Warwickshire Avon - Banjo's and Bandobasts

Autumn is in full swing now with the leaves falling off the trees and littering the garden. The mornings more often than not start misty and overcast and then with the light breeze the skies clear nicely, the dinky 1000kg Jimny praying for snow because there is some on the way apparently, well will we see, we are in a global warming climate emergency after all. 

Millions of kids want to clean up the earth to reverse it, millions of parents want them to start with their rooms fist. So some escapism will do nicely at the moment with this constant doom and gloom from the sanctimonious, so lets go fishing. 

The problem is, is that the Avon is back to clear again and with the skies also being clear fishing can often be tough for the bigger fish, so where to go what to do. I need some thinking time....!, out with the comfort food before finishing for shutting down the computer for the weekend !!!

Now the Egg Banjo is probably the most recognised snack in the Military (and often referred to as 'The Food of Gods) but why is it called an Egg Banjo? Well ingredients are simple, heavily buttered thick sliced bread, and one or more fried eggs.

Ok to many civilians, it is basically a fried egg sandwich, however within the military, it is widely known as an ‘egg banjo’ because when it is eaten, egg yolk usually squirts onto the eater's shirt/jacket, typically resulting in the person raising their sandwich out of the way, to approximately ear height, while they attempt to ‘strum’ the yolk mess from their shirt with their free hand.

Resulting in the appearance of someone playing an air banjo....

My effort though isn't quite an Egg Banjo but a rather nice egg mayo sandwich that contains three eggs, one boiled which is halved with the yoke still soft and then topped with traditional egg mayo. Simple I know but often simple ingredients makes the tastiest of food. A sprinkling of salt, a dash of white pepper, jobs a good'un.

So after that belly filler after a rather busy working week I fancied a Zander, the problem was the only window of opportunity I'd have really would be mid-afternoon which lets be honest is not ideal for Zander that like to feed in lowlight where they are the top dog, however this section of the Warwickshire Avon I'd been doing ok to be fair.

Ok nothing massive admittedly bu the bigger fish don't give up easily now do they. !!!! 

It helps that it carries some depth which I'm sure can only help because the deeper the swim, the darker its depths.  Also with the river low I could also fish the weir swim which has produced some zander for me in the past. The disturbance caused by the oxygenated water also providing a safe place for the zander to lay in wait. 

It certainly feels like the predator season has kicked in because there was a few more anglers on the bank but also the wind was blustery and the back of my neck a little chilly. The fish are wanting to pile on the ounces going forward and I prefer the autumn and winter for my fishing, its those seasons I cannot wait for. 

As I mentioned previously the Avon is back to clear again and when you can see the clearly one metre down as I could for this short session I thought bites might be hard to come by, but how wrong was I.

A small zed and a jack decided they wanted the roach deadbait, a 2.5" whole fish tempted the jack pike and the cut section was devoured by the zed. It took forty five minutes to get a bite though but not unexpected given the conditions. Now when the bites dried up I followed the river downstream and would end up in an area I'd finish in.

The problem was that it was littered with leaves and not only that but the flow was mimicking a washing machine so it was quite difficult to keep the light float set-up presenting the bait properly. 

I persevered though and eventually after half an hour I had a dropped run it didn't last long so would usually indicate a small zed with eyes bigger than its belly. Dusk was around half an hour away so no point moving now because there was certainly fish in the swim. As the light started to go the right hand float which was quite close in bobbed a couple of times and then buried straight under the surface.

What I did expect was what was on the end though because a greedy chub had taken a liking to the 2.5" whole roach deadbait. Not unexpected I suppose because I've caught chub on deadbait before but I was fully expecting a zander.

Oh well and that was a wrap, no more bites and a strange session but then fishing is one of those pastimes where the unexpected can happen. Oh and the chub was 3.5 - 4lb so not exactly massive but welcome all the same as especially when you can often rely on a chub to bite when other species are not interested.