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Fishing 2018

The First Family Holiday

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Although I have managed a few fishing trips away this year; this is the very first family break since the birth of our daughter.

It is just as well that I own an estate car as the amount of gear we needed to pack was unprecedented.

I was not expecting to get fishing on our holiday as there would simply be no room in the car for my fishing gear on top of all the family essentials, even in my estate car, but a friend persuaded me to stow a rod away somewhere and said that he may join me on the river bank for a crack at a Perch.

My first choice at this time of year is always a lovely Fred J.Taylor Roach rod that I own. It is quite a large rod and really would not have fitted and possibly would have got damaged in the transit. However, I found in my pile of sticks a rod I forgot that I had, an Edgar Sealey ‘Octofloat‘. This is a three piece rod and is light as a feather, perfect to smuggle into the car.

I had also packed the bare minimum into a Brady bag including a wide drum ‘Speedia‘ that I have not used in ages and looked forward to an afternoon on my favourite Wessex river aiming to catch one of it’s lovely Roach.

Our arrival in Wessex coincided with Storm ‘Callum’ and thoughts of any fishing were very distant for a number of days. Eventually a break in the weather did show on the forecast. Rain had stopped and high pressure was to stay for a couple of days. This was great, and gave the river a little time to recover allowing the water to fine down and clear a little.

The day arrived and was greeted with glorious sunshine, something that we had not seen for ages. Bizarre for this time of the year, mid-October and the temperature was in the high-teens. In fact, as I strolled to the river it could have been mistaken for a glorious summer’s day. Maybe not perfect fishing conditions for some, but perfect for me!

The river was the lowest that I have ever fished it following a very hot summer.  The spot that I chose to fish had very little current in it, which is unusual as later in the season I have know it to be a torrent here.

I did not manage to catch many Roach today, but did land endless Gudgeon, numerous Dace, a few small Chub and a cracking Perch right at the end of the day. A lovely couple of hours were spent.

Fishing 2018

Never Fish Off-Rota

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It was the last day of my trip and I  never look forward to the long journey home. The issue is that my route takes me very near to this pond, and I always tell myself that I will just fish an hour or two and then get back on the road home. This invariably never happens and I stay at the ponds far longer than intended. Today was no exception.

I had contacted a few of the members to see if it was ok to fish on their day and was very pleased to get a reply to say yes, there was no issue.

I checked out of my hotel and made my way to the tackle shop in order to purchase some fresh bait. When I arrived, no sooner had I opened the car door it began to rain, and by the time I walked the short distance to the tackle shop it was pouring down, accompanied by a deep rumble of thunder. I must be mad going fishing in this!Non-the-less, bait tubs full, I made my way to the ponds. The tops of the trees billowing over, and the wind was just getting stronger and stronger developing into a gale. No sane person would choose to go fishing in this weather, I was on my way home so had nothing to lose by giving it a go.

Remarkably the swim I was to fish was out of the wind. This pond is surrounded by trees which not only gives protection from the wind, but  are great for sheltering under in light showers. The wind was ridiculously strong by now.  Another issue was falling Kelly kindling (branches) which were a close encounter on more than one occasion, but came in very handy during the day for my tea making.

I did the same as yesterday by raking the swim a couple of times and only brought in light weed, baited it, and retired to put the Wizard together.

I was soon fishing and once more could hear distant rumbles of thunder and temporarily, I remained dry. How long could my luck last? Not long as it happened.

I caught a lovely palm-sized Crucian. The swim from time to time was cluttered with bubbles, so I was praying again to catch one of the fabulous Tench that reside here.

Fishing was quite slow, but very enjoyable.  Concentrating on my inactive float for so long then turning to attend to a boiling Kelly the split second my reel screamed into life. By the time I had put the kettle down and got my hand on the rod, the fish was well into the weed and there was no way back from there, loosing a float also in the disaster. If you are ever short of a bite, make tea! It’s amazing how many times stopping concentrating on a float actually gets you a bite. Obviously I had lost a Tench.

I missed a couple of lovely lift bites too, probably Tench although I have known Roach to feed in this manner also. I missed some proper thumping bites with the float shooting under, today was not going well.

Another cracking bite saw the float zip under, I lifted the rod and was into either a really good Crucian, or a Tench. The fish dived down into the lilles, my line kissed the stem of one of the lilles and gave way as if it had been cut by a razor blade; I could not believe it!

It was not long before my luck with the weather ended and the rain came in earnest. For the first shower I was quite comfortable sheltering under the boughs of the tress. When it stopped, I retrieved my brolly from the car in case of a big storm. The brolly came in very handy as the heavy rain did come, but I didn’t get any thunder surprisingly.

The last straw was another thumping bite, the float shot under and down towards the lillies, I struck into it, but the line between my reel and first eye on the rod had caught around a branch on the ground, the float shot out of the water and wrapped itself many times around the top of my rod – the air was blue!!! It was an impossible tangle. I had no option but to cut it off. This marked my time to head for home, the lake gods were telling me to go.

Tripping over the chain on my Kelly while packing up which was full of hot water and scalding myself in the process, gave even more proof that you should never-ever go fishing off-rota.