Piscatorial Quagswagging

...the diary of a specialist angler in around the Warwickshire Avon and its tributaries.

Friday 16 April 2021

The Close Season Zander Quest Pt.190 - Barbarity and Babeldoms

I looked out through the blinds of the office to see the windscreen needed a scraping and the heated seats would need to be switched on and did wonder whether I should bother or not. It's notable how the bites dry up when the cold blooded fish are kiboshed with another cold spell especially as they don't know which way to turn. 

For many the spawning put on hold for sure, there is no doubt about that....

So with the well deserved week of work though if I didn't get out to fish then I'd probably only regret it. 

As I said in a previous post there is a no better time to catch canal Zander, the problem is though at the minute is that overnight the temperatures really do plummet and the fish are not particularly moving around that much. 

Next week could well be the change I'm looking for because I'm sure their is a quest concluder here I've just not caught it yet. Apart from this hot spot I was put on to the only real way of finding the bigger fish is to drop a bait where they are laying up.


That's easier said than done because the canal network whatever one you are on is a rather large body of water. 

No F1's packed in to mud puddles to be seen here....!!!!

The more I fish for them though thick cover is certainly one of those fish holding areas so after a biteless hour in the swim that has brought nearly all the decent fish of late, it was time for a rove. It certainly didn't help that the skies were clear and the sun was illuminating the floats as soon as it rose. 


The swim is surprisingly shallow considering the size of the fish it holds but conditions like this will certainly out them off. The hard frost overnight wasn't ideal but still the fish will feed providing they are comfortable to do so and you can find them.

I caught a decent scraper pretty quickly that had been hiding under a boat hull but it was a waspers delight size and not exactly what I was after. 


Still a reasonable canal Zander though and when they are in such good condition like this one it was hard to complain about it.

What wasn't helping was that there was a tow on the canal which was bringing down the grass cutting from a recent No.1 from the CRT contractors and so much grass in-fact it was pulling the floats away from their position. I decided to get my walking head on and went up to an area of containment where the huge body of water put a rather large lump in my throat as there was far to much to go at. 


Fishing makes up some of my weekly exercise though and as the morning was very nice indeed catching fish is a byproduct of this pastime of ours. Enjoying the wildlife, the fresh air and countryside a big part of it and that on its own is a great wellbeing booster. 

You see I don't particularly enjoy fishing canals because the footfall as times can be a pain in the proverbials and this session was not different. By 10.00am dog walkers in numbers, bikers in abundance and joggers in groups. 


To be fair nothing to cause a major issue but not exactly solitude which you all know I need to seek. This quest is a means to an end though and despite having more fishing time at my disposal after blanking in the containment and catching a schoolie in a snag filled swim I called the sessions short.

I just wasn't feeling it and to be fair I don't think the fish were either. With my jab booked for Saturday afternoon that feeling could well be prolonged, maybe not a bad thing as it will be nice to give the swim a rest and also the improving weather could well get them feeding again. 

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