Ta for the Tesco Toastie Tip-off!
Went out Thursday pm, sunny, fishery crammed, got settled on E. bank, in an easterly wind, but because of trees, and the multiple bays and promontories, the scum was building up under my feet, and a carp popped up for a look at me before I'd even set my box down. So much for Plan "A", which was to ignore carp and go roaching.
I quite quickly snaffled a four pounder on a chick-pea, and not long after, a six-pounder most gloriously browny-bronze; a steam-punk's dream in assorted leathers and metals.
Here endeth the good bit.
The downy scum was building into snotballs on the line which had to be cleared at frequent intervals, and one of these had worked its way behind the tip ring, so the handful of slack I pulled off as I put the rod down didn't go to keeping the float in place, but round the reel handle, where I failed to check with my usual paranoid zeal.
Brute picks up pea and, hooked, steams into middle(thanks!) of lake. Muppet spots tangle and frantically tries to pull enough slack to free it. Handle gets in on the act and conceals true path of line round its spindle. Handle is attached to metal "receiver" (so is held onto the wood by two screws rather than one) which is lens-shaped, with sharp corners ...ping... exit carp, taking a very nice, ancient Harcork float with it.
Bother.
I left the landing net in the water... against my superstition, but top match-wallahs do it...
Then a baby tench, a glorious omen for the future; and a smash take, probably from a trout, on bread.
I could see my net more clearly than before, looking oddly pale...
A rudd, swung to hand; always like to catch the odd rudd, but I'd hate to be sat on a shoal of small ones.
My net was now floating! the paleness was bubbles- but why? I took it out, and it looked like a brewer's balm-pot. Oxygen from drifting algae? CO2 from fermenting seeds borne in by the down that was driving me nuts?
A couple of small, netter bream, then a final baby carp that can't have been caught before: it took off like a torpedo and stayed so deep, so long that I thought it might be a double. When I finally netted it, I couldn't stop laughing, I doubt if it went two pounds! A Mirror, too, really playing against stereotype.
Every lifetime or so you get a bream like that, don't you? One of life's little puzzles.
The sun dipped below the trees, I put my pullover on, but then my knees froze and it felt like home-time.
Lessons:
- Must round off the edges of those receivers, and maybe use superglue and pixie-dust to build up anti-tangle rings.
- Cheesepaste: only a tiny bit of wet, pressed bread needs to be added to kneaded cheese to produce a paste firm enough for summer use. (One bite, missed)
- If I'm going to take a box, I must take a table, there just isn't enough ground in easy reach, nor under-chair storage space. Or tidy my act up. Fat chance.
