Warwickshire Avon - Braunschweiger and Brachymetropia

I really wasn't that bothered about going fishing, however to be fair I had promised Sam I'd take him again. The weather wasn't brilliant with a cold-ish wind that would bump the quiver tip all over the place but in the end I gave in to Sam's wimper.

He wanted to fish the same peg we had caught some chub from the other day but upon arriving at the secure car-park we knew those cars would be in the peg(s) we wanted to fish, we just knew it.

And we were right on our assumption, as a couple of matchman with enough gear to start a tackle shop of their own were in our intended pegs. But the two next to each other have always been some of the favoured pegs on this section.

A chat with one of them, he'd managed a few chublets and also a small barbel but was struggling with anything decent to put a bend in the rod. He said the river isn't fishing that well of late and many anglers are struggling. They'd be off before dusk I know that just when the big fish start to venture out for a mosey about.

We left them to it and headed to another swim that holds some decent fish which was only a 5 minute walk away. We were out of bread however on-route I could stop off at the shop and get some, well that's what I thought because they'd sold out of literally everything, thankfully I'd had a back-up plan, some lambs liver left over from a lunchtime cook-up. 

If you're a reader of my blog you'd know I've been experimenting with liver to catch chub for a good while now. It does seem to single out the bigger fish so I was looking forward to see what we could catch once the light went.

It really is a like a switch on the Warwickshire Avon where as soon as the bats appears the bigger fish do to. That was an hour away so Sam got catching minnows using some bread in a cup where sadly he didn't manage to catch any of the bigger ones.

It kept him occupied though, because apart from the odd rattle the liver was doing naff all in the fairly deep swim. If we didn't know any different we might have moved, but then Sam who now wanted in on the quiver rod was all set-up ready to go. 

I've mentioned before there is a strict curfew here where you need to be off half an hour past official dusk so you need to connect to any bites you get if possible. Sam missed three really powerful bites where he hooked in to nothing when dusk was with us, and the chub were really on to the bait. We'd primed the swim with some pellets when we got there, helped I think.

I decided to have a go and the same thing happened to me, an unmissable bite missed where literally the 1 ounce tip bent all the way to where it connects to the rod and then some more.

With curfew approaching Sam let me have another chance at it where this time I managed to connect to a chub that didn't actually put up much of a fight. A 4lber I say because when I lifted it out the net for a quick photo it weighed more than I thought. So at least we'd not blanked, Sam had another 5 mins but no more bites sadly but the good thing about travelling light is that you can be eek the last dregs of the fishing session out and be off within a minute or so.

I'm sure the more visible bread had been the better option but still it just goes to show that chub really will eat anything in order to quell their hunger.