A chance glimpse of the jotter...

I didn't fancy venturing too far Saturday morning, A belly full of South Indian Garlic Chilli chicken and various liquid beverages the night before my insides needed to be treated with kid gloves. I was in two minds two minds whether to go or not, I felt as rough as a badgers ****.

So a particular stretch on the Grand Union Canal was ideal, predators in residence and with my car in view from the bottom of the lock where I was fishing, for any bubbly belly repercussions I could make a quick exit. I had a sleeper rod out with a small roach deadbait and as I only planned to fish for a couple of hours I had my lure rod with me and a solitary Savage Gear 4play shad. In hindsight just one lure was asking for trouble considering the huge amount of snags to be found in the cut.

Anyway to the fishing with my first cast I hooked in to a fish, only a small schoolie but a nice start to the morning. Maybe the Gods were looking over me as my luck continued as a couple of very attractive girls who were walking their dog along the tow path, decided to use the lock paddles above me to pass from one side of the canal to the other. Luck you say, well yes because one of the girls was wearing a skirt so short there was every chance of a glimpse of the forbidden,being a betting man to be honest it was a dead cert. I'm a male, it's in my make-up. A few pleasantries were exchanged and upon passing with her topography in full view my day wouldn't get better surely ?

Well nearly, but not quite. No big fish were landed but there was certainly plenty of them. I've fished this swim a few times now and never had a Perch but the next 8 or 9 fish landed were half decent stripeys that were shoaled up by a calm area of water near an overflow. 2 more small Zander later in 2.5 hours of fishing I had a pretty good return.

This week, well I'm planning to venture out one evening for Zander again but I'm also planning to try for a big crucian and if it's warm maybe some tenkara fly fishing for Roach.

It's always nice to meet a fellow Blogger on the bank and during a relatively unproductive trip to a local reservoir last week I bumped in to Danny Hale of  http://riveranglersgowiththeflow.blogspot.co.uk/. Good to see you Sir.

A days chucking fluff.

Saturday I found myself accompanying my father-in-law Sid on the 30 acre Great Pool at the Packington Estates trout fishery near Meriden where he is a member. It was a well over due belated birthday present and as Sid is an accomplished fluff chucker and willing to teach a novice I was looking forward to the day, The late Labrador, Ruddles used to be his boat partner so I had a lot to live up to.

I'm a novice to the apparent 'noble art',the basics I know but more theory than practice.In-fact the last time I fished for trout was probably about over 30 years ago when I fished a day ticket trout farm with my Dad when we were on holiday. A day ticket for Packington for example buys me a years membership for Warwick and District Angling Association so it does price some people out of the market, then again the annual membership would still be far less than a season ticket for a premiership football team and it's diving prima donna's.

You pays your money and takes your choice and all that however if you think about it, once you have the tackle I bet you wouldn't spend anything like you would do on coarse fishing tackle, rods and bait. It's my hobby and every man needs one but I dread to think how much I spend every year, just don't tell the Wife.

Elitist ? maybe the issue is available waters, apart from the odd stream and river that are stocked with trout via fly fishing clubs and the small amount of dedicated fisheries and reservoirs, living within Warwickshire you're a bit limited where you can fish for them. I prefer fishing flowing water, pools, lakes and canals I can give or take so if I could find a river within half an hour where I could fish in the coarse close season for wild brownies rather than fishing for non-native Zander in a dirty canal I'd be there like a shot. 

 

It's quite an exposed pool so chillier than I thought, a good day though. I won't go in to any details but I learnt loads and we ended up with 4 fish the biggest 3lb or so. The water was gin clear and it was nice to play the fish and being able to see the fight, I'm looking forward to the next time, just need to try and find a space in the father-in-laws stupidly busy diary. Cheers Sid.

A hammering....

Zander 4 - Mick 0

I joined a friend of mine Simon who was fishing the cut for an hour or so yesterday evening, having only managed to catch small Zander over the past couple of sessions I decided to have a change of tactics. I upped the savage gear 4play shad size to 11cm's and had a sleeper rod out with a small roach deadbait with the head cut off on a simple running rig. Single hook rigs for Zander seem to be successful so I used a Gamakatsu G-Point Circle Hook (GP407).

The previous last two sessions I never had a touch on the deadbait but today it was the complete opposite as I had 6 runs, hooked 4 Zander and landed 0. All 4 were on for what seemed a decent length of time and yet all managed to lose the hook. One was half decent too and put a nice bend in my 1.75TC rod. Any tips welcome as I'd rather not switch to size 8 trebles just yet. I'm new to Zander fishing but they certainly have tough bony mouths so maybe a stiffer rod would be better as would be a harder strike, maybe I didn't set the hook properly.

I've certainly found a so called Zander hotspot because in around 3 hours fishing this particular swim I've hooked, lost and landed more Zander than I have fingers. The issue I can see is the size of the fish in this area, there is no doubt biggun's here, I've seen the pictures. But it looks like you need to get through the countless greedy small ones, find the lone bigger fish that don't like to socialise and work out the diural feeding patterns with time on the bank. I've give it a couple more goes on the cut before switching species but when the new season is with us I'll definitely try for them on the Warwickshire Avon.

You are always learning when fishing, no doubt about that.