How did you get on?

[S-Kippy]

Proper grueller today.

Another go for the big tench but they just didnt seem to be at home today. I had to wait until well past 4pm for my first proper bite which I hooked before everything went slack. Reeling in I found the dreaded curly pigtail....the hook knot had pulled which is rank bad angling on my part though it must be 25 years since that's happened to me.

So I'm expecting my first Crabtree Bad Angling award of the year from Brother Simon aka The Skimmer King.

An hour later a tench rolled over my feed and 5 mins later I had my second bite....a big drop back and a blank saving tench of 5-14. Just about anywhere else and I'd be hopping for joy at a fish of that size but ( so far) that seems a very average sized fish for this water.

Phil was in the adjacent swim and bar one screamer which he didnt hook ( I suspect a spooked liner) never had a touch.

I packed earlier than usual after a perch of about 10ozs. Nothing to suggest any more tench were about and I was down to my last eggcup full of bait.

Very odd. You really couldnt have picked a more tenchy looking/feeling day. Warm,muggy and the water looked dark and oily. I cant explain it.

 

[Philip]

Rare fulls days fishing for me. I was after Tench but whilst wading out to bait up I noticed a couple of good Rudd in the shallows. Grabbing the catapult I put out some maggots and they hooverd them up. That’ll do me I thought and grabbed a float rod and flicked out a bunch …one grabbed it on the drop and I landed this lovely Rudd. The Tench were less obliging, the big females evaded me but I managed a couple of lively males.




& heres one of the Tench...

 

[rich66]

Having a week off work I decided to treat myself to an evening session, I enjoy fishing into the dark but rarely do it. Not that I have tons of success just enjoy the evening not stuck in a shop working delivery’s.
Arrived about 6:30 after choosing a swim I sat listening to the birds singing and the carp slurping what a strange noise that is. No one else about .. bliss
Fished 2 lines 1 float to the left 4’ out from the margins baited sweetcorn and fed the same. The other cage feeder with worm and a few chopped worms in the ground bait. Nothing much happened lots of fizzing around my float, few knocks the odd tremble, plenty of carp cruising by on the top eyeing up the human on the bank.
After much faffing bait changing and altering how much was on the bottom etc. Finally connected to a bite on the float after a very short fight I landed a type of fish I’d never seen before. I believe it’s an Ide ? Now there’s a first. Still nothing much happening on my leger line few small twitches on the swintip but nothing much. Different baits sweetcorn, bacon roll still nothing. Changed tactics put an Arsley bomb on instead of the cage feeder, pellet banded a mussel to the hook and back out to within a foot of the far reeds. It’s only been there 5 minutes when I had a decent bite and hooked into a small common that went beserk. It managed to tangle itself with my other line and completely ruined that rig.
Decided after to put away the float rod it was 9:30 ish and couldn’t be bothered to set it all up again for 1/2 an hours fishing. Dropped my leger rig with a new mussel into the area I’d been float fishing all evening. Few more knocks then a serious bite landed me a nice bream ( yes I used the word nice and bream together) the bigger ones are certainly less snotty. Anyway thought I’d weigh this one came in at 5lb 2oz so new best for me on that.
Funny evening all in all, I feel I should have caught more but something I was doing was not quite right for that evening.
The swim

An Ide ?

Nutter of a common carp

 

[108831]

Yep an ide mate.

 

[Stalker]

First trip out this season last week to the Bristol Avon.

Pretty hard going, even though the conditions seemed perfect (muggy, overcast, light breeze) - two barbel lost first thing (one slipped the hook, the other went straight into a sunken tree), then just one chublet the rest of the day.

Heading back tomorrow to try again. Hopefully the chub will be a bit more forthcoming even if the barbel stay hidden.

Asking around though, it does seem to have been a quiet start to the season on the BA generally, with many people struggling to even bag up on smaller fish.

See what happens tomorrow, and then I intend to go further up the river and do some trotting for a few hours Friday morning before work. Fingers crossed.

 

[108831]

View attachment 6919

View attachment 6920

I disappeared to the same venue but a different peg and again caught a good variety of fish with several crucians amongst them. The one in the pic was perhaps the best. No tench but plenty of carp, bream and gudgeon. I actually came home because it was too warm which makes a refreshing change. Maggot, pineapple boilies( 8mm) and chick peas were the dishes of the day and I float fished again.

What did you catch those crucians on Mike,surely not chick peas?

 

[mikench]

No pineapple method boilies.

 

[wetthrough]

I'd drink my pi55 first. That's assuming I had a pot to pi55 in

 

[103841]

Second time this week we’ve had a Mornington Crescent moment, I put it down to the weather.

 

[mikench]

There's dehydrated in that you are hot and thirsty and dehydrated as in need of an intravenous drip.

 

[Mark Wintle]

For reasons I cannot understand I've been unable to catch a roach over a pound from my local Dorset Stour since Feb 2016; hundreds of roach, yes, some nearly a pound, yes, but not a single pound-plus fish. I know they're in there, I've tried hard but to no avail.In the past I have had hundreds over a pound from the Stour including 20 over 2lbs so it's not like I don't know what to do, and there have been plenty caught by others to well over 2lbs in the last three years. Elsewhere on local stillwaters I've had a few lately over a pound to 1-11, and from several different waters, too.

But today after a hard afternoon's fishing on the Stour I've finally put one on the bank and hopefully the first of many. I tried hemp and tares last week and the response was tepid but today they were a bit more willing and I ended up with about 20 roach with quite a few of 8 - 12oz, some dace and chublets, lost a good chub, saw a carp, and at last landed a decent Stour roach of 1-12, all fish on a tare on the hook.

 

[Another Dave]

First river session of the season yesterday. Struggled to even find my first swim, it's the last one i discovered and fished back in March. Had to walk round to the far bank just to calculate where it should be. Eventually dropped in the The Hole, but i think my scrambling around killed it, hopefully i can ninja it next time. Completely hidden here, bit of link ledgering:



Next swim i took the link off and stuck a 'strike indicator' on with half a cocktail stick, big lob trotted through produced a fair perch:



Final swim was the shallow water under the ash trees where the visibility is excellent. Spotted a few small chub then was amazed to see a jack materialise from the river bed right underneath me staring at the lobby. I had some 2kg wire traces (0.1mm) with me but in the 2 minutes it took me to bite off the hook and tie on a trace and lure he had melted away as quickly as he appeared. Lovely to be back out.

 

[mikench]

Well done Dave! Isn't the Orinoco a bit far?

 

[seth49]

Set of later yesterday, with intention of fishing for the carp later on in the margins, arrived at twelve and had a walk round and talk to some friends who were already fishing, not much being caught, mainly bream, so we started with a carp rod in the side, and fished a method feeder in front, for what ever came along.

Just bream to a couple of pounds, had a dozen or so, then put two carp rods in close, fed some pellets and sat back to wait, result no carp just more bream, never saw a sign of a carp, probably getting ready to spawn, now it’s warming up.

Didn’t take any photos, nothing of interest to photograph,, bit of a let down really, expected more,

Back to new fishery tomorrow, seem to be doing better there.

 

[mikench]

An early start ( 5.30 am) this morning for a days fishing with Gordon(wetthrough) on a new water to him but one I am very familiar with. Gordon float fished and I set up my feeder rod. It become warmer as the hours passed but a very pleasant day was had and thankfully the fish obliged.

View attachment 6946

This was the cutest fish of the day caught by Gordon and just one of several varieties of baby carp caught by him plus a few considerably larger versions and several roach. I think he enjoyed it. I certainly did.

View attachment 6947

This was my peg and I had 12 carp to 6lb and a tiny roach which took an 8mm boilie. On reeling it in it looked like a silver lure attached to an oversized jig head.

Thank you Gordon for a most enjoyable day; we have both earned our pint or three this evening.

 

[wetthrough]

Great day thanks Mike. Looking forward to the next.

 

[Pete Shears]

I can confirm that the alleged heat wave has not reached south Leicestershire,cool in a NE wind this morning with low mist and cloud blotting out the hills around the reservoir,glad I haven't ditched all the winter clothing just yet.
Another wildlife watching trip apart from a bream of about 3lb which took a liking to an esterberry boilie.Two buzzards,a kestrel,red kite,great spotted woodpecker,kingfisher,flock of long tailed tits,no osprey today.Still haven't heard a cuckoo.

 

[rich66]

I can confirm that the alleged heat wave has not reached south Leicestershire,cool in a NE wind this morning with low mist and cloud blotting out the hills around the reservoir,glad I haven't ditched all the winter clothing just yet.
Another wildlife watching trip apart from a bream of about 3lb which took a liking to an esterberry boilie.Two buzzards,a kestrel,red kite,great spotted woodpecker,kingfisher,flock of long tailed tits,no osprey today.Still haven't heard a cuckoo.

Nor East Leicestershire either Pete ! Hopefully it’ll warm up soon.

 

[108831]

Nor South Bedfordshire either,Saturday I believe is going to be a shock to the system...

 

[The Runner]

Walk out to my favourite spot Rubha Hunish today, nice day, light cloud and a gentle NW breeze. And dry for the cliff scramble down to the headland- have no intention of ever attempting it when its wet and slippery, this shot taken on my return with the way up and down to the left of the pic might give you an idea why not...
View attachment 6948
Got out to the end on the East side to find the tiderun really motoring
View attachment 6949
so set up with 20+gm jighead and started on a paddletail. No action at all from first spot, moved along a bit to some higher rocks (in the background here )
View attachment 6950
about 20 ft above the water but gave me a bit of a crease to fish along. Soon hooked what felt like a smallish pollack, which came off, and immediately after had a couple of short takes without hooking anything. Tiderun stopped, as did any fish activity, so made the short move around to the west side, set up beachcaster with sandeel on a running ledger to fish itself and worked a variety of lures along the edge. Nothing for over an hour, decided to go back to the high ledge where had had only signs of fish. Tide had turned now, current not as strong as at the start, half an hour of nothing on lures so decided as last throw of the dice to trot a sandeel close in. Set up 10 gram slider at around 15 ft deep to start which went through at a nice stick float pace. Third run through, pound pollack, one a bit bigger five minutes later and twenty minutes after that, a better one
View attachment 6951
which is now in fillets in my freezer. Pollack usually all go back but float and bullet wedged in a crevice as I started to handline it up and the swell knocked it about a bit too much before I got it free.
Only activity after that was a guillemot which took the sandeel- no pic as was too busy avoiding being pecked. Safely returned no worse for wear.

Wildlife other than on my hook included the usual seals and a full array of seabirds, lots of fulmars about, shags everywhere, guillemots, tysties, gannets offshore and these two bonxies sitting about behind me waiting to chase them
View attachment 6952
As usual here , skylarks singing everywhere on the walk back to the road- lovely.

Might be cleaning Grahams of Inverness out of frozen sandeels next week...