Warwickshire Avon - Omens and Omphalopsychites

A well deserved cup of tea to start the trotting session went down rather nicely, because boy it was cold one, and it's going to get even colder this week where sleet is a possibility. The wind would be picking up as well so a proper artic blast.

Anyway back to the same swim I did ok yesterday for much of the same !!!

Trot a float past these snags you see there are fish in waiting !!!

The key is to get them confidently feeding first and its surprising how they respond positively. Now I've had the Drennan Acolyte 14 ultra for a good while now, at least 6 years or so where it was perfect for trout and grayling on the Itchen and over the time I've owned it, it's done a sterling job. 

The chub when hooked head straight for the cover obviously but the rod does sorry DID 😡 a brilliant job of resisting their lunges. 

I would feel under-gunned I'd imagine with barbel but for decent chub where my best on the float has been 5lb and 10 ounces it was the perfect tool or so I thought !!!!

You see 2 fish in and one bumped off what I didn't expect was that mid fight with a decent chub on the end a very loud audible CRACK !!! the rod has decided to break...

You can imagine my language because this isn't a cheap rod, but it snapped about 30 cms up the middle section where I assume there was a manufacturing fault. 

So that was my session cut short and being the only rod I had in the car I had to head back home with a huge amount of disappointment. Martyn from my local tackle shop  is on the case to get a replacement section as would be well out of warranty now. Considering the amount of fish I've caught on this rod I wonder why it failed on me today ? 

Cold perhaps ? no idea but not a happy angler especially when I've a trip to the Wye the 16th and this was going to be the main chub attack !!! oh well, better but a replacement quick hadn't I. To be fair I could do with a power float rod and maybe add another foot to the end, maybe this was an omen, let's hope it was anyway.