How did you get on?

[nottskev]

With a couple of feet of water on and the river racing through and a soupy colour, there's only one species to fish for. And it's not bream. Which suited me fine as I continue to leave the pole, the micro shot and the size 20 hooks etc at home and fish for barbel.

I'd had a text from Steve at some ungodly hour; he'd been on the bank since 5.30 or something, and the pic of a decent barbel arrived before I was able to focus on it. About 2 in the afternoon, I thought I'd join him, but it turned out he'd left the river about 3 minutes before I got there. Since he'd caught a few, and the swim options had been narrowed down by the conditions, I set up in the swim he'd vacated.

I'd only been fishing for 10 minutes when I had the first bite, and I weighed this one at 11lb 14oz, and it gave me a bit of a run-around in the heavy flow.




Between 2.30 and 6.30 I got bites at intervals, landing 7 from 8 barbel bites , and not hooking a single chub despite the liberties they were taking with the bait. After a spell of fishing in a t shirt, I spent the afternoon zipped up in a jacket hoping my hat wouldn't blow off in the wind. I hope the summer will resume; I didn't like this taste of autumn.

 

[daniel121]

Club fixture today on the River Colne, my local stretch. Drew a peg I’ve not fished for a few years, it used to be a hot chub peg but not today.

On arrival I noticed the branches above the peg, that put paid to using 3 of the long rods I’d packed, ended up using 11’ ultralight, not the most suitable for the job...

As you can see there’s a tree down across it downstream to my left, so just a short trot.
4bb stick float to a 20 red maggot hook. Single maggot to start and it was just like most pegs on the river, perch, dace, chublets and gudgeon for an hour then dead.
Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a carp stick it’s head out over in the lily pads. No way I was casting into there. Later it popped up again but my side of the pads, then a telltale row of bubbles as it dredged the bottom on its way upstream. I quickly cast above it and let the float come down towards the bubbles.
Float buried! It was on.
I had it on for what seemed like ages when in reality was about 30seconds. I almost had in netting distance, my little rod hooped over as it made a dash for the bank and under the tree root on my left and ping...
The air turned blue, much to the amusement of the people in the pub garden opposite..

Winning weight was 13lb with 10lb second.
My 4:2:0 came nowhere but wasn’t bad compared to others..

Winning is not as important as enjoying mate. Lovely bet of fish, I'd personally love to catch a few of the river that's in good nick like that.

I miss river fishing

 

[sam vimes]

Another fairly short (3 hours or so) trip to the river. Much less water and much more productive than last time. 28 dace, 4 grayling, 2 chublets, the obligatory trout and masses of minnows. You'd think a size 12 hook and bunches of maggots would put the minnows off, but it doesn't.

 

[john step]

With manageable winds today I went to my pit to have a play with my new 14ft Accy ultra. Cor!
Some decent roach +skimmers on hard banded pellet and perchlets on dead reds.
Line pick up and the cushioning effect for light hooklengths is amazing.
The tip is still intact too!!!!

I got away dry all day until the last hour when the heavens opened and bites ceased.

 

[flightliner]

THose big Trent roach have my appetite whetted so yesterday I was on a tidal reach all prepped just before the big 7+ metre tide turned.
Slowly paced for a while on account of it bites and fish were there from the off.
Sadly no roach but decant Bream that tho I like them immensely I didn't want them on this occasion but my pellets and double 12mm krill boillies hair rigged were proving irresistible .
Some of the Bream were in the 4+ bracket and really fought hard in the still lazy flow.
Later the pace picked up noticeably and the bites slackened a little and the pellets seemed to lose a little of their appeal but the double boillies didn't, all part of angling mysteries I suppose but maybe why we find it so appealing.
The last few fish were all skimmers, and hybrids.
Can anyone tell me how the fish below can get two half inch baits in its mouth - then the hook on the hair behind it as looking down its throat there's barely enough room for one?
All in all I enjoyed the day but the roach never showed in a swim I know has turned up the odd "two " .
I may be back later to try again.
image host website

 

[103841]

Ive also noticed Flight that if a bream gets the slightest bit of hybridisation it fights so much harder.

 

[flightliner]

S63, correct, I was using a four ounce rated quivertip and they put a really big bend in the rod. One time I thought for sure I was playing a very small Barbel.

 

[neil1970]

I went down to a swim which hold a good number of Perch on Sunday evening.
The plan was to thin out the smaller ones, to give myself more of a chance when the big ones start hunting at dusk.
Didn't quite work out, but I had some fun catching the little ones.

 

[Pete Shears]

Back on the local canal feeder reservoir this morning.The recent rains have pushed the the level up about 2ft more and it will be full,in fact it is higher than all last winter.
Two method feeder rods out ,sit back and wait with a coffee.A sparrowhawk flew low across the water followed by a couple of crows,three wihite egrets were prowling the shallows when the plastic corn was away resulting a in female tench of 5lb 11oz.Some time later two bream either side of two pounds followed on the plastic corn and a roach which needed netting - weighed 13oz and in pristine condition.
Had two bites on the other rod with a pink wafter but both fish fell off,bit of a puzzle as the hook was very sharp having tested it on the end of my thumb accidentally.

 

[mikench]

I had an enjoyable 5 hours floater fishing today with the DV and all were caught on bread crust. I wasn't going to post here as it was uneventful and carp are carp but I also had several bream which clearly thought they were trout or marlin. Bream puzzle me in that they are either like a bag of water or lunatics. No fish were harmed during my exploits and i enjoyed missing so many wily fish.

 

[nottskev]

Back to the river for a couple of hours this evening. It had dropped down 2' since Sunday, and I didn't like the look of it - it looked neither one thing nor the other, if that makes sense.
I found a swim that had a smooth glide at the right pace, but the only things to show any interest were chub. They're pretty well uncatchable on a hair-rigged bait. I put up with their cheek for a while, then took the hair off, buried the hook in the bait, swapped the feeder for a bomb, ditched the rod rest and touch-legered with a loop of line so I could give them a bit of slack when they started their games. This allowed me to catch a few, all about this size



but that bit of sport dried up after half an hour and the barbel were still refusing to play - perhaps they'd eaten themselves into a stupor with all the recent high water - and the wind had that unwelcome touch of autumn in it, so I packed up. About 5 miles down the road, I realised I'd left my landing net on the bank, and going back for it just about completed a day to forget.

 

[John Keane]

Another evening trip to the club lake. Got there about 3:00 and set up one peg away from where I fished last week. Decided on inline bomb and pellet again (if it ain’t broke why fix it?) However I was most looking forward to giving my Darent Valley 0.75lb rod and new Daiwa Regal X 2500 “baitrunner” a good workout. Plus I’d bought a couple of Fox Black Label Mini Swingers to try instead of bobbins and chains.

After a few casts to clip up to the island I started and, having fired a few pouches of pellets over the top, I settled back in the chair to wait. I find with this type of fishing that it’s slow getting started but gets frenetic the more bait you put in.

Anyway, around 25mins in the little alarm screeched and, after a short fight, an F1 of around 3lbs which the DV rod handled beautifully. More F1s followed and some smaller, lovely conditioned mirrors and commons and then a mirror of around 6 - 8lbs which gave the rod a great workout.

My second DV arrives via FedEx tomorrow and I’m thinking that it’s the ideal rod for this club water which contains F1s to 6lb, carp to 20+ with lots of high singles and mid-doubles and barbel to 6lb. I certainly would have no worries about the rod if one of the 20’s happened along.

I don’t think it’s too early to say I LOVE THIS ROD!

 

[sam vimes]

My usual evening session, this time on the gravel pit. Only the one bite for a 4lb 7oz tench. Only went to avoid the village fete funfair which is about 100 yards from my gaff. Only stayed as long because the footie was on the radio.

 

[seth49]

Back to old fishery today, fancied a go for some silvers,for a change, picked a corner swim, which has been good for these, on for six o clock, first thing was to put carp rod in margins on alarm, which never did a thing all day.

And then set my pole up, drennan white hydro,6-10 elastic, plumbed up to fish at top kit plus two sections, bait was either six or eight mm soft pellets, maggots or small cubes of meat, feeding two swims, one by a bush and one straight out.


Caught mainly bream and skimmers, plus a few roach, did lose a good roach at the net as well.

One thing I didn’t want to see was an Otter which came of the small brook behind me, ran past me and dived in the pond, just up from me, I could see the the trail of bubbles go across the pond and it went out the other side, just hope it keeps going.

Anyway I caught fairly well all day, when I looked at the clicker about three o clock, I’d caught thirty eight fish, so as I was feeling a bit tired, I thought right two more, and I’m away, which I duly caught, so a decent day, no big roach caught yet, but there usually better to catch when it cools of a bit.

Mick is back fishing on Thursday, so we will be back on new fishery.

 

[daniel121]

Well before I write my memoir of my days fishing, I will say I find it so difficult to upload photos onto this website. I love the pictures on other peoples posts but every time to upload one the site tells me to suck an egg, it's too big or something else.

Anyroad ... moan over back to my day;

Yesterday, I had a day on a trip to the local club lake. My lad fishing next to me and we had a great day in the sun chatting away. Not a serious fishing trip and the lake was not exactly on form, its worth noting its of a little of a moody lake is the particular lake we was fishing, one day you can bag and the next struggle.

we had a uneventful morning with me and my lad mainly play argument fighting, to the onlooker it probably sounds like we hate each other but it works for us and we had the lake to ourselves so why not have a laugh? All of a sudden it kind of dawned on me that I might be able to strike a win over my lad, which on man made waters is a rarity to say the very least. So I kept him chatting away with our banter.

At the weigh in I weighted 12lb and he weighed 8lb and a few ouches. Small carp, ide and roach. Very hard day where every fish counted but enjoyable Of course I said my usual "imagine how much more than you, I would of caught if I could see properly" Then it was off to the pub for a rare free pint on the way home, looser pays normally we don't have one nowadays but I insisted on claiming mine!

 

[maggot_dangler]

Had a nice session on tern fisheries today just over a mile from home so it is worth it .
Started the day on Prawns then switched to Luncheon meat with great effect had 8 fish in all got pictures of three of the smaller ones

https://www.fishingmagic.com/forums/members/maggot_dangler-albums-tern-picture7398-ternf3.html
https://www.fishingmagic.com/forums/members/maggot_dangler-albums-tern-picture7397-ternf2.html
https://www.fishingmagic.com/forums/members/maggot_dangler-albums-tern-picture7396-ternf1.html


PG ...

 

[mikench]

As i alluded to in the Morning post i was up early meeting Gordon( Wetthrough) at 6.15 am at the famous Dam. This is a large water which at 150 yards wide at its widest and over a kilometre in length . We chose to fish at the opposite end to the Dam wall which is much narrower. Gordon with masterful understatement said the pegs might be a bit muddy!

View attachment 7400

That's the man himself. My peg was better. Gordon float fished and I started on the feeder. I couldn't get a bite on the feeder despite trying a wide variety of baits so I switched to the float an de just as well I did as I immediately began to catch small roach and the odd perch. I finished with fifty and Gordon had eighty nine. My iPad has just stopped me accessing numerals hence the figures in words.

View attachment 7401

The view above is from my peg. The Dam has some very large carp to 30lb, Pike to similar, bream to 13lb and perch to 4lb if you can find them. It was a little difficult climbing down a muddy embankment to the peg with all the gear- good job I had crampons and a rope.:wh

Thanks Gordon for another enjoyable day. As autumn draws near I think pike should be my next target.

 

[wetthrough]

68! The clicker was upside down. A most enjoyable day thanks Mike. Just a shame the promised monsters didn't show.

 

[john step]

I had an enjoyable 5 hours floater fishing today with the DV and all were caught on bread crust. I wasn't going to post here as it was uneventful and carp are carp but I also had several bream which clearly thought they were trout or marlin. Bream puzzle me in that they are either like a bag of water or lunatics. No fish were harmed during my exploits and i enjoyed missing so many wily fish.[/QUOTE

Glad you are getting them on floaters now. Bream can be very peculiar. Every now and again one will jump clear of the water when hooked. I guess yours did that.

 

[mikench]

There is always the next time Gordon.

That's just what they did Pete having taken crust off the top they then breached like a whale and skimmed across the surface.