Transient Towpath Trudging - Pt.113 (Bream Bay)

For some reason my sleep has improved immeasurably of late, I'm not sure why and hopefully it will continue because I feel better for it. To be fair with the weather the way it was over the weekend, not a bad thing either as I'd have had to fish in the rain both mornings if I did get out.

Bank holiday Monday was a shower dodging day however post a late afternoon BBQ dinner I decided to head up to bream bay where Nic from Avon Angling had 11 bream from the other day. I'd gone for a wander up there at the tail end of one of my sessions and the fish activity really was quite ridiculous. I'd ran out of time though and Nic returned the following day and cleaned up.

I got bankside around 6.00ish to see the surface as still as anything and no sign of fish whatsoever, not only that within 5 minutes of arriving the heavens opened and the shower amplified to umbrella requiring levels. Luckily I had decided to don my waterproof gear. 

Anyway something different for this session, I decided to use feeder tactics to reach over to the far side which is a bit of a chuck with a float. I rarely use feeder tactics on the canal but I've caught plenty of bream using the method so was I missing a trick ?

I decided to ball in some sweet groundbait and small pellets to kick two swims off and used a simple cage feeder a long shank feeder hook and alternated between corn, worm and maggot, oh and the odd time bread. The rain stuck around for a good 40 minutes or so which made trying to spot any fish activity impossible really, but the motionless tip was 2nd best 😀

Thankfully the rain stopped and the surface as like a mill pond but both of the baited area there was no sign of feeder fish whatsoever, then out of the blue a decent bream rolled out in the middle of the track well away from the shallower areas I was fishing.

No sooner as I got the feeder over to that spot I had a confident pull round of the tip and a fish was on. Now often canal bream because of their slab sides give up some good resistance, but this fish despite being over a couple of pounds I almost just reeled it in.

I felt sorry for it to be honest, because it was slimier than the usual stamp here so after a quick photo in the net I quickly returned it, hoping that the swim would kick off knowing now where the fish were. 

But sadly that never happened, the bream were just not here, or in a feeding mood so God knows what was going on. It's feature filled this bay and it usually holds fish because of that, but not today. The mist started to hug the water around 8.30pm or so and I could have fished till dusk and beyond but with over 2 hours fishing without much success and a black cloud coming my way I decided to call the session early and maybe come back another day.

It's a lovely place to be this area because you overlook open countryside and because it's a trek to get here with all your gear it seems to put anglers off.

Then again the amount of walking I do on the locals canals I rarely see other anglers. Where the heck are they, well ok many anglers hate the idea of a slimy bream tainting their landing nets, but it's the mystery for me, in relatively untapped waters.

You really don't know what is going to be on the end of your line in these narrowboat free waters (sadly just temporary), well luckily until the rivers are open again was is nice. I'll be back though and maybe the deeper track is worth a proper go next time, fingers crossed the weather will improve.