October is generally one of my favourite months, but the last five weeks seem to have been some of the wettest I can remember in a long time. Yet, checking with the Met Office, it seems that it has been a pretty average year. I must have just picked all of the wrong days to go fishing I guess! That said, the results have been interesting, with some lovely fish coming to the boat and bank, along with trips here there and everywhere!
The month started with a trip up to Cudmore with fellow Peg One angler Jimmy Coffey, our plan for the day was to shoot a feature on winter method feeder tactics and, with a steady number of fish coming, we got the feature put to bed without too much difficulty, despite the frequent rain showers. The only real incident of the day was my long-suffering old car having a fit on the way there and almost dying on me. On the way back it seemed even worse, I was almost coming to a standstill on the hills and was being overtaken by lorries! Even turning the radio up REALLY loud didn’t seem to make any difference (this is my normal response to most car related issues).
A few days later it was off to Rutland and then Grafham in the company of Rob Orton. The fishing, pretty much as expected, was tough, but we got there in the end. Rutland is a great venue to learn about zander as there is a big head of small fish to be caught. OK, you aren’t going to catch anything earth-shattering, but confidence comes with catching fish when learning new methods, and if you want to try vertical fishing this is the place to do it.
As it happened, the first couple of fish came to a cast lure fished slow and deep, and were a reasonable stamp of fish. Interestingly, they came to Berkley Split Belly Shads in Fire Tiger pattern – a colour combination that does seem to work well for me on the ressies.
Later in the day we swapped arms and dropped on to one of my banker areas for a spot of vertical fishing. We started getting hits almost straight away and ended an enjoyable afternoon with a good number of fish between us. When there are two of us fishing similar methods in the boat I will often put my boat partner on what I believe is going to be the best lure and then spend my time experimenting with other patterns. This is a great way of trying out new patterns and colours and it was interesting that the fish were definitely showing a marked preference for Rob’s cappuccino-coloured finesse shad.
Split tails really have an amazing action underwater, the whole body almost forms an S-shape as you lift and drop them. They might not be as obvious as the deeper-bodied shads, but there is something about the action that the zander like. They also, I suppose, resemble a tiny zander in shape and colour.
Day two and we were off to Grafham. Reports were not too good, it was fishing hard with lots of blanks, and I was in two minds about whether we would be better sticking to Rutland, but in the end I felt we could get a hit or two if we worked hard.
The fishing was certainly as tough as expected, but after fishing both vertical and on the drift we finally found a pocket of fish and Rob had a cracking zander on the light casting outfit. I marked the spot on the GPS and next run through Rob was in again. This one was certainly no zander as it shook its head and powered away under the boat…
Eventually up she came and a 20-pound plus pike went into the net first time – what a brace – and although the rest of the day passed bite-less Graf had done the business once again.
The car situation was now getting to the stage where even cyclists were overtaking me on the hills! It was a case of pretending to be ‘driving Miss Daisy’ and keeping my head down behind the wheel. Still, the car would be going in for surgery, but the garage couldn’t fit it in until the following week, and there was a pretty major obstacle looming large!
I had to make a quick run over to Wales for a couple of days’ work and checking out the route it didn’t look too bad, except for one short piece about two miles long where the ominous arrows etched on the map hinted that it might be a bit steep. There was nothing for it but to plough through the rain and try to keep my progress as swift as the water on the roads and my spluttering motor would allow.
Of course, when I finally made it to the steep bit there was someone going even slower than me in front and with no way of overtaking it was time to change down a gear, then another, and another. With only one gear left I was thankful that my little car didn’t leave me stranded halfway up a Welsh mountain in the pouring rain, but get over it she did. Now there was just the matter of the return journey a couple of days later…
I normally manage a couple of trips fishing in Europe each year. To be honest, having travelled all over the world for work in the past it has pretty much knocked the need to travel to far-flung places out of me over the years; it is just all too much stress, especially when it is supposed to be a holiday! I also, strangely perhaps, do not really have any desire to catch exotic monsters, I’m quite happy with what we have here in Europe thanks, as there is still so much to do and so many great places to explore on my own doorstep. From Huchen to Ferox, via big pike, monster barbel and whatever else may come along – that will do for me!
This autumn’s trip was planned to be a short hop over the channel to The Netherlands in search of pike with Thijs van der Sanden, and his mate Robert-Paul. Thijs is actually really good mates with fellow Peg One angler Lewis Baldwin who had kindly invited me along on the trip, and so it would be the four of us fishing over the weekend (You can read Lewis’ account of this trip in his blog which appeared here on FM recently).
The Dutch are generally much more advanced in their lure fishing tactics than we are in the UK, and have adapted a lot of the American tactics to their home waters. Fast bass boats, big lures and hit and run piking are the name of the game, and compared to the generally pretty static fishing we do in the UK, this is high-octane stuff. You cannot help but learn new things when fishing abroad and I have brought so many tactics and ideas back from my trips to Europe that have really influenced my lure fishing in particular. Everything from vertical fishing for zander to cranking spinnerbaits through the weedbeds have been learnt from friends in Europe.
Of course it rained…
When it wasn’t stair-rodding down, the wind blew so hard that the boat disappeared deep into the troughs between the waves. And sometimes the rain came down and the wind blew as well, making just staying dry and not falling out of the boat challenging enough. I took up a strategic position close to the middle of the boat where I could wedge myself between the edge of the deck and the centre chair. From there I could just about hold position and cast at the same time, but by the end of the first day my knee was black and blue, with just a solitary ‘jack’ for my trouble.
We spent most of our time fishing a large lake, some 15 kilometres in length, but in the main only a few feet deep and, unsurprisingly, the water turned a deep chocolate brown and the pike sulked. With perseverance we ploughed on and eventually caught a few fish, but it was definitely game, set and match to the weather gods.
Finally the car went to the garage, leaving me stranded at home for a few days and with no way of escaping it was time to catch up on some work and try to dry some of my gear out and make some sense of the massive pile of festering gear that had spread from the shed into the back extension. Yes, it was wet and it was certainly muddy!
Eventually the car was sorted and it turned out to be less terminally expensive than it could have been. Of course nothing ever goes quite to plan and now I am the owner of a car with a lovely big dent in the rear wing where a lorry driver decided to drive into it whilst parked up at the garage. Cars – don’t you just love them!
With the nights drawing in and the water temperatures falling fast it was quickly getting to the stage where we would have to knock any underwater photography on the head for the winter. Getting out at this time of the year is always difficult as you really need good weather to get any useable material and that can be in short supply. Stuart Morgan and I had a date in the diary and for once things went pretty much to plan. We managed to shoot quite a lot of new material that will keep me busy editing and writing about over the next few months. We even managed to shoot a small amount of video for a new project we are planning for next year. Just rough and ready stuff, but it did prove that what we wanted to do was technically possible and worth pursuing.
Pitsford is not a reservoir I know well, but I had a day booked on there and was confident that we would find a few pike. Although it does throw up some big fish, this ressie is normally more about numbers of fish and plenty of action, but as usual the weather had other ideas!
For once the rain wasn’t as bad, but it was windy. An early fish and another bumped had us hopeful of plenty of action, and a few follows right up to the boat had us going, but the tally remained steadfastly stuck on one. I did fall somewhat for the charms of Pitsford though and will definitely have a few more trips there next year.
Roll on November; let’s hope I managed to stay dry a little more frequently this month…
