Piscatorial Quagswagging

...the diary of a specialist angler in around the Warwickshire Avon and its tributaries.

Sunday 18 November 2018

Warwickshire Avon – Tickle Pitchers and Tub Thumpers

As a lover of food what a great belated birthday all-dayer with her indoors. A lunchtime dirty burger up Shaws Passage courtesy of the original patty men, the ‘Patty Pimps and Purveyors of Filth’, their words not mine. A visit to the 4DX cinema to watch the new Fantastic Beasts movie - The Crimes of Grindelwald, 5 or 6 pubs in-between for some thirst quenching.


Then after hot-footing it back to civiliation before the great unwashed, things with horns and the gene meddlers surfaced, it was seated and wined and fine dined at the award winning Cheal’s of Henley-In-Arden before finishing off the day with some port and cheese, the food of the Gods....

....Phhhheewwwwwww !!!! Come on it was my birthday, I'm allowed to be treated once in a while.

The 12 hours of liquid and food gastronomic gluttony had taken its toll though, as the morning’s planned fishing session before picking the kids up was ditched and I had a nice lie-in instead battling with some overly warm shirt saboteurs.


I had to get out the weekend somehow however though, to try and target some monsters of my own. So after the youngest expressed an interest after we’d picked them up. Sam the tangelator was with me for this post bladderation session, now Sam loves fishing as long as he is getting bites and isn’t cold. The weather was reasonably mild for this short morning trip, and this part of the Warwickshire Avon is usually full of small fish so therefore ticks all the boxes.

We had planned to venture to the huge Chub ‘Snallygaster’ swim, but with a busy weekend being quite a distance away, to walk that is, that would have to be shelved to another time, when we had more time at our disposal.


Whilst he was fishing the float and maggot I planned to use a lure rod and also to fish a small live bait from time to time. I wanted to catch a decent Perch that I know reside here, so a small pike bob, a wire trace and a big hook, with a livebait aerator to retain them in.

As well as the Perch you see there are some good Pike here that like to get in on the action and a wire trace is a must. The Pike outnumber the big Perch considerably, so it’s a necessity, but to be fair the stripey’s don’t seem to mind the wire such their predatory reactions.


It didn't start well, as soon as we got swim-side a huge cormorant was disturbed, exited the water and went upstream. The mercury said 5 degrees but it felt much colder than that, and after an hour without a bite on maggot Sam's hands and toes were getting cold despite being wrapped up well.

The fish eventually turned up after catipulting maggots regularly for a while and eventually bleak and small dace turned up. By this time though and after trying to distract him with the use of a surface frog lure, Sam had enough and was suffering in the biting wind. A bleak went on the live bait rod whilst I was packing up but that bobbed around and remained biteless without any interested.


So a session caught short, shame as the day turned out nice in the end, at least I was back early to get started on the cheesepaste, this batch a slight change to my usual concoction. I might try and squeeze in a quick after work session next week, as I want to try the cheesepaste in an area I don't fish static baits and also I fancy a try with the garlic spam again in a swim I've earmarked as I spotted a decent Barbel there.

The change today, well, it definitely had a winter feel about it, conditions I love for my fishing.

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