The Close Season Zander Quest Pt.111 – Addle Plots and Athanasian Wenches

A week back, down at the deep bit, an area I only know about, some sections of lamprey and smelt left to do their thing. Pre-baiting if you will, now despite the session itself being mediocre this area had always been on my radar despite not catching anything over 5lb. The stamp of fish has always been pretty good, and a lunker is likely to be here even though I've not got near one yet.

When I left the sky couldn't be bluer. A lovely spring morning, that improved as soon as I got towpath-side. The mist just lifting off the surface, smelt on both rods, floats out. The water clarity is clear than I like for my Zander fishing. But that's not such of a problem when out there in front of me is half decent cover for a Zander to hold up, but not only that, it's over 5 foot deep in places.

So baits out tight to cover, a murmur of the left float within 5 minutes, some interest. A bite doesn't develop though, a small pull to change the baits position, it's now on the move. Going right to left the pull from the fish is confident as I wind down, take up the slack and lean in to the fish.

I can tell quick quickly if the fish is hooked properly or not straight away and this was a good hold. Hang on a minute though, now this feels like a good fish. It surfaces, sees me and then all breaks loose. It's now carted to my left and I'm following the fish down the towpath as the rod tip is heading towards the water. I have to release the clutch a little to give it some line otherwise I might have a hookpull, this are light gauge hooks after all. 

As soon as I think I'm on top of it, it goes on another strong run, this is giving me a fight unlike any other canal Zed I've caught, and believe you me I've caught a few. Eventually though after such a good fight it's tiring and I get it close to me and manage to scoop it in the net.

Now that's a good un !!!! In-fact my best for a while. A proper big belly on it, going 67cm on the tape and 7lb 8oz's on the scales. A good rest in the net and released to see another day. It's only when you catch a decent size Zander you realise what an impressive predator they really are. Shame I didn't get a picture from the front, because quite a wide fish, and in mint condition like most of these canal Zeds are.

Another 8-10 cm's would have been nice, but hey, if I do eventually catch that double figure canal Zander and move on to a another quest, it's a species that I love catching especially when fish like this turn up from time to time, very rewarding indeed, makes all those hours spend in dog poo riddled waterways worthwhile. 

3 fishing trips in so many days, this one only two hours but well worth getting up in the morning to catch these impressive predators.