Times Are A Changin'

The weather is, at last, changing.

We're promised double figure temperatures almost all of next week. About time, it's been bloody awful.

With that in mind, two spots were prebaited with seed and maize. 

The first spot received a light scattering of seed in the still margins of a wide pool, the fast water flowing much further out.

The deep mill pond received a barage of rock hard grapefruit sized soil balls packed with goodies.

Next week we'll see if there's anything in residence and willing to feed.

Get out there and fill yer boots, only a couple of weeks left.

Take A Breath

Lost a bit of enthusiasm last week, so haven't been fishing for almost a week.

Been out and about though, yesterday had a lovely walk on the northern bank of the estuary in glorious sunshine ( albeit with a cold ,blustery wind ) . Another couple of months and the bass and mullet will be back, can't wait.

Found absolutely loads of cuttlefish bones at the top of the tideline, never seen this in the estuary before this far upriver. A new phenomenon or have I just noticed them ?

Another walk the next day and early signs of wild garlic growing by the stream, nature is waking up.

When I was a school, I remember getting the fishing books out the library. One of my favourites was Successful Roach Fishing by David Carl Forbes and the other day I read something about this book that jogged my memory.

A quick Google told me that a first edition currently goes for between £40 and £80 quid. A bit more searching and I somehow found one for £5.00. Delivered !

Worth a punt. I was expecting a dog eared reprint but no, a first edition in good nick. Bargain and what a bloody good read.

If you see a reasonably priced copy then buy it.

Work today then fishing tomorrow.  Less than four weeks of the season remaining, get out there and fill yer boots.

Raging Against "The Man"

Firstly, a good day with Waaaaaak Bureboi Baines the other day.

Let's just say he wasn't at his best though.

Three spots fished. First produced nice dace and four decent chub, biggest maybe 2.5lb. Good fun on the Dace Ace ten footer.

Someone appears to have superimposed a face comprising of Uncle Albert and an aging garden gnome on my head, ffs.

On to the brook and it truly was a bite a chuck, mostly big dace with the occasional chub thrown in.

The trouble with taking a photo of dace is that, well , they look what they are. A small fish ! Even a big one is "small". 

The third section of river was a twenty minute drive downstream.  Set amongst woodland , good sized dace and "bonus" ( Mr Matchman ) roach fed keenly as dusk approached. 

I packed up, I'd caught enough. A good day.

Today. The incessant rain had stopped. Almost.

Rivers up. Didn't look great, but I went to "The Forbidden". Biteless after an hour , a woman on the far bank shouted "You can't fish here !"

Now, I always respond with "Are you the landowner ? " , because ninety nine per cent of the time it's some nosy bastard sticking their beak in where it's not wanted.

This time however, the woman said she leased the land off the National Trust "who don't allow fishing on their land". I've fished for forty years without issue on NT land a mile downstream, so I'm not sure about that.

Anyway, she leases the land and it's up to her. She then said "If you don't pack up right away I'll ring ( EA balief's name ) and get him to chuck you off.

I packed up and left, but what the feck is an EA balief doing enforcing private landowners fishing rights ? Surely the EA, a public body should not be using license payer's money to do this.  She is not the only landowner to say this to me, the bullshitting RSPB bloke down the road has tried this trick. 

So that's another place I can't fish. My mate was chucked off EA land a bit upstream by said balief. Eh, you can't fish there because it's EA land ? You mean the same EA that our money funds ? WTF ?

Another place half mile from me is owned by EA and used to be day ticket and was used primarily by local people, especially kids.

The parish council contributed money for half dozen fishing platforms.

A few seasons ago the EA invited bids from clubs for fishing rights. What about the money contributed by the PC for the platforms ? It's now run by a club whose members never fish it and out of bounds to everyone except "poachers".

The same EA let water companies pump tonnes of shite into our rivers without any consequence. 

It's a fecking joke.

In Between Days

Two fishing days this week, in between the incessant and now massively tedious and annoying rain.

First session it was grey, windy and cold. Not exactly inspiring. Two chub were winkled out on the Suffolk Test, moderate fish of around the 3lb mark, before I had an hour on the Stour, with another brace of chub, bit bigger though, both around the 4lb mark.

Yesterday, after a beautiful early morning walk along the river and then farting about with a couple of little jobs, I was off in the van, destination unknown. I really couldn't decide.

I ended up on the Grubby Town river, after dace. Despite looking spot on, it was dire, with just a chublet to show for my efforts. My mood was not enhanced when I discovered I'd left my waist pack in the furthest swim, which necessitated a long trek to rescue it.

Off to another stream, a few miles down the road. Again, the river looked perfect and plenty of dace, roach and chub came to the stick float.

I decided to call in on the Stour on the way back, "just for an hour". Two road closures and a precarious journey down tiny lanes full of pot holes made the journey "interesting". The Stour looked fantastic but failed to produce.

Rain moved in around dusk, the wind got up and I sacked it off. Walking back in the gloaming, I could just make out the huge beds of snowdrop and acolytes, the first and most welcome sign that winter is on its way out.

Good riddance.

Grim

Cold, windy, raining. Horrible.

I can't ( or won't) work in this crappy weather and neither can I sit indoors all day, regardless of what I'm doing.

I decided to have another recce on The Suffolk Test. Before the recce, I checked out the roach stretch. It was up and coloured, you could almost say " in flood ", though it wasn't dirty and there was no floating detritus. 

Had to have a quick go didn't I ? First swim, the "hot peg", not a touch. Never mind, another place downstream offered steady water and I'd had several fish from the same spot on Tuesday.

It was hard, but I winkled out half a dozen decent fish to a pound or so in less than two hours, when I packed up, wet and freezing cold.

Sitting in the van with the heater on, my fingers slowly came back to life and after a bite to eat I donned the waterproofs and wellies and checked out another stretch upstream.

Difficult to say what it was like, as it was going through like a train. Let's just say I wasn't inspired.

Hopefully the rain will relent and we can hit the river in prime condition again soon.

Roachtastic

The day after our Sunday trip dace fishing me and TCG were both out again, but on different rivers.

TCG checked out two tiny streams. On one he was "chubbed out" whilst dace fishing and on the other gave up in disgust due to pollution and litter on the outskirts of a grubby Essex town.

I went to a river in Suffolk that YCG has subsequently christened "The Suffolk Test", due to the discovery of swaying ranunculous beds in the post flood current, which he said, tongue in cheek , looked like the famous Hampshire chalk stream.

My recce was successful and we agreed to go back the following day for a proper go at the roach.

The colour had dropped out a bit, but the flow was perfect and first run down TCG was in to a nice roach. It was not quite a bite a chuck, but almost, with the fish averaging 8-10 oz and the two best around the pound.

A lone perch in immaculate condition gave us food for thought, as we'd heard that big ones had started to show this season. Earlier we'd had a recce upstream and seen some very  chubby/perchy swims, snaggy and much deeper. Definitely give those a go soon.

Five or six swims produced fish with two being very good indeed. Running the float down, seeing it disappear and then the satisfying "clunk" as you struck, it doesn't get much better.

As the light faded I got the eight foot Quiver Picker out the van ( comprised of parts of three different rods and assembled by Lord Lobkin ) and set up a swan shot link with bread flake. Less bites, but as dusk fell I had two nice roach, the biggest around the pound mark.

Great conditions, some cracking fish and good company, another lovely day.

Ferreting About

Me and TCG decided to try another little river,  again, it looked perfect, lots of flow and a bit of colour.

In short, it was another great day. Fish from half a dozen or more swims, mostly really good sized dace with some nice roach and chub thrown in.

You learn so much about the river when trotting. Where the snags are, the deep and shallow bits, where the fish like to sit. Your brain is constantly processing information and building a picture of what lies beneath.

Catching fish from multiple swims was encouraging, the river had a big pollution incident and number of years ago and suffers from severe abstraction issues, but it seems that life carries on, at least in some places.

Downstream of a little outfall was an absolute discourage. Baby wipes and all types of detritus everywhere, in addition to the discarded cans and plastic bottles that we apparently have to accept as the norm.

Next to nobody gives a damn about it and you can be sure "the authorities" will do absolutely feck all about any of it. Makes me so bloody angry.

Before the weather turns again we've got a couple more small streams to try for a monster dace. But really, I just like farting about in new places.

Oh, and I involuntarily cheered two Man Utd goals yesterday. Don't know what came over me.