Warwickshire Avon – Up, Up and Ebay

For the first session of the new 2015 river season I wanted to go and have a look at my favourite stretch of the Warwickshire Avon to see if I could spot any decent fish and also to see which swims were accessible for some future trips I had planned. For this short evening reccy simple tactics were to be employed a link ledgered worm or a couple of maggots on a new rod and reel set-up. Ebay and alcohol doesn’t really mix well does it, ones trigger finger cannot consciously be controlled and you tend to bid for things you wouldn’t ordinarily do if you were nonindulgent. One evening in the closed season after a Zander trip and with the Wife out ,the kids safely tucked up in bed and a couple of cask strength Finlaggan’s consumed , I bypassed xhampster, logged in to Ebay and got browsing. Half an hour later, I’d bought a new JW Young Centrepin and an 11ft TFG River and Stream rod, certainly an expensive evening especially when I’d also managed to bid on a car.

Come morning, a private message and a white lie sorted the seller of the classic mini, pesky kids….

It’s a lovely dainty piece of carbon, very very nice indeed and ideal from me as a roving angler who handles his rod so much (no, not an euphemism) …. To be honest, I’m glad the grain kicked in, it’s one of my better intoxicated purchases as it looked like it hadn’t even been used. The rod consists of one butt section and two top sections, one being a 1lb 2 oz test curve standard tip that will accept screw in swing tip, the other a spliced in quiver section that feels about 2oz or so. Despite being TFG, it looks like a Freespirit blank to me. This is my third TFG rod and I’ve always been a fan of them, good value for money and perform very well. Ok I’ve a smilar’ish Drennan Avon Quiver Rod but a fisherman cannot have too many rods can he.

I got it delivered to work too; the Wife was none the wiser…for some reason she thinks they are breeding….

I’ve my eye on some river carp for the next few weekend sessions as I don’t usually target the Barbel till later in the season I was just glad to be out fishing on flowing water. I’d not got a species in mind but to christen the new rod a dace, roach or perch would be nice.

When I arrived bankside the river was far clearer than I thought it would be, the first swim was my autumn Perch banker swim, it’s an area of slack water which is a bit deeper than the norm. I loose fed some hemp and maggot and positioned the worm. The worm probably didn’t even hit the bottom when the rod hooped over. A fish was on, it felt half decent too and after getting it under control I saw it’s flanks, it was a half decent Chub. It didn’t put up a particularly good fight and when landed it wasn’t in the best condition, a pike mark on Its side and rather hollow. Other than that it was a decent fish for this particular area of the avon and come wintertime it will be well over 5lb. It weighed 4lb 7oz and 1oz off my PB.

I fished 4 other swims and caught fish out of everyone, only small cublets and perch though. I bumped in to another angler who had caught Perch and also some small Barbel which is encouraging. There are big Barbel here but as I was underguned if I hooked one I called it a day as 9.30pm. So nice to be back on the flowing water, it’s certainly been missed.