Warwickshire Avon - Splenitives and Splodgenations

Rudd again were the target for this evening’s session headed in to dusk. On my terms though this time, I had the prise the rod away from little Sam’s clutches the last visit, not only that but I couldn’t get a word in edge-ways, not exactly relaxing let’s put it that way. Nic and Anastasia would be swim side as well for this session.

So slightly different tactics as well, this time some a few No 8’s to help the maggots down a little faster through the water column and I’d also have a sleeper out with a small maggot feeder and short hooklink, where I’d alternative between breadflake, corn and maggots.

Now the Rudd’s bottom jaw protrudes past the top, giving away the fact that it prefers to feed from above, be that on the water’s surface, or on food as it falls through the water. Its pelvic and anal fins are usually bright red but can be dull orange if living in coloured water, whilst the pectoral, dorsal and tail fins are sort of a muddy-red colour.

To the untrained eye Rudd are often mistaken for roach, the easiest way to distinguish between the two is to look out for the brilliant colouring of the Rudd’s fins and its bottom jaw which is set forward, unlike the roach which has its upper jaw set forward. I cannot see how you would misidentify them myself, maybe when they are really small but yet to a couple ounces and above, they are wildly different to me.

However because Bream, Roach and Rudd all spawn at roughly the same point in the year, hybrids between the species are not impossible and are in fact quite common. The Rudd-Roach hybrid causes the most confusion amongst anglers, as the two species are already quite tricky for some to distinguish between.

A Rudd-Roach hybrid will often look mostly like a true Rudd or Roach, but will have some confounding features, such as an extended bottom jaw, when everything else about the fish suggests it to be Roach, or vice versa. To be fair a couple of fish I caught the weekend appeared to show characteristics of these strange specimens! And could well have been hybrids.

Now I didn’t manage anything half decent last time, even a jack pike would have think twice over the mere toothpick, but there are much better fish here hence my return. You’ve got to fish for what is likely to be biting in these conditions and Rudd particularly in the summer months is a worthy quarry.

What else to target ? well chub off the top, eels, or trotting for whatever comes along, just maybe not wade in to the bleakakke (™ Russ Hilton ) seemingly going on at the minute, wrong in so many levels and target them specifically there will be casualties.

The river is full of them at the minute, for the Pike, Perch and Zander It’s like a conveyor of Haribo Tangtastics put in front of a kid in need of a sweet fix, after a while the gluttony wears off even Jack, Billy and Zedlet would be looking for the stop button.

After a swim was raked the bite were forthcoming with Nic managing a bite a chuck for the fits hour or so. Now I was fishing away from the raked swim but was fishing above the weed which is quite thick here, however I was still catching fish, bleak, small roach and my target the Rudd. Those fish were in the 1 to 2 oz range when out of the blue a much bigger Rudd turned up. Ok not big in the scheme of things but I rarely catch Rudd on the Warwickshire Avon.

All 6.2 Ounces of it. A lovely fish though, nice proportions and fat. After hooking a duck which took my maggots on the drop a couple of foot down, the bites dried up, not helped by a boat that churned the bottom up to be fair.  Anastasia was back catching the perch though and I lost count of the fish she caught by the end of the session.

As the light went I started to pack up as the bites were hard to come by but after a small bream out of the blue Nic's float buried under and a half decent fish was on. It was giving a good fight for his size and "A hybrid I reckon" said Nic. He was right, a roach bream hybrid, all 1.6oz's of it and a good scores on the board for the bloggers challenge. 

The sleeper rod remained untouched but there is too much weed here to fish it effectively. I will be back, this time for a dawn session and will fish and bait it a bit differently. I'm sure there are more surprises to be had.

Warwickshire Avon - Silk Snatchers and Simeonites

With the local rivers seemingly stuffed full of bait fish at the moment and the river being clear, what to fish for. Certainly the Barbel don't seem to be interested in a stretch where usually there are fish in numbers. Spawning who knows but after speaking with other anglers, they are wondering the same thing, where have they gone.

For this short morning session I decided to fish in and among the lily pads, an area that has not only thrown up carp in the past, but also tench believe it or not. Even with the river as low and clear as it is, the float stop need to adjusted time and time again, because it has some depth to it as well. 

Where the bait eventually settles away from the shoals of hungry bleak and dace, one would assume it would be a nice place for a Tench to hang out away from those that would prefer to partake in the rave.

I don't float fish enough because when I do, I really enjoy it, the concentration required is something a little different and when that static float eventually starts to move, visually as a fisherman there is nothing quite like it.

I fished lift style under a large crystal insert waggler and its a great method, the float lifting out the water and almost settling on the surface when the bulk shot is displaced off the bottom when the fish picks up the bait.

I used groundbait initially to get some bait on the bed, a mixture of dead maggots, hemp and small pellets. The fizz on the surface evident it was adding some attraction. Corn for bait because maggot would pick up unwanted small fish such the biomass at this time of year. There were a few pike hits when I was there, one jack even launched itself out of the water such the ferocity.

Sadly straight to the point, after half an hour the first bob of the float and then it sailed away, a small dace of three ounces decided that it would like a gob stopper. And that's as exciting as it got. Once the sun came up the amount of small fish I could see on the surface was ridiculous. The bigger fish seemingly not interested, even the bream.

But that's fishing for you, sometimes it's nice to be out, especially when you can watch a feeding kingfisher, a novice in a rowing boat flapping and flailing, a butterfly chasing a dragonfly. 

Warwickshire Avon - Spice Islands and Spindle Shanks

250grams of decent lean beef mince, chopped red onion, half a teaspoon of coriander powder, half of ground cumin and lots and lots of salt and pepper makes the burger you see in the picture. I don't like to mess around when I comes to barbecuing, bigger the better.

Huge lumps of pork shoulder slow cooked on the Webber kettle being one of my favorites, no real finesse just meat, meat and more meat. In complete contrast though, for this session I had to go a bit more reserved, because Rudd were the target for this morning’s short session, you see an area I’d been told about by Nic (Avon Angling UK) was well known to him.

With the third series of Stranger Things on the TV,  I assembled it to pay hommage to the 'upside down'. Stuffed in the grilled bun, the thick hommade burger, large flat mushroom with baked egg within it, cheese slices, sliced tomato, red onion, some green leafy stuff and a mayo and sriracha chili sauce, the only thing missing was the bacon. I'll remember that for next time, a burger should be done properly or not at all, chicken and chorizo filled in the gaps.

Rudd and Roach shoals can be found in numbers here apparently, hence Sam in tow. If there are bites to be had, Sam is up for it, especially if it’s for a new species.

Now I caught Rudd from the Warwickshire Avon before, often providing sport during the summer months when nothing else seems to be biting and also on the Stour where again they are there in numbers. I wanted to see the lay of the land before maybe returning on my own to fish for them properly.

Some mad vibrant ones, almost ornamental

Rudd are most commonly associated with still waters, particularly those that are profusely overgrown with aquatic vegetation, although they do occur in slow-moving lowland rivers and sluggish backwaters.

They are well suited to life in nutrient-rich shallow farm ponds and pools where they will often form vast shoals that hugely overpopulate the pond.


In such situations they strip the naturally occurring invertebrates from the environment and consequently become stunted. Farm ponds are usually full of them, and get them feeding you can catch several hundred Rudd in a day, seemingly everlastingly hungry.

They are in the river to be caught though, come a warm evening those topping fish trying to infiltrate insects on the surface are usually small Rudd. Their mouths shaped to take food off the surface in relative ease. Here the tangleator could cast without hindrance, without appearing to try and cast in to every tree possible. To be fair he is getting better for sure, in-fact he can almost fish independently now which makes more of an enjoyable session.

So simple tactics for this potential point registering sortie, a loaded clear waggler between some grippa stops, a size 16 tied directly to the line and that’s it. I’d ping the maggots out and hopefully the slow sinking bait would be picked up by one of the Rudd shoal, if we’d manage to locate them that is. I’d also had a couple of slices of white bread if they would prefer a surface bait, they are surface feeders after all.

So me, being me, I’d also have a sleeper rod out for a bream that also frequent this relatively pedestrian area. So with a rod already made up I’d employ the same tactics I used when I fished for them recently. A small method feeder filled with small pellets, fishmeal and krill groundbait and a pellet on the hook.

Nic and Anastacia would join us as well and Sam could "meet a real life YouTube'r"

With the limited time I have to go fishing, planning is always at the forefront in almost all of my sessions, I need to get on and get dangling, no messing around once bankside, I need to keep the bait in the water as long as possible. That’s easier said than done with Sam as like his mother, he is a bit of a sleep monster,

“Hey Sam lets go fishing !!!!!”

“Can I have another ten minutes please” eyes close, back to snoring.”

I’d prefer to fish as the sun was going down but sadly a busy weekend put pay to that, if this morning was a struggle I’d give an evening a go instead if I got a chance. In-fact another stretch altogether there were topping shoal fish as the sun was setting, so there appear to be in pockets up and down the river. Maybe a roving approach might be the better way to winkle out something bigger than I expected to catch during this trip out.

Anyway back to the task in hand, for the first hour bites were forthcoming, with some Rudd, Dace, Roach and Bleak caught. The biggest Rudd only 1.4oz's but Sams first which he was excited about especially as some of them have the most vibrant colours. But the bites dried up for some reason so we had to get on the move. Nic was also struggling but when nothing much was doing Sam wanted to go to the stream we know about to try and catch bullhead.

So we left Nic and he updated me on his progress, he'd managed some bigger fish, 6 or 7 ounces in the end I think, again he had to move around to try and get bites. The stream provided the biggest trout Sam had ever caught, it took two maggots in one foot of water less than a metre wide. It shot off like a rocket as well, I've not seen a float so move so fast, he was smitten !!!!