Warwickshire Avon - Pteronarcophobia and Prestigiators

An influx of flies in the Newey household has led many a theory of how they have seemingly turned up from nowhere. Ben has been trying to squish them with his wiggly worm and Sam has been whacking them with his tennis racket, with much success I might add, but still they keep coming.

An undiscovered dead mouse corpse hidden from view ? some rotting food ?, that office window I've been leaving open ? the wormery going wrong ?

Errrrr no, now don't tell the Wife but I came home from fishing the other day to discover the door of the bait fridge was not only open, but what seemed like a good handful of maggots was sitting underneath the fridge and some had already gone on the run and make haste.

The problem was you see the maggots had sweated and I had somehow fitted the wrong lid to the maggot box. That ill-fitting lid combined with the moisture filled maggots lead to the issue that I now needed to contain.

So after a good while collecting the maggots, moving the fridge, lifting the crude loose rubber flooring to reveal more, crisis everted, the Wife none the wiser. 

But then a couple of hours afterwards a return to the garage there were more Goddam it. Not just the odd one either, enough for a gonk session for sure.

Where the heck were they coming from ?

Again another clean up from those I could initially see however this time I also looked behind the washing machine and tumble drier, and yeap, you guessed it, there were more !!!. 

Not a huge amount granted but still they were seemingly scattered everywhere.  

I didn't think much of it until a couple of weeks later it was noticeable there were more flies in the house. These weren't houseflies either, big'uns. Now at least I knew the source and how they came about rather than one of the theories the other house members had come up with.  

The numbers are reducing, my cover not blown, fingers crossed !!! 

For this short in to dusk session and with the weather mild I fancied a go for a Barbus. This short stretch has been kind to me in the past because it's a reliable area to get a bite. 

The river was also expected to rise going forward in to the weekend so with the levels and temps been settled for a couple of days the fish should have been used to the conditions. 

A quick smash and grab of tackle and bait I was hoot-footing it bankside. One rod, a small spicy boilie and a paste wrap, a small bag of pellets in a PVA bag as freebies.

I'm a roving angler at heart but the session wasn't even three hours so I decided to stick to one swim, chill and sit it out after having a busy week at work. 

The weather wasn't brilliant for the duration, the odd bit of rain around, dull and fairly windy. You cannot catch fish sat at home though can you, you need to embrace the conditions especially as the local rivers may well be in a different state altogether in the coming days.

The river looked good, the temperature up 1 degree from a couple of days ago I was hopeful. Now another angler was present when I got there, the only other angler to brave the rough conditions and he had been there most of the day without even a bite. Hmmm not a good sign but catch a feeding spell here often motionless rods can change at the flick of the switch so you just have to do the waiting game.

An hour in though without even a nibble or a pull from a chub I decided to move swims and then return as the light was going. Again after an hour biteless. The river looked perfect for a bite too. So for the final half an hour I found a lovely clear area over gravel right out in front of me, I waited and waited and waited, there was nothing doing at all.

With the light now gone the club rules meant I had to be off, so another blank to add to the list. I'll try and get out for another session though as this time fish some meat. The weather is turning colder as the start of next week  (13 degrees when I left at 4.30pm 😮 ) so the window to catch a Barbel is getting smaller and smaller, I need to make it happen.