How did you get on?

[@Clive]

had a day on the lakes near to where we live. Wilf is back from Portugal and champing at the bit to go fishing, but I was committed to being on call for a couple of friends who have car issues and might need a hand. So, I went local on my own so that I could be free to assist if required. As it turned out I wasn't required.

I started at a 25 hectare section of Lac Mas Chaban fishing two rods, one a Greys 12 foot float rod, Mitchell Match with home made waggler and maggot, worm and sweetcorn baits. The second rod was a Greys 1.75lb with a Lidl 300 size reel, one of the zander floats I made last week and the back half of a sardine mounted on a circle hook to wire trace. Today is the last day of the zander season on these lakes. It was very windy and cool too. I fished for two hours without a bite until just after 11am the zander float dipped and slid away. I tightened up and felt solid resistance. Unfortunately it wasn't the zander that I was hoping would grace our dining table tomorrow, but an out of season jack that knew no better.

I moved to the other side of the lake and fished a feeder for an hour without any interest.

I then drove about 15 minutes to the other big lake, Lac Lavaud, right round it to the other side and settled down about fifty metres from three French zander hunters who were fishless and a pole angler who had caught a few zander baits. I started with the waggler, cast as far as possible into 10 foot of water and with maggots scattered every cast. Second cast resulted in a nice roach and I ended up with between fifty and sixty. By the third hour I had managed to get them feeding two rod lengths out in 7 foot instead of the 20 odd metres into 10 foot intially required. Virtually all took on the bottom after the float had settled. Plenty of time to cast, catapult and strike. It was only in the last 15 to 20 minutes that they started to take on the drop. Single maggot to a 20 and 2.5lb hook link did the trick.

By 3pm I had discarded the coat and jumper and was fishing in shirt sleeves. What a difference it was when the wind dropped!

 

[ian g]

Met my fishing mate around 11 o'clock to fish above Shrewsbury . The stretch is slow and deep and was a favourite haunt of mine a few years ago when I was trying to catch big chub. Not sure why but there are some great chub in this stretch , I always used to fish bread flake or cheese paste on this stretch and have had a few 6lb chub off here along with barbel , pike and even a salmon all caught on bread flake . It's always a tough stretch and 2 or 3 fish is a good day . Any way today wasn't a good day for me fishing wise as I blanked but my mate had 4 chub so it must be me.

 

[Alan Whitty]

Well I sat on the Ouse at Bedford in a cracking roach and bream swim and made it look crap, one 3oz roach saved the blank...

 

[ian g]

Hard luck Alan , I'll be out again tomorrow on the Severn

 

[Alan Whitty]

That will be my last day on the rivers this season, hope you get a few tomorrow...

 

[flightliner]

I fancied fishing the pole yesterday afternoon and I hadn't been to the disused canal since last summer, so I headed there. I asked the one angler on it who was packing up how he'd got on; one bite, he said, and the match on Sunday had plenty of DNW's. It was either give it a try or go home. The place holds thousands of Ide, and these fish were brought here, as far as I know, to provide winter sport. Surely I can get a bite off one on a warm March afternoon? No, I couldn't.

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Today, despite blanking on my last three trips to it, I thought I'd give the Trent a try for chub. Steak and mince have been revived by some local anglers, so my bait for the afternoon was just some of Lidl's finest

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I called in at 3 stretches before I found the combination I was looking for: a swim where the risk of sliding in and drowning was low, with the kind of pace and crease chub like. Luckily, unlike those canal fish, the chub were looking for something to eat and I hadn't put the rod in the rest first cast before the tip bounced and the first chub was on

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The next three fish were a similar size, and then the swim died. I had a walk around to see if there were any other swims nearby, but I decided I was in the best place, so I lay on the bank in the sun, ate my lunch and gave the chub an hour to resume their positions. When I started again, I got no indications, so I put on a lighter hooklength and a smaller hook and cut bits of steak not much bigger than a maggot. Bingo! Two bites and the two best chub

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Superb chub kev, and the last two against the standard practice of "swim jumping" i watched a u tube video last night where the angler only gave his bait two minutes in the water before moving on- far to short a time (imho) for any swim to be searched properly.

 

[nottskev]

Superb chub kev, and the last two against the standard practice of "swim jumping" i watched a u tube video last night where the angler only gave his bait two minutes in the water before moving on- far to short a time (imho) for any swim to be searched properly.

Cheers Mick! Hope your hand is healing well. A friend had a great barbel session on Friday not far away and gave me the details. I turned up yesterday full of hope and the sun blazed all day, the colour dropped out and I found the swim he'd fished had somehow filled up with rocks overnight. It had to be a feeder job, not my favourite way to fish, and I added a couple to the tackle graveyard while failing to get a bite.

Your point maybe deserves a thread of its own - what people do outside of flogging a swim for the duration or moving swims after a couple of casts. Someone famous is supposed to have said it only takes a second to score a goal. I get the idea, even if you're unlikely to score if the ball's in your penalty area with a second to go. Maybe it's sometimes the same with catching a fish - if half a dozen fish would make a good session, it might be true that fewer casts/less time with your line in the water pays off. I remember the fashion for "bait and wait" tactics for barbel, feeding a swim but only casting once at widely spaced intervals. And fishing for chub by repeatedly casting in a maggot feeder with no hooklength for a time, adding a hook only when you think they're coming up and bumping the feeder. I'm sure people have other examples of that kind of thing.

 

[ian g]

Pretty disappointing perch season for me , well I think most of us so I thought I'd try and change things by giving a stretch near Atcham a try . Arrived around 11 o'clock , no one on but bright sunshine didn't fill me with confidence . Set up a maggot feeder with lobworm as bait and a float rod also with worm and fished down the side . Slow day saw me swapping the tip rod over to maggots . A couple of knocks on maggot followed and finally the tip goes around . I struck but the hook link came back bitten off . Back out again and around 2.15 the tip goes around again and I'm attached to a decent heavy fish , long hard fight on a 6 lb hooklink and a size 14 hook . I thought it might have been a carp but slipped the net under a very nice barbel 10.10lb . A guy came on around 3 o'clock , had a chat then he disappeared upstream into the next field . Not another sniff fish wise so I packed up around 6 o'clock . Met another guy fishing around the corner who was just netting another good barbel , 10lb on the nose . I'll try and fit in another session or two but weather looks a bit changeable.