Warwickshire Avon – Petricores and Ponasks

The walk down to the lair of giant Chub I was greeted with that pleasant smell that frequently accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm, dry weather.

There is a word for it to apparently, that being ‘petrichor’

Basically, the scent of rain on dry ground. The word was coined in the 1960s by mineralogists studying the chemical composition of that scent. Petr- is the Greek root for stone, and ichor was the word for the blood-like substance in the veins of the Greek gods. So petrichor would be the divine essence of stone.

Enough of the preamble though, just breathe it all in !!!

For me though it signals the return to fish actually biting and rivers likely to rise above and beyond a trickle. You see the river Alne I really wanted to get stuck in to wouldn’t even feature a rubber duck race at the minute, desperately need of some water, like many of the local rivers. I’m impatient and disgruntled I know, but I’m sure there are some specimens to be had in this new river I’m fishing for this season. It looks very roach’y to me but conditions need to be right for the Roach to show themselves.

A little like following a doddering Honda Jazz driver insistent on taking up the whole road and straying over the white line and whom brakes as someone dares to come the other way, patience is a virtue.

I’m sure there will be opportunities to overtake soon, just bite ones tongue a little harder.

You’ll be bankside soon enough I’m sure Mick. The problem is time waits for no man and there are swims I’m sure hold decent fish, Right Now !!!

So what's will determine good conditions then for a dabble for the Alne Roach, well a dull day, or at least not a clear blue skied one. Anything above a moderate wind is bad, unless it's warm westerly in which case it doesn't matter too much if it's strong, or even gale force.

Afternoon temperatures of 6 degrees or above. Less than 4 degrees hesitate about going. Heavy rain in the proceeding days not an issue, as the extra rain could just have served to colour up what is usually gin clear water. 

Hmmm, not that soon then !!!!

To get my mind off it, I was hoping the recent rain we had would have topped up the levels a little, down this little section of the Avon and spur the fish to feed. I was hoping that I was in their comfort zone as well because this was a rare midday session, having only really fished it morning and evening. My kids have their snack times, and I was sure these fish would be happy that the biscuit time was waving in their faces.

Let’s be honest here, Chub when they feed have the blinkers on and are quite easily caught once they are feeding but it’s that initial confidence boost the chub need to get over their worry’s and anxiety. I’ve seen them happily stay deep with food going over their head, but once one queues up at the buffet table, a few more usually follow.

5lb on the nose has been my best up till now and having seen and lost a bigger fish I need to keep trying for something that I know would be a cracking Warwickshire Fish. A 5lber ain’t a bad’un because it took me long enough to get that monkey off my back, but there are bigger fish here still, I know that for a fact. 

So tactics, well you’ve seen it before, a 11ft rod, centrepin and a large hook, you cannot get much simpler than that.

For this session though a change, an addition to the bread, some cubes of spam. You see a couple of swims are ideal for rolling some meat under some cover and along the clear gravely bottom. Oddly I've not seen Barbel here since the start of the new season, but they are good at hiding themselves, and probably feet from you in places. A moving bait sparks some interest though, a little like a predator with a lure, a chubster reaching for their outside of a kebab shop.

This bit of river rises quite quick with a bit of rain and sure enough when I got bankside it was flowing nicely and with a decent colour. 6 or 7 swims fished and oddly it was the first swim I fished that I returned to that produced the fish.

Floating bread did the trick after it became confident in picking up the bait. Not a huge fish for this stretch as it went 3lb and 7oz's but it gave a decent scrap in the current. Despite the meat rolling in some decent swims it didn't produce any fish and also the floating bread was only taken off the top in one swim. Hmmm, surprised as the conditions looked ideal albeit the wind was quite strong. Ok, only 2 and a bit hours, I'm in two minds what to fish for tomorrow morning Barbel or Zander, I'll have to mull it over with a beer me thinks.