Back In The Groove

" Don't be sad it's over, be glad it happened "

Ian Brown ( and lots of others )

Back from our French barbel trip and I've got the hunger back for freshwater fishing, probably helped by the fact that sea fishing is dire at the moment.

First session at the big ressie for a while. Looks lovely down there, water level dropping, giving access to lots of swims. Sat there for several hours watching the terns, grebes, kingfishers and pike chase the roach.

Out of the blue I had a determined take, bent into the fish and the line snapped. On inspection it looked like zebra mussels had badly damaged the line. Bastard. Apart from a suicidal roach which took three grains of sweetcorn that was it.

With Lord Pualus of Clacton on holiday I decided on a lone early morning session on "The Poaching Pit", just a quick couple of hours before the dog walkers appear. The previous evening I'd watched a big group of  ghostie types cruising about and occasionally going down on the bait, so I was keen and confident of a few fish.

I arrived at first light, which this time of year is in the middle of the bloody night. Several handfuls of maize and tiger nuts and I was settled and fishing.

Within ten minutes I was in. The usual savage take and crazy fight and a few minutes later a nice mid double mirror was in the net.

Shite photo, but it was dark and the flash didn't go off

A while later the rod suddenly whipped round as a very unusual looking litlun of around 5lb sped off at a rate of knots. Strange colouration, browny orange ghostie. Much smaller than anything I've seen so far.

I then immediately had another take, on bending into the fish it was obvious that this was much, much bigger. It rocketed off through several weedbeds and didn't stop for fifty or sixty yards. I managed to turn it and it started to kite around towards open water. It felt like "the one" I was after. Then the fecking hook pinged out. I was not amused.

After that it went quiet for an hour or so. A few more handfuls of maize and I had two fish in quick succession, one of which swam round in circles in a strange manner. When I got it in I could see why. A chunky mid double mirror with a freakishly small tail. Take a look.

Six takes and four fish in three hours, not bad, so I packed in and sneaked off, unseen and already looking forward to the next session.