A year to remember - month by month look at the years results.

Looking through my diary for last year I have decided it was not too bad a 12 month period at all.  I have had better, but that's the name of the game.   I though a look at my pick of the catches for each  month could make interesting blog so here goes.

January.     I'll cheat here and pick a catch from the last days of the previous year since my January results were crap.  It was the 29th of December and I had gone down to the Hampshire Avon for a couple of days.  The first of those days I dropped into a favourite swim which had done 6lb chub fish for me on previous visits - Fishing a maggot feeder it came up trumps with chub of 7lb-3oz and 6lb-14oz.

                                                                7lb-3oz Avon Gem

February-     Following that very cold and snow covered period of the previous month there were a few gaps that gave a chance on the rivers - I took advantage of one of those and came up with a very nice Warwickshire Avon barbel of 13lb-10oz to prove that if the bait's is in the water you can catch.

                                                              13lb-10oz - very nice!

March                      Still variable weather and the end of the river season did not live up to my hopes for a big chub.  I started off a good year for sturgeon though, with a  catch of 5 fish over 23lb with a best of 28lb-11oz.

                                                       Best of 5 at 28lb-11oz

April           With April came better weather, and my usual trips to the Colne Valley gave me double figure bream, and tench to over 8lb, but I thought a bit of variety here so I include an eary catfish of 30lb-11oz.

                                                              Wells Catfish of 30lb-11oz.

May          A few more 20lb sturgeon but May is for tench and although my first choice venue failed - it seemed the big fish probably died in the freeze up of the winter - a local venue came good for the month with a number of tench to a very pleasing 8lb-14oz best of the month.

                                                       A lucky Friday 13th tench of 8lb-14oz.

June.                        With the loss of the big tench I was also at a loss as to where to try for a double, I decided to return to my bream venue since it does occasionally turn up a nice tench - it did, in spades and gave my new pb tench of 11lb-14oz.
Another nice catch for the month was a brace of double figure barbel on the same day off the River Teme which included a new pb for the river at the time of capture. 10lb-2oz and 10lb-7oz.

                                                       Probably my best fish of the year 11lb-14oz.

July                     A funny month is July - sometimes great and at other times it can be a killer.  A couple of notable capture here, first a new all comers lake record for Orchid Lakes with a 55lb-9oz Wells Catfish. Then added to this for the month is a 12lb-1oz barbel off the Warwickshire Avon.

                                                     12lb-1oz Warwickshire Avon

                                                          55lb-9oz lake record.

August                    Probably the best thing that happened in this month was that I finally completed the book and it went off for the finishing touches.  A few more 20lb sturgeon hit the bank, with lots of barbel from the Teme, Avon and Derwent along with another river pb coming off the Derwent.   The best of 6 barbel on the day, and at 11lb-4oz it was over a 1lb increase over my previous best so obviously very pleasing.

                                                                Derwent pb at 11lb-4oz.

September.                  Always a good month and this was no different, still lots of barbel coming to the net, but I do fish a lot of time for them.  A increase on my Teme pb took it to 11lb-6oz to give it the month's honours, but a close second goes to a 10lb3oz zander - my first double for a long time.

                                                        A new Teme pb at 11lb-6oz.

                                                            10lb-3oz the first double for years.
    
October                  The river Derwent has been good to me this year but now it was really good, a catch of nine barbel includng three doubles of 10lb-8oz, 11lb4oz and another river best at 12lb2oz, it does not come much better than that.

                                                       The season's biggest so far at 12lb-2oz.

November               It makes a real change to trot a river and a trip to the River Test gave me the chance to do just that - when it gave up a 2lb-6oz roach that really made the day.

                                                                River roach are something special.

December     I started this blog by going back into december for a great brace of fish, this year the month has been dead for me.  Roach and perch fishing very quiet.  A two day blank on the Hampshire Avon for chub was disappointing.  I will close the peice with a Boxing Day barbel mentioned in my last blog, always nice to end the year with a reasonable fish.

                                                        Small but perfectly proportioned!

I hope that next year can give as much fun and success to both myself and all of you as well.

Fishing over the Xmas break - success and failier in equal measure.

Well that’s the Xmas break over and lots of anglers are making their sad way back to the workplace.  It has been quite a mix of weather conditions but the start of the break saw very mild weather for late December, and I got out on Boxing Day in the hope of getting a late barbel.  Sitting on the banks of the river it could have been September and I basked in the sunshine waiting for the first indication.  It came as I was talking to one of the lads off a web site I visit on a regular basis, the barbel itself was not particularly big at about 5lb, but at this stage just its capture was very pleasing.  My fishing tackle was the usual arrangement of two rods with the end tackle being open ended feeders carrying mixed pellets and hemp along with a boilie on one, and two 8mm pellets on the other.  This time it had been the boilie that caught the fish, but a few hours later my wait was rewarded with another fighting fish of 6lb or so that took the pellet bait.  It would seem that often the fish just pick up bait that they come across in the wandering travels.

                                                     Boxing Day Barbel

The next day I went to a local lake with Mervyn Wilkinson in the hope of catching a zander, still reasonable weather for December, but decidedly cooler in the quite strong wind.  The bait to be used was a mix of lamprey section on one of the rods and a small 4 inch roach on the other, we had both used leger tactics and similar baits, but whilst I just had a couple of pulls that did not develop, Mervyn caught a fine specimen of 8lb-10oz that had looked to be a certain double.

                                                                                        Merv's prize

With the various thing that come up at this time of year I did not get out again until Xmas eve and I should have stayed at home, the river was right up and lots of rubbish was coming through making the fishing very difficult.  I did try for maybe three hours but in the end I gave up and left very disappointed.

I treated myself to a new pc tower and being a near total novice in these things it took me nearly two days to sort the transfer over from the old system of Windows XP to the new windows 7.  Even now I’ve still got problems with something called Active X and trying to find conversion leads for my traffic camera detector – an essential bit of gear that!  Still, I got out fishing again yesterday, 2-1 -2012.

It had gone quite cold with a near frost overnight and the forecast of a maximum temperature of 5C, but fortunately the wind was more of a gentle breeze so the chill factor was kept to a minimum.  With the sun breaking through the clouds occasionally, it was indeed nice to be on the banks.  It seemed that lots of other anglers had been cooped up for too long as well, and with ten or more people about it was by far the most I had seen on a river bank for a long time.  The river itself had dropped by a couple of foot from those conditions that had beaten me on the Saturday, and once fishing I could confirm that the rubbish had lessened as well.  Still plenty of dead leaves to catch on the line, but at least it was now manageable.

I thought the chance of a barbel was less than 50/50 and reports from other anglers confirmed that the big drop in temperature had indeed caused the fish to retreat to their hidey holes and nothing was being caught.  Today I had resorted to my favourite Dynamite Monster Crab boilie on both rods, heavily glugged I thought that the scent trail would perhaps encourage a fish to at least try, just like the cherry on the cake –irresistible!

As dusk approached I had already made up my mind that I would not stop into dark, the temperature was dropping fast and my hopes of a fish were dropping just as quickly.  I was again talking with a fellow angler when at last that boilie did prove irresistible to a barbel, one of that species had to be responsible for the bend in the rod, and with the fishes own power increased by the additional floodwater I got my days sport in the extra fight the barbel was able to give.  With the slippy banks left by the high water, both the fellow angler who was netting the fish, and me, nearly ended up in the river, but at last it was in the net and safe.  At 8lb-14oz not a monster, but a very pleasing start to 2012 and I retired from the river well pleased with the day – now what will the coming year bring?

                                                                         The first barbel for 2012.

A record barbel.

It was cold and frosty when I set out on the barbel trip, I knew the odds were against me, but the call of the river was too much to ignore.  This river, and more particularly the section I was to fish, had produced a very big barbel in recent times and my thoughts were that it just might go over that magical 21lb, but perhaps that was hoping for too much.

My tackle was set as had been used on recent visits, 12lb main line on 1.75lb test rods.  The open-ended oval feeder that would be loaded with a 50/50 mix of small pellet and hemp.  A 12inch hook length had a size 8 hook with two 8mm pellets on a hair and this was cast into the know deep hole where the big fish was sometimes to be seen.

                                                    There are big barbel in small rivers.

Darkness fell and the beta-light glowed in the darkness as the rod itself began to twinkle with the frost that had settled on its surface.  Wild life could be heard all around my fishing position, perhaps a fox or deer went past just behind the swim, an owl hooted its call for a mate, but no answer came to the plaintive cry.  Stars stood out clearly in the blackness of the sky with no light pollution around to dim the effect and I waited – hoping for just that one special bite.

Then out of the blue as is normally the case the rod slammed round as a fish tore off downstream, I stuck and immediately knew that this could be it!  The fight was spectacular to say the very least and several times I thought I had lost him, but after some considerable minutes I looked into the net and there lay the biggest barbel I had ever seen.

I heard a voice behind me and turned to see who had spoken, but no-one was there, then I saw it was daylight through the bedroom window and with a sinking feeling I realised I had been dreaming!

Hopefully over the coming year my dream will come true, but until then I would like to wish you all a Happy Christmas, and may all your dreams come true in 2012.

Dreams of big perch and chub.

I arrived back in Coventry last night from two days fishing in the company of an angling friend, John Found, who lives in the Kennet Valley region.  He retired to the area with fishing in mind, and it paid off in spades with the diversity of chances within comparatively close range of his home.  The Rivers Kennet, Loddon, St Pats Stream and Thames are all within close striking range, and gravel pits galore seem to be just waiting for his arrival to plunder the specimen fish that are there.   At least that’s my view of his situation, but perhaps after this trip I need to reappraise that idea.

                                                      Perch like this lake monster were the target.

The weather had been forecast to improve by several degrees and it seemed an ideal opportunity to go down and try out a venue that John had recently been exploring for perch.  The half dozen trips already made had been split equally, first walking the banks and plumbing depths, whilst the remaining three sessions had produced a few perch to 2lb-12oz.  Talking to anglers already fishing there, normally for carp, suggested the perch fishing could be very good with specimens to 4lb plus amongst numerous 2lb plus back-up fish.  Arrangements were made that we would meet in the car park at 8:00am, I did the 90 miles from my house, whilst John complained that this would be amongst the more distant of his venues at nearly 10 miles, I’m not jealous – much!

As we surveyed the lake it looked perfect, the temperature rise had happened and we basked in double figure numbers on the Celsius scale, water clarity was just tinged with colour and a slight breeze rippled the surface inviting us to get fishing without delay.

I was to fish a leger style approach with lobworm on the hook and dedrabenas along with red maggots to attract the intended large perch targets.  John settled on float fishing tactics with a similar feed pattern, we could not fail!  That last sentence says it all and you already know what’s coming – other than a few small 4oz bits we were both were blown out of the water with the dreams shattered.  To add insult to injury even the single carp angler present on the bank caught two carp with a best of 25lb, so the fish were feeding.  I had fished four different swims, and John did similar, but it was all to no avail, a blank is blank and new plans were now needed.  We had intended that both days would be spent on this water, but now there were having second thoughts and we finally decided on a chub session on the Kennet.

We went to a well-tried section of river where previous trips had given up chub to over 6lb, with the weather holding nicely we were of course hopeful of success.  The only fly in the ointment was that the British Waterways had to spend some money and had decided that this section of river looked too nice.  It must be a condition of employment within the various agencies, that you cannot have any love of nature or its appearance.  They had gone through the section and rip out any bush or tree that might suggest it would, or could, hang over the water giving cover and shelter to wildlife.  Where previously the chub swims were self evident with such cover giving protection from the passing boat traffic, now we had to wonder if the fish had stayed in the area or moved to those sections left alone.

This time we were to use identical tactics, maggot feeders with a little hemp as an attractor for the chub.  Short hook links of 2.5lb strain and size 20 hooks and a single maggot should have been irresistible to these fish, but in my case it did not work and they resisted very successfully.  Meanwhile John did manage to convince a couple of chub that they should attack his feeder and hookbait taking a best of just under 5lb.  A barbel of similar size had the heart rate going for a little while in the thought it might just have been one of the bigger chub, but the truth soon became obvious. 

                                                               John's near 5lb chub.

   

That was my two day break done with not a single worthwhile fish landed, I’ll return in the new year and hopefully we will both have better luck – perhaps a quick trip down to the Avon or Stour could bring that big chub or even one of the large roach that seem to be making a comeback around various different rivers.

Winter has arrived.

It seems amazing that just ten days ago I sat by a river fishing for barbel until gone 11:00pm without a coat on and did not get cold.  Now the wind goes through my heavy-duty clothing and reminds me that I should not stay out too long.

Since that warm night I’ve been zander fishing on a gravel pit as mentioned in the last blog – blank.   Then a couple of trips onto local pits in the search for a nice perch, caught a few smaller samples of less than a pound but still looking for the big one.

                                                  Zander fishing on a local gravel pit.

                                                   Roll Over bite indicators, just the job for open bail-arm fishing.  finely adjustable to give no resistance to the taking fish.

A trip to the south and the Hampshire Avon was meant to improve the catches with big chub the target, but then I should have known better.  The Avon, like many other rivers and waterways is desperately low and the weed is still quite prolific in the very low flow rates.  Add to this the fact that the locals were reporting very poor fishing returns when I went into the two local tackle shops in Ringwood, and the writing was on the wall.  I was feeder fishing with hemp, maggot and casters, almost infallible when after chub, but that one word made the difference, ‘almost.’   For two days I did my best but even with maggots on the hook the minnows did not make an appearance, now that is really unusual.   Travelling back the 160 miles to home I ran over all the things I did and might have done, and I don’t think I could have done it different – that’s fishing, sometimes you blank.

                                             I fished the perfect swim at the rainbows end on the Hampshire Avon.

Yesterday I went again for the perch and I was surprised to find ice over part of the lake, apparently it had formed overnight and would suggest that the water is very near to freezing since it did not go that cold for very much of the dark hours.  A couple of fish, a roach and a perch had a go at my small bit of lobworm tail on a size 18 hook, but yet again I was reminded that the winter has arrived.

It rained heavy overnight and at last some of the rivers are showing signs of being flushed through taking some of the dead stuff away, the forecast is for wind and rain whilst staying quite cold, but given a rise in temperatures I could be back in business again

Time is running out for that Xmas box present of  'Target set and Achieved' -  get yours ordered at http://www.philsmithangler.com/.  

Winter fishing trips

Now it is quite obvious that we all go fishing in order to catch fish, but if you fail in that task is it the end of the day?  Yesterday I was zander fishing on a lake with doubles availble, and good bait to attract the fish, but they would not play and I blanked, what did save my day was a sight I had not seen before.

Probably the best part of 100 yards away I noticed a number of flashes of bright red amongst the trees, robins was the first thought that came to mind, but that was quickly dismissed -they hate each other at times outside of the Springtime.  As I watch I became more and more interested, not being able to decide what I was watching.   With no binoculars to use I took the next best thing which was my camera with its 20X zoom lens and Image Stabiliser to make it possible in the hand held mode to take photos with maximum zoom in play.  It can be quite a problem looking through the camera with that zoom working to find just exactly what you are trying to find.  Even when I found the flash of red a number of the shots just showed the birds behind a branch or some awkward postion that was of no use.  Digital photography is brilliant in that you can take as many shots as you like - it does not matter as you delete the bad ones later, but here the first photo shows the image as captured, while the second is close cropped to identify the bird - a male bulfinch.

                                              Original shot at about 100 yrds.

                         One of several male bulfinches present.

Normally these birds are shy, retiring birds and you only get a fleeting glance as they move away from your presence, to see this flock at play, well it made up for the blank - almost!

Barbel river and the end of the warm weather.

A bit slow on completed this blog as I have been quite busy on other things like the article for the Coarse Angling Today magazine, and a chapter for a proposed Tenchfishers Book.  The last week has been a mixed bag of perch fishing, with a dash of barbel chasing thrown in for good measure.  The water that seemed to offer the best chance of a 4lb perch last season seems to have lost its potential with the larger fish all apparently gone, this yet again reinforces the view I’ve often expressed of ‘make the best of it today since you don’t know what tomorrow may bring.’   Not sure what happened, but it seemed the fish were there in February [four known 4lb perch] but gone by the end of March.   So I’m back on the search trail again and a couple of trips in the week to a water that seems to have potential only produced two fair perch with maybe 1lb-8oz for the best one.  It will be a long winter so still plenty of time to find a water to concentrate on come next spring when they will reach peak weights.

When the forecast showed the colder weather coming into the area for the end of the week I decided to get one last trip to the Derwent for barbel.  I took a float rod along with me with a few lobworms to have a little try for the perch along the edge of the rushes, but that ended in failure as a hooked fish that would almost certainly have been a nice perch [the alternative could have been chub but it did not try to get into the rushes] threw the hook before I could get it to leave the river bed to enable me to get a look at what I had hooked.

I had taken hemp and casters along for the session and with this mix I laid a nice bed of feed in mid-river then fished casters over the top with a swimfeeder in play as well.  Lots of knocks and taps off small fish with a few of them hooked, but none of the larger fish showed.  As it got dark the temperature dropped a little, but it was still quite mild so I determined to stay on for a while.  An hour into dark I changed rigs to the open-ended feeders and 8mm pellets that have worked so well this season and I did get two barbel, one of 6lb plus and another of 10lb-7oz to give a fine ending to the day.  Will there be another chance before Xmas? – we wait and will see.

                                                    10lb-7oz on the last day of November.

That brings me up to date and still making plans for the next week though I’ve arranged a zander trip for Sunday, be interesting to see if that can work.