Canal Roach - The Sisyphean Task ? Pt.11

Some rum fishing stories you hear these days...

....the former chairman of the National Federation of Fishing Tackle Retailers was attacked by a 60 lb. Celebes ape. And a black leopard cub was found gambolling along the banks of the Medway. Not so long before, wallabies were going hoppity-hop around a bunch of anglers who were trying to concentrate on the fishing near a safari park. Another angler made all speed backwards when a hippo walked out of the water.

All we were short of was a ghost and then, would you believe, a phantom fisherman disappeared before the very eyes of some flesh-and-blood lads.

None of this surprises me. I've been used to it ever since that parrot walked in front of the car in Hemel Hempstead. But what next?

I'll tell you. With the aid of the Parker Plastic Ball. Going through the cuttings in 1976, I note a sharp increase in the number of Yeti- Bites-Man headlines.

There was the lad at Monton Bridge who was trodden on by an elephant.

'It left me feeling pretty flat,' he told an Angling Times reporter. There were complaints from Pixie's Mere about low-flying pterodactyls swooping on floating crusts.

'It's about time the council stepped in,' said a spokesman for the Anti-Dinosaur Vigilante Committee.

An angler at Redmire had a titanic struggle with what he thought at first was a 60 lb. carp. It turned out to be a go-ton scaly thing with big teeth and six legs.

'If I'd thought on, I'd have had it set up,' he said. 'But as it was, I took it home for the cat."

The only bit the cat left, a 12-foot thigh bone, was sent to the Natural History Museum by registered post.

An angler at Claydon Lakes, who put the boot into what he thought was a Golden Labrador eating his butties, discovered his mistake when it chewed his leg off.

'How was I to know it was a lion?' he demanded. 'I'm studying animals in a weekly-part encyclopaedia, but they've only got up to D.

Perhaps the most unfortunate angler of 1976 was the table-tennis- playing proprietor of a Chinese takeaway shop. 

He was fishing an ornamental lake in an attempt to meet a rush order for six hi-gois and prawn balls, when he was carried off by a 60-foot gorilla. The gorilla took him up to the belfry of the local church and used him as a clapper to play a triple Bob Major.

How could we forget the headline of the year?:

PING PONG CHING CHONG

IN KING KONG DING DONG

Must go. As I type this, a funny round thing has landed on the lawn. Some little green fellers with BBC 2 aerials sticking out of their heads are walking towards the shed.

Now, what is it you say to these lads? 'Green man speak with forked tongue?' No. Er. 'Lead me to your taker?' No.

Never mind. It'll come to me in a minute. And I'll get me name in t'paper.

I certainly won't get my name in the paper again with this big roach chase as after a capture of a really nice canal roach that I managed to get in the angling times, the quest has largely gone backwards. A few areas have been tried and some nice fish caught, but none really the size I'm after really. 

However the loss of what I'm sure was a big roach from the same area I caught my biggest from it raised my eyebrows a little as there could well be some big ones still lurking. 

The small roach were showing right away and once they stuffed their little bellies with the freebie bread slop it was those with  more capacity to mop up the rest. 

Even those small roach were managing to get the size 12 hook in their mouths which surprised me, but then the activity on the float the big bit of bread I'm sure they whittled away to next to nothing, before almost hooking themselves. So I was back to have another go to see what I could winkle out. 

An early start this one with the boats now up and moving after the lock has been fixed and the change on the colour of the water was all to see. Maybe that's why it took a while to get the first bite !! The weather was horrid too, light rain and with the wind coming from right, not exactly pleasant with.  

The warmest spring since records began, my backside. Anyway the first fish was a small roach and a few more followed throughout the session. I also lost another big roach I think, after it just came off. Nobody likes to see that, now do they 😠, I've had it a few times recently, might look at a different hook pattern me thinks.

Anyway a couple of skimmers, one single hybrid and then eventually a nice roach a couple of ounces under the pound. Not that long but proper thickset so it had obviously been getting its head down to feed. I'm a bit canaled out now I think, thankfully next weekend I can get back on the rivers where many of us belong.

As soon as the first boat headed my way it was time for the off. To be honest it was a fairly quiet session I must admit. But fishing with bread is very selective to be honest, ok you will still catch small roach once they have reduced the bait size but I'd catch more no doubt if I fished maggots. Bread just seems to work for the bigger canal fish though, especially roach they seem to love bread.