I fished a 100+ acre water for pike yesterday with an old friend .
The night before the weather forecast was pretty dour with sub zero temps and snow in various parts of the country so a five o-clock alarm was hard to respond to fearing what I might see from the bedroom window.
Well, surprise , all seemed ok so an hour later I was off on my way to meet my friend who no doubt would beat me to the venue .it was still dark when we met and some half hour or so later we were both ensconced in our chosen swims with th rods out with various deadbaits.
The sun rose above the horizon and I knew we were in for a lovely sunny day that was nice to be out in but maybe not for fish being inclined to feed , especially after the cold night previously.
We were sat having a coffee when at 10-30 my drop off fell away on my mackerel head bait but sadly the pike decided to look elsewhere for another meal and dropped the head after only a few seconds.
That was it, no runs all day but it was glorious in the winter sun .
My friend is a keen birdwatchers so during the day he kept me informed of some of the ones that kept appearing from time to time .
About noon two big geese flew around us and my friend informed me that they were Egyptian geese --some that I'd never seen before.
He went on to say that two had escaped from captivity somewhere in the uk not so long ago and maybe they were the ones but no matter from my point of view as just seeing them was a first and I appreciated my luck.
We sat until sundown when the far side of the lake was covered with hundreds of gulls resting for the night safe from predators.
The water has "pike history" from decades back and a venue that I shared some good fortune myself in those times but rumour has it that it's not what it was-- maybe needing a few years more before it regenerates itself back to its former glory.
Still. It was great to be out on it even tho by the end of the day we were reduced to simply reminiscing !
