How did you get on?

[mikench]

Well it remained dry all day and when the sun shone and the cloud retreated it was summer weather which we expect in June. However when the cloud returned plus a stiff breeze , it felt more like march.

The maestro at work. Gordon caught from the off and just fell short of 30 fish by one. He caught a few carp and lots of lovely roach of at least 8oz and more. He had success on corn mainly.

My peg next door persuaded my to stick with my bomb rod and maggot feeder which resulted in around 8 assorted roach and perch. I also had 9 carp, mainly F1’s on the pellet and hybrid feeder. It looked like it wasn’t a day for prolific catches judging by the other 8 or so anglers on the pool but we are not complaining. It was a lovely day out . None of the fish were special or of any size but we caught them and enjoyed doing so. We didn’t bother with photos. We have a plan for next time if we go to the same venue and I will set up two rods.cheers Gordon and good to see you again and to catch up.

 

[Pete Shears]

At the canal feeder reservoir this morning and spent 50 minutes clearing thick weed hoping to get a tench. A cold NW breeze set in, time to sit back and wait with a coffee or two. Eventually had a run and after teasing the fish through even more weed I had a plump female tench in the net weighing in at 6lb 9oz and later a second run resulted in what felt to be a smaller tench falling off in the thick weed.

 

[Steve Arnold]

Sally and I are having a few days in the camper van at Cajarc. Only 15 minutes from our home but it's such a lovely little town......of course it's on a lovely stretch of the river Lot.
So far the fishing has been very good. First fish was a 7 lb bream, followed by two barbel just over 7lb.

Next day six more barbel with an average size over 6lb. Another bream of 4lb finished that session.

Wonderful finish to the evening with an atmospheric swim view.

I will fish again this evening

 

[@Clive]

There has been a scheme running in the Charente department to take a youth fishing. I've been meaning to participate for ages, but never got round to it. Today I finally managed to do my bit. Problem was I had left it too late. This is all they had left on their books....

Meet Wilf. We have been intending going fishing for over a year, but he kept ducking and diving by getting covid twice, bronchitis three times and having numerous stents fitted. Then we had 7 months of rain that left the rivers unfishable. Finally today was the day! I picked him up at home around 9am and locked him in the car. I had him away so fast he forgot his glasses, hearing aids and sandwiches!

The venue was the River Charente in a rare double swim where we could fish together. He has no idea what a quiver tip rod was so I rigged him up with an old Shimano Alivio with 2oz tip and Shimmy reel loaded with braid and a mono shock leader.I had prepared it last night and all we needed to add was a cage feeder and maggot or sweetcorn hook bait on the 16 spade end hook. I had my, usual for this venue, ABU Suveran feeder rod, 2oz tip and matching Suveran reel set up the same way.

Now, I had no idea of Wilf's skill level. It turned out that he was what could be described as early Bob Mortimer. Despite that he was off the mark first with a small bream. That might have been because I was sat behind him coaching, not yet having wet a line.

I then took the next 5 or 6 fish that included a lovely roach of about 1lb while Wilf seemed to be struggling with tangles.

I suggested that we swap positions, him on my seat box and me in his folding chair. That didn't work, so we also exchanged rods. That seemed to help him mainly because the Suveran has an obvious grip around the reel seat. He still got tangles, but once Wilf learned to embrace the reel seat with his right hand and use his left hand on the butt his casting improved from abysmal to respectable. Then we worked on response to bites using the same grip. That resulted in more bites being hit and a succession of fish coming that included bleak, roach and some bream to around 2lbs ish.

He beat his lifetime pb at least five times.

We finished up with 20 fish between us on what was, for this swim, a slow day. I had lost a nice carassin at the net and had 2 bream drop off the barbless hooks while nonchalently swing them in. Wilf probably lost the same amount through holding the rod too horizontal and winding like Bob. So in the end, honours even. Just a sample from the day's catch.

 

[Keith M]

By the beaming look on Wilfs face in the last picture it looks like you have made a new convert to our sport

Nice one Clive

Keith

 

[no-one in particular]

One decent tench about 3.5-4lb. 50/50 bread on a 14 hook and a one bb float, first tench since June last year, worth the wait, hard canal this, hope I don't have to wait another year for one. Just the one fish, a few nibbles probably small roach but couldn't hook one, thought this was a roach until it shot off and for a while I thought I had a carp, rod good, weighs a ton but played the fish well. New swim, very slow but worth another visit. Had a group of octogenarians stand on the bridge for a while right over my swim, one even asked if I was after tench, turns out her husband was an angler, took them all day to cross the bridge, didn't have the heart to tell them, "get a move on" . I don't mind really, all part of the mix and it was a lovely day.

 

[Kevin Perkins]

Little tincas....

Due to roadworks, I had to change venues for a planned morning session.

Completely unknown venue to me, and I had just set up when another angler came up and proceeded to tell me he had fished that very swim last time he was there and had a few carp casting straight out. He the asked if I didn't fancy fishing the 'lily pad' swim next door.. ! I politely declined his kind offer to vacate my swim and got on with my preparations.
First line of attack was a shotgun feeder/bloodworm pellet combo which brought a mixed bag of some 15 fish, with carp, roach and tench coming to the net.

And it may just be me, but there is something about those little tench that brings a smile to my face, a similar feeling to when a robin comes visiting demanding to be fed

All in all a very enjoyable short session (and from what I could hear, far more productive that the swim next door chosen by the angler who thought I might like to move. And who incidentally managed to 'accidentally' cast across my swim more than a few times....)

 

[mikench]

No Kevin you are not alone in finding small tench cute. I don’t feel the same about any other fish.

 

[Steve Arnold]

A quick follow-up to my last post. We have just returned from our few days at Cajarc, absolute heaven to be at that campsite for us!

Final score was 11 barbel, none smaller than 5lbs, and three bream of 4lb, 5lb and 7lb. I dropped a couple of fish when I tried a smaller hook.

I did not fish all the time! Cajarc is attractive for my wife, has some nice shops and several restaurants. So we had a couple of long lunches and a few drinks in the evening, lovely atmosphere for a proper little holiday.

Some photos.......

A little street celebration for a 10 year anniversary of La Pause restaurant.

 

[Ray Roberts]

I fished the same lake as last week. It’s a funny place and the parking is in a car park that is part of a country park. The entrance has a barrier so at this time of the year you have to wait for 7:30 to gain access and away before they shut, or your car gets locked in.

There has been a club AGM since I fished it last and its been made a float only venue. It has some other odd rules, like line to be between three and five pounds b/s. No alarms, no bivvys no floaters, no carp gear. Which is fine by me. Last time I used an Acolyte Plus, but this time I gave my Drennan Floatmaster an outing. It’s a more forgiving rod than the acolyte and you really have to balls things up to get broken when using it. I had a brilliant day and apart from two small rudd all the other fish were of a decent size and gave great sport. I tried a variety of baits and cooked king prawn was the most successful. I chopped them up into 10mm sections and had most of my fish on them. I had a mirror carp that was only about eight pounds but it fought like a fish of twice its size and on light float gear it was good fun. I topped up with; 8 tench, 3 carp, 8 bream, 12 goer roach and two small rudd. Most of the tench were over three pounds and the bream were decent too. I dug my brimmed leather hat out for ear protection, no pork scratching ears for me today. I also tried out a fishing shirt I bought in Decathlon a while back, its thin and has long sleeves to protect against the sun, I was quite impressed with it to be honest.

 

[Skoda]

Sounds like a dream venue, Ray.

 

[Ray Roberts]

Sounds like a dream venue, Ray.

It’s very nice, I intend to take my grandchildren in the holidays and joined them into this club and another with a tench and crucian only water.

I have taken the two girls to that one and they both loved it. The next time I will take their younger brother too. So that’s everybody else’s peace and tranquility buggered for the foreseeable, lol.

 

[nottskev]

It was cool, wet and windy here today, but I'm away for a few days so I went out, a bit reluctantly, and headed for the most sheltered of the ponds. That wasn't too uncomfortable, though I never like fishing under a brolly, which hampers you in so many ways, and not a great choice for the fishing either. I should have anticipated the weather would put a dampener on fishing shallow for the ide and I couldn't get a bite fishing on the bottom. I kept feeding floating casters and chopped meat, but a team of ducks mopped this up. A couple of mallards picked up the casters while a pair of tufties swept the bottom and clouded the swim up. For the last half hour of my three hours the rain stopped, the sun came out and a few fish showed, four ide and a couple of trout

 

[Islandbear]

A not too bad in the end session today.
2 lovely Tench 4 bream n a rudd.
Is it June?really??
Bally norf wind had us wrapped up like Autumn then early afternoon it turned out bright and no wind for about n hour. Hey ho twas still good to be sat bankside.

 

[Crystal Bend]

With the weather getting cooler now winter is setting in here in Melbourne, I thought I'd head back for an evening\night session on a moody urban clear water lake where I'd previously caught my best Australian Roach of 14oz on a worm\corn cocktail fished 2ft off bottom on the waggler in 16ft of water.
The lake has lovely houses around it in a semi circle and it's only a couple of mill for one! Keep playing the lotto......
It has big common carp (not interested in catching), perch, silver perch, roach and stocked rainbow trout for the kids at Easter time.
I was hoping the carp wouldn't be as active now and I'd get amongst the roach (even though I'd only ever caught one previous!).
It was a nice session and I packed up about 10.45pm when the temperature dropped to 9c with a lovely clear sky above.
I had read Jeff Hatt's excellent blog again "My Way with Bread" and decided on an all bread approach.
I made 3 punches from pvc condensate drain pipe and bevelled the edges to make 18mm, 23mm & 27mm bread discs.
The rigs couldn't have been simpler. Small Cresta 0.145mm clear pro fluorine hooklengths tied to Sz12 VMC 7009 sharp barbed hooks, which I reversed, tied to the main line with 3 spread out SSG shot above the hook.
This was to pin down the line around the floating white bread discs so the fish wouldn't feel the line and keep it out of the way.
I'd punched the discs at home and reeled back in every 10 minutes or so to put another fresh one on. The rod on the left had a 18mm disc set at 50mm off bottom and the other was 400mm to see what would happen.
With the water being clear, I don't like casting a feeder in all the time, so I knocked up 2 bait boxes of bread crumb with some dry hemp seeds I'd ran thru a coffee grinder. I chucked this all in to my left and right and put a rod over each. The ducks were a pain but what can you do!
I had nothing for 1.5hrs and then at 7pm my little 7ft whiting fibreglass nibble top rod went off on the right!
The fish put up a lovely fight on the soft rod and soon I was looking at a 32cm silver perch of 14oz in the landing net.
My first silver perch and I'm afraid it didn't make it back to the water as they're nice eating!
And that was it. One bite, one fish but I really enjoyed fishing the bread and hope to get back again to give it another whirl.
I found my Fox Halo light very useful too during the session to shine on the tips of the rods. There are 5 light settings and it lasts for hours.

After the session I decided I wanted a pair of soft roach quiver\picker type action rods for next time.
I wanted them to be slightly longer than the 7ft NT rod so I could see the tips easily and shine the Fox light on them.
Importing rods can be expensive here so I searched for another NT (nibble top) rod and came across these 8ft Okuma NT rods with "UFR" technology which looks interesting after watching a clip on YouTube about it.
I've bought two and I'm looking forward to putting them into service again with the bread.
Incidentally, the silver perch is omnivorous with algae becoming increasingly important in the diet with age which was very relevant when I looked at the stomach contents of the one I caught.

8ft Okuma Lunaris 2-4kg Spin Rod - 2 Piece Fishing Rod with Glowing Nibble Tip

8ft Okuma Lunaris 2-4kg Spin Rod - 2 Piece Fishing Rod with Glowing Nibble Tip - Okuma

www.hookedonline.com.au

My Way with Bread

I've done a great deal of bread fishing over the last few years and through hundreds of hours of various failures and successes have learne...

idlersquest.blogspot.com

 

[Steve Arnold]

With the weather getting cooler now winter is setting in here in Melbourne, I thought I'd head back for an evening\night session on a moody urban clear water lake where I'd previously caught my best Australian Roach of 14oz on a worm\corn cocktail fished 2ft off bottom on the waggler in 16ft of water.
The lake has lovely houses around it in a semi circle and it's only a couple of mill for one! Keep playing the lotto......
It has big common carp (not interested in catching), perch, silver perch, roach and stocked rainbow trout for the kids at Easter time.
I was hoping the carp wouldn't be as active now and I'd get amongst the roach (even though I'd only ever caught one previous!).
It was a nice session and I packed up about 10.45pm when the temperature dropped to 9c with a lovely clear sky above.
I had read Jeff Hatt's excellent blog again "My Way with Bread" and decided on an all bread approach.
I made 3 punches from pvc condensate drain pipe and bevelled the edges to make 18mm, 23mm & 27mm bread discs.
The rigs couldn't have been simpler. Small Cresta 0.145mm clear pro fluorine hooklengths tied to Sz12 VMC 7009 sharp barbed hooks, which I reversed, tied to the main line with 3 spread out SSG shot above the hook.
This was to pin down the line around the floating white bread discs so the fish wouldn't feel the line and keep it out of the way.
I'd punched the discs at home and reeled back in every 10 minutes or so to put another fresh one on. The rod on the left had a 18mm disc set at 50mm off bottom and the other was 400mm to see what would happen.
With the water being clear, I don't like casting a feeder in all the time, so I knocked up 2 bait boxes of bread crumb with some dry hemp seeds I'd ran thru a coffee grinder. I chucked this all in to my left and right and put a rod over each. The ducks were a pain but what can you do!
I had nothing for 1.5hrs and then at 7pm my little 7ft whiting fibreglass nibble top rod went off on the right!
The fish put up a lovely fight on the soft rod and soon I was looking at a 32cm silver perch of 14oz in the landing net.
My first silver perch and I'm afraid it didn't make it back to the water as they're nice eating!
And that was it. One bite, one fish but I really enjoyed fishing the bread and hope to get back again to give it another whirl.
I found my Fox Halo light very useful too during the session to shine on the tips of the rods. There are 5 light settings and it lasts for hours.

After the session I decided I wanted a pair of soft roach quiver\picker type action rods for next time.
I wanted them to be slightly longer than the 7ft NT rod so I could see the tips easily and shine the Fox light on them.
Importing rods can be expensive here so I searched for another NT (nibble top) rod and came across these 8ft Okuma NT rods with "UFR" technology which looks interesting after watching a clip on YouTube about it.
I've bought two and I'm looking forward to putting them into service again with the bread.
Incidentally, the silver perch is omnivorous with algae becoming increasingly important in the diet with age which was very relevant when I looked at the stomach contents of the one I caught.

8ft Okuma Lunaris 2-4kg Spin Rod - 2 Piece Fishing Rod with Glowing Nibble Tip

8ft Okuma Lunaris 2-4kg Spin Rod - 2 Piece Fishing Rod with Glowing Nibble Tip - Okuma

www.hookedonline.com.au

My Way with Bread

I've done a great deal of bread fishing over the last few years and through hundreds of hours of various failures and successes have learne...

idlersquest.blogspot.com

Interesting post and I appreciate that link to the punched bread, Thanks!

 

[Crystal Bend]

@Steve Arnold
Thanks Steve. First time posting something like that and I'll do another one about a Tench session I had a few months ago too in time.
I've since found a PDF at the bottom of this link under Media Coverage about UFR Technology which was interesting.
Especially that the Okuma Psycho Perch 1.9m UL Rod (1-8g) has it that The Ginger Fisherman uses on small stream chub caught on hard bodies.
Lovely looking rod for not a lot of money.

UFR® | OKUMA FISHING TACKLE CO., LTD.

OKUMA FISHING UFR® Introduction. OKUMA FISHING TACKLE is a global leader in the design and manufacturing of high quality fishing tackle.. At Okuma Fishing Tackle we deliver more than just fishing gear. We deliver the motivation to hit the water, the energy to maintain focus and the excitement...

www.okumafishing.com

Okuma Psycho Perch UFR Spin Rod

Key Features Ultra-light high-modulus carbon blank construction UFR: Ultimate Flex Reinforced rod tip technology New exclusive psychedelic blank artwork CCS Seaguide, 316 stainless steel frame SIC guide View blank screw-down reel seat 3-split EVA handle with rubber cork inserts For all European...

www.anglingdirect.co.uk

 

[mikench]

Whitty is alive and well. He hasn't posted recently for his own reasons which i understand.

 

[Alan Whitty]

It was cool, wet and windy here today, but I'm away for a few days so I went out, a bit reluctantly, and headed for the most sheltered of the ponds. That wasn't too uncomfortable, though I never like fishing under a brolly, which hampers you in so many ways, and not a great choice for the fishing either. I should have anticipated the weather would put a dampener on fishing shallow for the ide and I couldn't get a bite fishing on the bottom. I kept feeding floating casters and chopped meat, but a team of ducks mopped this up. A couple of mallards picked up the casters while a pair of tufties swept the bottom and clouded the swim up. For the last half hour of my three hours the rain stopped, the sun came out and a few fish showed, four ide and a couple of trout

View attachment 30405

View attachment 30406

View attachment 30407

Very dark ide Kev, defo ide, but an unusual colouration....

 

[Islandbear]

@Crystal Bend nice post and certainly liked the bread one.
Will be trying that out
Looking forward to the Tench one.