grass and top soil had been scoured away exposing rock and subsoil.

I decided to take some photos of the damage caused by the floods only to discover I had also left my camera at home – it was going to be one of those days!

After trying unsuccessfully for salmon for a couple of hours I decided to see if the grayling were in a more obliging mood, making first for a stretch of river that had produced a 2 lb 2 oz grayling for me back in November, but the grayling in this particular stretch were not playing ball so I set of for pastures new, having a cast or two here and there as the fancy took me and learning how the river had changed as I went.

As I roved the riverbank, the breeze dropped, the sun came out, there was even a small hatch of upwinged flies. After such a huge flood which has left gravel, sand banks and big cobbles in the field 50 yards from the river I am amazed that any invertebrate life, never mind fish life, could survive in what must have been a most hostile and abrasive environment. Nature can be remarkably resilient.

It now seemed an overcoat warmer than when I had first arrived on the riverbank and I began to catch grayling. By the time I’d reached some willow bushes that had been flattened by the floods, deflecting the current and creating a very inviting looking crease and bankside slack I had taken 7 grayling up to around 1