Warwickshire Avon - Bush Botherers and Buckminsterfullerenes

The one day a week in the office for our small team is most welcome because it gets me away from the four walls which to be honest can become a little prison-like. Faces other than the usual does boost wellbeing for me especially when banter is part of the conversations away from the busyness of work which has never let up since I started on the project over 2 years ago.

Now some post pandemic home workers probably don't realise they have almost have Stockholm syndrome which is a condition in which hostages develop a psychological bond with their captors during captivity.

They are more than happy to work from home especially with the pump prices the way they are at the minute, how much !! 😖. However in this case the pandemic is the captor, and for many still especially the elderly it has still has the scaremongering grip firmly on them.

 

At least I've Saturday to look forward to as Fatboy Slim, aka DJ Norman Cook always puts on a good show, finally the life we knew it, a no-holds-barred hedonistic rave with scant regard for consequences. (well ok maybe not but I can reminisce ) 

Face coverings nowhere to be seen not even any late-80s acid-house revivalists togged up in Altern 8-style PPE. Social distancing and fear of one’s fellow man were checked at the door. 

Strangers no doubt hugging in the aisles and grim-faced security blokes tapping their feet. I've returned to normal like many have it seems, well the best I can anyway...

Now I need to break the working week up and despite the short days there are a couple of local venues I can fish in to dark with no issue at all. 

It means I can shut the CAD station down, cobble a few bits of tackle together and be bankside from leaving the front door in 10 to 15 minutes, and be back in enough time to make the tea and see off the kids to bed. 

The sessions are often short like this one was where where most of the time I know exactly what swim(s) I'd fish going in to dark. Now with the Avon low I wanted to fish this one particular swim that carries some depth. 

 

Strangely I'd not fished this swim before for the chub which would be my target as I'd only fished it for the pike in the past where I'd managed to winkle out some nice fish over the years. 

There is a nice bush to act as cover though and its always been on my radar because of it. 

The same tactics as the recent chub session where I'd fish my dedicated chub rod and a lump of cheesepaste. Dusk (16.49) would arrive almost as I'd just got my bait in the water so the tip would be illuminated with torchlight. 

I've had some cracking chub here in the past and even when the water temperature has been 3 degrees or so they can often be coaxed in to a bite.

I had some liver with me as well and as the paste would be fished on a hair I'd also also a small bite size piece to the hook for added attraction. 

Oh and one other thing, I'd also prime another swim with a couple of paste freebies so if the first swim wasn't doing the business after an hour I could drop in to the other swim for the last half an hour.

So anything doing ?

Well you can see from the picture below, errrrrr no !!!!

There were fish in the swim for sure as I did get the odd tentative pull so they were either small fish or very very cautious chub indeed.

There was literally no wind to speak of so a very pleasant time to be about indeed but when I got bankside to see a really low and clear river, I wasn't expecting them to crawl up the rod. I've experimented with bait quite a bit with chub and they can wide up to certain baits that for sure, so I might have to get the secret bait out sooner than expected. Very technicolour let's leave it at that. 

I fished an hour and a half past dusk and it was clear the fish were just not interested in either of the swims. The deep swim the line is almost vertical, but even that didn't produce, in-fact there was more action in the shallower swim, so on the next one whenever that will be, I'm not sure as I've a very busy weekend coming up.