The short truth about the cut.

Are canals really as badly populated with fish as most anglers would have you think? The simple answer to that is, no. From what the majority of angling clubs and occasional canal anglers say you'd think certainly the midland canal system was bloody well devoid of life. Honestly I couldn't count on my entire families fingers and toes the amount of times I've heard that all the fish in here have been eaten by the zander, and it's just not true. In fact every time I hear that sentence or the likes I have to stop myself physically throttling whoever said it whilst screaming 'what the effing hell do you think they're eating then you t*$t'.

Undoubtedly the biomass has undergone a change since the introduction of a new apex predator, but the fact remains that zander are thriving and they are eating something to thrive. Gone are the days of bit bashing for 3lb of fish and here are the bag up days where the canals are abound with big fish, as my old friend Phil Mattock here seems to prove every other week by bagging up with quality fish all over the canal network.

What brought me to this micro rant was a session I fished a few nights ago on the cut. Spring/early summer it would seem is one of the best times for silver bream from the canals. It's not that I am an expert or anything on the subject of silver bream, it's just I've seen a lot getting caught recently on other blogs. So I thought this was as good a time as any to try and fill that silver bream box.

So off to the local canal I go with minimal tackle, to pitch up in an area where I have always seen loads of topping fish whilst rubber chucking. I aint the biggest fan of the Oxford but this bit is close to home and is terribly convenient for short evening sessions. After tapping a few mates for info on how they catch these forgotten fish I opted to fish down the track of the canal using 13ft rod almost like a pole. I also set up a Drennan antenna float to fish for lift bites as well as dips. Apart from the super sensitive float set up, everything else was very crude; size fourteen hook, 3lb hook link, and double red maggot fished over a few balls of ground bait.

Much against the common belief I found this section of the Oxford to be brimming with fish of some very interesting sizes. From the off I was into small roach of up to six ounces, which sharply jagged the float under when they attacked the maggots. Interspersed with the roach were a nice helping of skimmers and perch. It was only a matter of numbers before I hooked a better fish and the first one was a nice perch of around a pound,  followed by its mate who was a few ounces bigger. I kept the maggots going in and the fish carried on biting all the way through till dusk.

The silver bream I had gone for never materialized but just as the sun dipped below the horizon my float indicated the first positive lift bite of the session. It turned out to be a very powerful fish that led me a merry dance all around the canal before succumbing to gentle pressure. After seeing a big silver flank I so wanted it to be a massive roach, but the reality was that I had hooked a big roach bream hybrid that had got rolled up in the line. On the scales I registered over three pounds which added a few needed points for the challenge though.

I didn't carry on after that fish as my bed was calling me home after a long day at work. Although it only turned out to be a very short one and I didn't find my target fish, it was a very interesting session. I really had no idea how many fish were in this section of canal, and it proves how wrong the naysayers are when they say there is no small fish in the canals. This session reaffirmed to me exactly how healthy my local canals are. Maybe if the common garden angler spent a bit more of his time fishing the canal rather than commercial fishery then they might start to catch a few more fish out of the canals and then this misnomer that the zander have eaten all the fish might just fade away... what am I saying, of course it won't, because it's always easier to blame someone or something else for us not catching rather than admitting it's our fault.

A Jobber's point collecting job.

When I decided to take part in this most recent fishing challenge, I said to myself it was always going to be a case of just doing what I wanted to do and collecting any points that came along as a result of my captures, unlike in previous challenges where I have gone off searching for specific points. My good intentions though lasted all of five minutes, after I decided to go on a point collecting mission and head down to one of my favorite sections of canal to try and catch a few decent examples of a few different species. 

The idea to go a fish the canal using some old school Sensas ground bait while fishing worms over the top had popped out of my brain goo a while ago.  As it's something I rarely do on canals nowadays I wondered what the reaction on this highly populated area might be. So after settling on a favorite fish holding area I plumbed my float up two inches over depth and baited a small area about a foot square with four hard golf ball sized balls of Lake black ground bait, laced with a few broken worms, and threw in one loose ball to break up on the way down. Then while that stewed away sending of waves of scent down the canal with the tow, I got comfortable.

I reckon worms must make up a huge proportion of small zanders diet as I regularly catch them on worm sections and because of that I wasn't surprised to see the first fish that pulled my float under was a sprightly little zander.

The next bite came not even minutes after the float had settled down to only the orange tip. A quick dip indicated the lob tail being sucked in and the float then slid away as something moved out of the swim. My light rod hooped over severely towards the water as I tried to man handle the fish away from my spot to the side of the swim so as not to spook any other still on my bait. It turned out to be a nice big perch. Wanting to weigh the fish I kept it in the net after unhooking it and nonchalantly just threw the bait out into the water. As I was faffing around with my scales I notice the rod nodding down towards the water. After picking it up I was once again playing a powerful fish and moments later a brace of big perch lay side by side in the net ready to be weighed.

I wished I had bought a keep net along as the sport had gone from zero to frantic instantly and I could just saved the weighing of the fish till the end. But having not bought a  keep net I just persevered and the next fish that needed weighing came along immediately after a quartet of pound perch. With no hint of an impending bite my float zipped under, I struck and straight away I knew I was playing a different sort of fish. With a dogged thumping fight I knew it was a roach and as per normal for this area it was a big one of well over a pound in weight

Before messing around trying to photograph the roach I took a moment to top up again and hopefully prime the swim. So two hard golf ball sized balls of ground bait went in followed by a single loose ball help spread the scent. It worked too, as first put in a small bream took the bait, followed by two of it mates up to nearly three pounds.

In little over an hour I had amassed a very nice catch, that any match angler fishing a canal match would have happily swapped this catch for his right nut I know. After the last bream it turned into a perch finale until the sky clouded over. I think my feeding of broken lob worms over the ground bait kept a few lingering around and every so often one would nip in to have a feed. I quickly figured what the perch really liked was taking the worms falling through the water, rather than picking them up of the bottom. Once I'd clocked this I was constantly lifting the bait up and dropping it down. By doing this I kept busy right up until home time catching another twenty or so fish topped off with a very nice near two.

Apart from amassing a weight of fish that would have won a match on pretty much any canal, I easily totted up a few points for the challenge whilst having thoroughly enjoyable evening. I reckon I might do a few more of these point collecting forays through the year, especially in the late summer when these perch should be in prime condition and maybe that bench mark two pound roach might be a little more attainable.

To drop shot or not to drop shot, that is the question.

The cynical element of my personality grows proportionately larger with age. By that I mean I grow ever more suspicious of those who pedal shiny things in relation to those who are attracted to and purchase shiny things. I may not be making myself totally clear here so some clarification or specifics may well be in order.

This autumn/winter/spring I fancy having me a proper big perch campaign once again, with the aim of a new PB as the ultimate target. As always, this will entail catching copious amounts of perch of all sizes in order to sort out some top of the pyramid type beasts. I have been mulling and planning this for a while and in doing so have concluded that refining my methods and adding new ones  might be in order. The refining I will get to as time goes by but it's the new methods, or method, I am alluding to now; as I already float fish and ledger for perch this really only leaves lure fishing as the "legal" and "sporting" method to add to my armory and to help attain my target.

Those of you who may read of my earlier exploits with lures will already be aware that I am a sucker for a bright shiny lure and although I have dabbled before with them I have never felt truly comfortable slinging plastic at my quarry, largely because I've always felt it to be a little disruptive to fish in conjunction with my more favored and reliable methods. But then the in vogue drop shot method caught my eye and I now have found myself thinking this more subtle form of fakery might be a little more conducive to how I fish. But, and there's always a but, when you're growing cynical with age, how efficient is this method? and are those sneaky chaps at the popular angling rags pulling out their fish eye lenses to snap piccies of little perch with the latest line of CAD designed fish imitations hanging from their mouths in order to placate their wage paying overlords, sorry I mean advertisers, or does this method really sort out some big billies?

So, recently I obtained a reasonably priced but fairly high quality rod which I matched up with a two thousand size reel filled with light braid, to try my hand at drop shotting. I have always thought there was a lot more to lure fishing than just chucking out a lure retrieving it and hoping something is stupid enough to hit it. Hence the last few weeks I have whenever possible been throwing various bits of rubber into any-where I can and success or not I really feel doing so has taught me a lot  more about lure fishing. But! And there's that but again, even though I can, hand on heart, say I really enjoy strolling around the world shooting lures here there and everywhere, I still remain unconvinced of the true efficiency of this method compared to bait fishing and that's what I am hoping to try a discover a bit more about over the next few months.

I had two opportunities for sessions this past weekend and with my previous statement in mind the thought of trying to catch some big perch drove me firstly to a commercial pool that contains some kippers and has been rather obliging to me in the past.

Now, having not visited this venue for a good long time I set out my stall as per normal using float and worm tactics in order to ascertain if the perch were in the mood and that the carp which I was worried were still a little to active might be slowing down. The bites came on line very quickly after I'd baited up and after landing a string of rudd, roach and skimmers I finally struck into a big and much more determined fish. Happily it turned out to be what I was after; having not visited this lake for the whole summer it was good to see a nice but lean two pounder in the bottom of my net which confirmed this was still going to be a viable venue for this campaign.

More feed went in straight after that fish which in turn attracted more silver fish. I actually tracked the approach of a carp as it came bumbling through the swim truffling up the bottom sending up puffs of silt. Being a bit cheeky I tried to avoid it by removing my hook bait from the water and hoping it might move on, but that was in vain. I watched sipping a cup of tea, as the carp single handily mopped up all of my expensive chopped worm. Then when I thought it was gone I baited up and the bubbling started all over again. I had no choice but to try and fish it out of the swim, which took all of about a minute to initiate and ten minutes to end on the light gear I was fishing.

With the nuisance carp relocated a few pegs away I topped up and resumed trying to pick perch from the shoals of hungry silvers determined to peck my hook baits to pieces. I did eventually hook into another hard fighting perch which after really having a go found its way into the net. Although certainly related to the first this one was in slightly better condition which was reflected by it having six ounces on the first. 

I was over the moon with the performance of this little pool. The fishing went just as I suspected it might, with the perch beginning to get on the feed and the carp slowing down. Given that in just over four hours I picked out a couple of nice fish I think it bodes well for more sessions on here as the temperatures drop and hopefully I can find that bigger fish I know lives in this pool.

The next day I took a trip to the canal that has in the past has been so good to me. Now in all honesty I feel this sacred bit of navi dug water way has been a bit off colour of late fishing wise. Whether it's the change in seasons or some seasonal glut available that is keeping the perch catches low I couldn't say. Something that is for certain is the bloom of small zander on this bit of canal is unreal with the savage little blighter's turning up a lot more regularly that the perch I am after.

Even knowing the seeming state of affairs I found myself walking the tow path in the half light and setting up on a quite mist shrouded bend in the canal. Turned out I was exactly right and the bites were hard to come by. Annoyingly when I did get a little spell of action I bumped off three perch on the trot. Two of them weren't much to write home about but one was infuriatingly a definite mid two.

After scratching out a couple more small ones I made the decision to up sticks and try a second spot that has in the past been quite productive. In this area I was at least I was getting bites even if they were from the wrong fish. A small shoal of tiny fingerling sized zander turned up attracted by the free offerings and would not leave my bait alone. I was catching them at a ratio of three bites to one zed until a bigger perch stormed in and seemingly sent them packing. After the perch though it went dead as door nail until I had a very fast bite. Finally I thought I was hooked up to a good sized perch and after knocking those few off I took things very carefully. Then the fish rolled on the top and my hopes of a big Sargent were dashed. It looked like one of the big hybrids that I've caught in this area before so I turned up the pressure to get the damn thing in the net.

It was as it lay in the net and I lifted it towards me that I realized how rash I'd been. The sun caught its fins and I knew this was no roach bream hybrid at all. Two inches thick, well over a foot long, with massive silvery white scales and orange red fins it looked to be a massive roach.

I don't mind admitting that I did get Jeff to have a look at the photos before I would fully let myself believe it was what I hoped it was, but after multiple checks counts and comparisons he confirmed that yes, it was defiantly a big roach. Beyond that happy bit of information the only pill in this catch was the weight. On my digital scales in the lightest of carrier bags the display flickered back and forth between 1.15 and 2lb refusing to settle on that most magic of numbers. At best all I can figure is that with my scales not showing drams this fish was within a maggot's weight of being a very special fish indeed.

Drops shotting!!!

You may of noticed that even though the title of this post is in direct relation to the afore mentioned method I have not written a single word about partaking of this endeavor in this blog, This is not because I didn't do it, because I did and I did it quite a lot as well. In fact on the commercial I actually spent well over two hours searching out plenty of free water that has been very productive in the past. And on the canal I spent most my time alternating between a float road and a drop shot rod. But on both venues the result was exactly the same! On waters with loads of big perch and one stuffed with zander I failed to raise a single hit! Now I know that this method works on at least one of the venues as I have caught and seen others catch both perch and zander. But the result of this little experiment already has me leaning to what I kind of thought, and that is that although fun and en vogue right now lure fishing, or more specifically drop shotting, seems to not be as efficient as good old fashioned bait fishing.

I won't however be removing my drop shot rod from my quiver right away. Like all methods I think it will have its day and in the right circumstance I might well out fish the float or ledger. But right now I suspect those days when it works might well be when fishing a gin clear venue when you can't buy a bite on bait for love nor money, and that's when I feel sure I can have some real fun whilst getting the most out of this method.