Late season catch up.

Ah, alas once again I find myself writing a catch up blog to bridge some of the larger gaps that have appeared in this fishing diary of late. The reason for catch up is simple yet sad, as I have felt little like writing after the passing of a dearly loved family member has left me feeling somewhat introspective. Although throughout this difficult time I have continued to fish, the fact remains that the ripples caused by this period in my life have taken a long time to dissipate, but now the waters of life are settling and I once again feel the need to leave behind civilian life and re-enter the fishing blogosphere and fill in the blanks in my tome.

The silver incident!

I've tried quite a few times over the years to try and catch a silver bream by design, only to basically fall flat on my face into a mire of roach, bream and hybrids. This year was no different and early season forays achieved little more than me stinking like a bream. Then a while ago I was out dropshotting for predators trying to locate some hotspots on a local canal when I struck into what I naturally assumed would be a average perch as I was using a small black leech intimation. This perch soon turned into a hybrid then in my net and on the bank it became clear I had actually caught my first silver bream of the year on a lure and therefore not by design... 

Maybe next spring I will save some time and just go out after them using lures as this is the second one I've caught on the dropshot on the same section of canal.

A trip to the Wye.
It's been a few years since I've trod the banks of the Wye and normally I'd head over to a friend's private beat, which was initially the plan when my good friend Martin Oxley asked if I fancied going. Unfortunately though our friends beat became unavailable when the late running croy repairs were rescheduled for when our trip was organized. After a panic to try and find another venue we settled on the Letton Court fishery which has three beats available to day ticket anglers along with a very interesting oxbow lake.

The river as always was stunning but beautiful as it was, the fishing was hard. Recent rains and the lack of weed meant we were faced with a fast and potent Wye that I don't mind admitting I struggled to cope with.

We choose to fish the middle beat where the river dropped away in depth after a field length run of riffles. I was hopeful that even with the cold temperatures and clear water that we might be lucky enough to find a few barbel laying up in this sort of area. Even after nearly losing my rod once to my single savage bite I was unable to return anything for my efforts on the river. Martin faired a little better and winkled out some chub.

All too soon my feet started to itch and after mooching the entire available length of the river I discovered little to move for as the other three chaps on the upper and lower beats had nothing whatsoever to show for their efforts. Now the oxbow lake that flanked the river started to seem rather appealing to me as I had brought along a medium weight lure outfit and as sure ducks like bread, I knew that lake had to have a few pike in it.

What met me when I began snooping around the lake was shocking to say the least. The bank that divided the river from the lake was at least six meters high and as I walked along the bank I could see that the recent flood water had left debris hung all over the trees surrounding the lake; thus the Wye had actually gone up more than six meters and filled the lake with dirty cold river water which left the lake murky with sediment. All that aside a single turn up and down the bank resulted in a couple of follows from some jacks and one hard hit from a tiny pike. The highlight had to be when I offered Martin my rod for a few casts whilst I went down to try and find a path through the trees, only to go back and find Martin with the rod doubled over and a huge pike thrashing around in the margins. Sadly though the monster came off just before it was ready for the net, much to our disappointment.

So simply put this was all I caught on that trip to the Wye...

Return to the CRT match stretch.

During the recent CRT match there was a few decent zander caught and the areas of these captures were duly noted and filed away for a return visit in the company of the equally zander mad Mick off of Piscatorial Quagswagging. Once we finally got a date we could both make we met up early doors at the parking area just off the canal.

Armed with a pair of dead bait rods, Mick chose to wait it out whilst I fished a single dead bait and a lure rod as well to try and find the fish as my bait rod stewed away. Early on we thought we'd struck gold when Mick connected with a good fish after a stuttering run. The bend in the rod had both of our arses squeaking until what we hoped was a big zander morphed into a better than average canal pike.

For my part my incessant working of a gaudy lure up and down the trench soon rooted out a small zander which threw the hook, but was followed by one which nailed the lure so hard it was never coming off.

Myself and Mick are very much of the same mind when it comes to zander fishing and after more than the average amount of time in the first swim we were off searching for active fish. This actually works brilliantly for me as not only is my bait rod always fishing in fresh spots but I always have new areas to work lures. We struggled to find zander but the occasional perch took umbridge to my rhythmical gyrating of rubber and through the deteriorating morning I scratched a few stripys here and there.

Those beast zander never did turn up and I will sure as hell be back to have another go. Interestingly I took note of the rough sizes of the few fish on caught on this occasion back on the rock hard section where the CRT match was held just to see how I might have fared with this nominal catch. Surprisingly The rough 80cm+ catch would have put me somewhere 13th or 14th out of 125 odd anglers which would have still been a decent score in that very hard match.