A change of venue from our planned day out to Blythe Waters because the Carpers in our group found out that there were no floating baits or dog biscuits were allowed at the original venue and you could 'Spod' (I have no clue what this means either) only if it didn't interfere with other anglers. Apparently this reduces the chances of them catching anything from the surface and so we ended up back at Woodhall Lakes. I'm not complaining though because it is still a day of fishing but I was looking forward to fishing new water and all the challenges that brings with it. The Carpers have been busy preparing baits for the last few days and getting their new toys ready for Sunday's adventures. Richard has his new Carp Cradle and Damian has his new rods, bivvy, rod rests and whatever else he purchased to have a play with, and the pair of them had arranged to fish through the night from 3pm(ish) Saturday, sleeping bank-side and having a little camp out. I'm not sure if they had a little sing-song around the camp-fire or just concentrated on the fishing though, but a photograph of Damian holding the 15lb Carp he caught does suggest there was a fair amount of alcohol consumed. Luke and myself joined them on Sunday morning, though as usual I turned up late.
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| The photographic evidence |
I have been busy getting a few bits and bats for myself and have managed to get the bottom half of my Dad's old fishing umbrella sorted with a new storm stick that I bought from Angling Direct (Halesowen). The original part had what looked like an arrowhead on it and it looked like an old fashioned spear. It was used by one of the kids for the Roman soldier in a school nativity play, painted brown and never returned to us, so I have had to cobble together a 50+ year old brolly with a new section. I should be okay if it rains and we only have a very light breeze, anything other than that could lead to trouble, in fact I'm not too confident that it will stay together if a squirrel farts anywhere close to it. However, it is the only thing of my Dad's old fishing gear I have left so I will find a way of making it work. It kind of fits in with the rest of my gear though now, a mixture of old, new and donated. I could find myself becoming a sponsored angler at this rate, but only if Oxfam, Dr. Barnado's, Help the Aged or any other charitable organisation sponsor anglers.
I didn't feel the love for fishing at the start of the session and it showed with my clumsy approach to everything. I took forever to set up the peg, setting up the rod took another age and if anyone had offered me a chance to go home I would have snapped their hand off. My saveloy-esque fingers could not function at the same speed as my mind and I had a severe case of the 'dropsies', which did nothing to improve my general demeanour or attitude. And then the rain came......Now I wasn't phased at all by this and I soon had the umbrella up over my new fishing chair that I got from Emma for Father's Day but Dad's old umbrella is over 50 years old and looks like it as well. While the others were all safely ensconced under their fancy new nylon shelters with all of their gear nice and dry, my old canvas umbrella just about covered my chair. The rainwater filled up my clip on containers on the side of my seat box which soon began to sag dramatically, it got into my maggot box, it dripped down the back of my neck, my legs were soaked and to top it all off it even got into my cup of coffee that I had poured myself pre-downpour. I haven't felt so miserable for ages, I was tired, I had a temperature and I was hungry. This was going to be a long, long day.
The rain soon passed and Richard came to my rescue with a surprise breakfast he rustled up on his camping stove and I was presented with an ex-military mess tin with bacon, sausages and a hash brown cooked to perfection. It was the best breakfast I have ever had and I will be eternally grateful to Richard for it. The hash brown, bacon and sausage worked their magic on me and I suddenly felt a bit more alive and ready to face the day. I finished setting up my rod with a crystal waggler with two No 6 shot to lock the float in place and then 3 x No 8 shot spaced out in the "shirt button" pattern down to a Size 16 Snap Lock Swivel and finished off with a size 14 hook. The weight would pull almost all of the float under the water leaving just the tip above the surface. I just needed to sort the depth out now and move the float up or down accordingly to have the correct amount of line below the float to fish an inch or two off the bottom. (How technical was that ?)
The peg that I was fishing from was next to a large bush, with two groups of reeds in front of me and trees behind me, the water was about 2 to 3 feet deep in the shallows, dropping to around 6 feet, about 10 to 15 metres out. I wanted to hit this drop off as it would improve my chances of larger fish, rather than in the margins where the newly hatched fry would be hiding from the predators and my first cast produced almost instant results as I beat my personal best with an 8oz Perch. I had followed the "feed little and often" method and the first hour or so saw a mixed bag of Roach and Perch, but I had tempted the much smaller Roach out of their hidey holes and a few were quickly hooked as they took advantage of the free feed of maggots. I love catching Roach, but the Perch do my swede in because they nearly always take the hook right down their gullets and it can be a nightmare to unhook them, so I decided to fish a little further out and started to feed up those areas to tempt the fish into the swim.
Now it may sound like an idyllic day spent with great company, relaxing bank-side and doing a spot of fishing, but the truth is that it was about as frustrating as it gets. The reeds at the front were a nightmare and I got the line caught in them more times than I care to remember, losing at least three hooks to them, the bush to the side limited casting to the right-hand side of the swim, the tree behind me meant that casting any sort of distance was problematic and when I did manage to get a decent cast, I twice had the waggler ripped off the plastic plug on the line and lost two of my best floats. To make sure I was really frustrated, the swim was full of weed with very few spaces where I could hit the lake bottom so I needed to be accurate with the casting. The language was foul to say the least and it was a good job that young Rhys was at the furthest peg from me or he would have learnt a few Anglo-Saxon phrases he had never heard before.
Damian thought it would add to my frustration when he appeared on my peg, giggling like a schoolkid with his landing net in his hand. I thought he had caught something and was bringing it to show me, so imagine my surprise when he deposited a dead duckling at my feet and then ran off in fits. Thanks for that !!!.....Apparently it had floated into Rhys's swim and he had asked an adult to help him move it, unfortunately he got Damian. I must admit that when I had scooped it up into my landing net, my first thoughts were to see if Luke's car was locked and if not, place the object in the spare wheel well and cover it up, but considering he has just had a new baby a month ago I felt that maybe that wasn't the best idea. Instead I dropped it into a ditch behind Damian's peg and left it where a fox or cat would find it. As the day wore on and I had my issues with casting sorted I settled down into things and managed to land a total of 40 fish including my first Tench and Rudd, so I was very happy with that.
Due to the marathon overnight fishing session Richard and Damian left just after 3pm, leaving myself, Luke and Rhys to carry on fishing and I moved into Richard's old peg and was soon joined by Rhys who fished next to me for the last few hours and didn't bring his jinx with him this time....The day had started off miserably with the overcast grey skies and the rain, but ended in glorious sunshine with azure blue skies, the kind of day when you're glad to be out and about.
See you on the bank-side......
I didn't feel the love for fishing at the start of the session and it showed with my clumsy approach to everything. I took forever to set up the peg, setting up the rod took another age and if anyone had offered me a chance to go home I would have snapped their hand off. My saveloy-esque fingers could not function at the same speed as my mind and I had a severe case of the 'dropsies', which did nothing to improve my general demeanour or attitude. And then the rain came......Now I wasn't phased at all by this and I soon had the umbrella up over my new fishing chair that I got from Emma for Father's Day but Dad's old umbrella is over 50 years old and looks like it as well. While the others were all safely ensconced under their fancy new nylon shelters with all of their gear nice and dry, my old canvas umbrella just about covered my chair. The rainwater filled up my clip on containers on the side of my seat box which soon began to sag dramatically, it got into my maggot box, it dripped down the back of my neck, my legs were soaked and to top it all off it even got into my cup of coffee that I had poured myself pre-downpour. I haven't felt so miserable for ages, I was tired, I had a temperature and I was hungry. This was going to be a long, long day.
The rain soon passed and Richard came to my rescue with a surprise breakfast he rustled up on his camping stove and I was presented with an ex-military mess tin with bacon, sausages and a hash brown cooked to perfection. It was the best breakfast I have ever had and I will be eternally grateful to Richard for it. The hash brown, bacon and sausage worked their magic on me and I suddenly felt a bit more alive and ready to face the day. I finished setting up my rod with a crystal waggler with two No 6 shot to lock the float in place and then 3 x No 8 shot spaced out in the "shirt button" pattern down to a Size 16 Snap Lock Swivel and finished off with a size 14 hook. The weight would pull almost all of the float under the water leaving just the tip above the surface. I just needed to sort the depth out now and move the float up or down accordingly to have the correct amount of line below the float to fish an inch or two off the bottom. (How technical was that ?)
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| My peg and those damn reeds |
The peg that I was fishing from was next to a large bush, with two groups of reeds in front of me and trees behind me, the water was about 2 to 3 feet deep in the shallows, dropping to around 6 feet, about 10 to 15 metres out. I wanted to hit this drop off as it would improve my chances of larger fish, rather than in the margins where the newly hatched fry would be hiding from the predators and my first cast produced almost instant results as I beat my personal best with an 8oz Perch. I had followed the "feed little and often" method and the first hour or so saw a mixed bag of Roach and Perch, but I had tempted the much smaller Roach out of their hidey holes and a few were quickly hooked as they took advantage of the free feed of maggots. I love catching Roach, but the Perch do my swede in because they nearly always take the hook right down their gullets and it can be a nightmare to unhook them, so I decided to fish a little further out and started to feed up those areas to tempt the fish into the swim.
Now it may sound like an idyllic day spent with great company, relaxing bank-side and doing a spot of fishing, but the truth is that it was about as frustrating as it gets. The reeds at the front were a nightmare and I got the line caught in them more times than I care to remember, losing at least three hooks to them, the bush to the side limited casting to the right-hand side of the swim, the tree behind me meant that casting any sort of distance was problematic and when I did manage to get a decent cast, I twice had the waggler ripped off the plastic plug on the line and lost two of my best floats. To make sure I was really frustrated, the swim was full of weed with very few spaces where I could hit the lake bottom so I needed to be accurate with the casting. The language was foul to say the least and it was a good job that young Rhys was at the furthest peg from me or he would have learnt a few Anglo-Saxon phrases he had never heard before.
Damian thought it would add to my frustration when he appeared on my peg, giggling like a schoolkid with his landing net in his hand. I thought he had caught something and was bringing it to show me, so imagine my surprise when he deposited a dead duckling at my feet and then ran off in fits. Thanks for that !!!.....Apparently it had floated into Rhys's swim and he had asked an adult to help him move it, unfortunately he got Damian. I must admit that when I had scooped it up into my landing net, my first thoughts were to see if Luke's car was locked and if not, place the object in the spare wheel well and cover it up, but considering he has just had a new baby a month ago I felt that maybe that wasn't the best idea. Instead I dropped it into a ditch behind Damian's peg and left it where a fox or cat would find it. As the day wore on and I had my issues with casting sorted I settled down into things and managed to land a total of 40 fish including my first Tench and Rudd, so I was very happy with that.
Due to the marathon overnight fishing session Richard and Damian left just after 3pm, leaving myself, Luke and Rhys to carry on fishing and I moved into Richard's old peg and was soon joined by Rhys who fished next to me for the last few hours and didn't bring his jinx with him this time....The day had started off miserably with the overcast grey skies and the rain, but ended in glorious sunshine with azure blue skies, the kind of day when you're glad to be out and about.
See you on the bank-side......
Glad you stuck the day out buddy, can't go fishing without cooking up a breakfast boi..
ReplyDeleteBest breakfast I have ever had mate....You're a star
ReplyDelete