Two Weeks & Two Rivers

SHIFTS HAND OVER

The moon was brightening and I thought I could sense something breathing, but the sound was continually drowned-out by the sky, throbbing with the lumpy drone of a hundred distant combustion engines

Now the river, at its narrowest accelerated channel, glinted silver as sunlight struck it via the surface of that early evening moon; each turbulent surge outlined and shrinking as it subsided into darkness

Through the summer it is readily forgotten how thoroughly the cup of calm can be drained right down to the very last drop by the riverside at dusk. Everything settles to roost and a whole new everything soon stirs. 

Rooks and jackdaws, tonight over a thousand starling, and of course the pheasants' unpleasant cocophony as they crash-in to perches, often inappropriately selected and then deselected, are the regular proponents of the changing guard. 

No sooner have they handed over to the night-shift than the rustling and chewing of rodents; the last minute piscean displays of ebullience; then the cries, hoots and screeches of owls; moorhen scrambling into bushes or climbing rushes all comprise the, albeit brief, B-side of the day's soundtrack before a general silence descends. 

On two consecutive trips the local barn owl flew straight to me as if to check-out this new and mobile feature of the usually unchanged landscape. What a sight, as they floated without even the slightest sound on moth-like wings. Unsatisfied on both occasions each perched nearby to survey the scene but lost interest as efficiently as they gained it. Voles called (now when I say, "Voles called", I don't mean...well, anyway). 

The little grebe, a ubiquitous tiny river bird, seemingly ever present in the colder months, is easily missed or mistaken for a crashing chub or rolling roach, but with stealth they can be seen in between the reed stems diving for the last water boatmen of summer or perhaps winter  sticklebacks to sustain their Slender yet impossibly buoyant selves. 

The evening was frustrating in the extreme. It's not often I can say I've had 15 bites when chubbing with meat but conversely quite usual to say I've had just the one fish. This however was that day. The first three or four bites were sail-aways yet were struck into nothing. Slow to learn, I held back and allowed the next bite to develop more fully, managing to hook and land, via a crisis-let with a weedbed, an immaculate chub of 3lbs 13ozs

I was no better off afterwards, as the bites became increasingly short, sharp and stacatto, such that I began to consider the possibility of eels. HonGenSec suggested signal crayfish, which I suppose could have been trying to swim off with the bait and then quickly losing grip, neatly reflecting my own demeanour as I sloped away into the mist of the darkening field, largely defeated

----

RIGHTS HAND OVER

To be sat there again; feet in the rushy margins, backside on the bank; was like the reopening of the sweet shop hoping mint humbugs were back in stock. 

The Leam is, as they say, "A funny river"

The slightest miscue and she appears devoid of life. Her appetite generally on the reluctant side of anorexic except during those occasional times when her complexion suggests a flush of rude and ravenous health. 

This weekend was clearly the former, as she lay chilled in serpentine stillness. Visibility was two feet plus, far too clear for more than the odd fish per swim, with any panic palpable, but hope would be a companion.

In flight, fieldfare and the seeping Redwing, flushed from hawthorn and willow, scatter in random abandon at the first morning sight of man. Meadow pipit and skylark continue the winter spread as they filter throughout the land. 

Prostrate willows seemed more prevalent, and more dramatic, than three years prior. 

It had been that long. 

20 minutes of 10g feeder deployment and no bites to show for it, the river low and clear, I slip into the old banker swim. A change of approach to boot. 4 finger blobs of mash, scattered such that they would entice the quarry from its lair, drifted down in the negligible gentle flow to the edge of a previously significant feature, now depleted. There was something about it though, something imperceptible that made it attractive to both chub and roach in the past and so there was no reason to conclude that this would still be the case; perhaps the bed was scoured gravel?

First flick - poor. 

The second? Accurate and short of the spot imagined where the feed came to rest. Ideal.

As is the case with small rivers, one tends to seek-out micro-quivertips to indicate the tiniest of twitches, but when the fish is worth the effort it could put a curve in a 2oz tip without any trouble. This bite was to be no different; the customary tremble closely pursued by a wrap around and what felt like a proper combatant was engaged.

Now the wand isn't made for specimen fishing but it copes adequately with fish up to 3lbs and can subdue bigger fish in open water but this was the Leam, all rushy margins and snag-ridden runs. Initially the fish didn't show any desire for the vegetative route of escape but as it approached the net instinct clearly took hold and there it was being dragged to the surface and into the net before we had to offer it the option of releasing itself before digging it from the debris.

The opening fish of the new era then was chub of 2lbs 13ozs, and a very welcome start!

Usually under such circumstances I might give it one more cast or I might move on immediately. The former was favoured, given the re-acquaintance with the stretch, and in went a tasty fresh flake of Jonathan's best. This time the hook bait lodged in the leading edge of the feature and the heart fluttered like a cabbage white under the gaze of a wren but one gentle tweak and it flipped neatly out and sunk right next to the snag. Needless to say, when such luck abounds, it wasn't long before the tip was arching downstream again and another decent fish was hooked. At first it was a roach, then a chub of a pound or more but the head-shaking didn't seem right and, as it came into view, it was clearly a more than decent roach. Then it turned into chub again and dived into the dead rushes. The landing net turned excavator scooped the fish and all around it up, and at the scales it proved the first river pounder of the season at 1.1.8 and the world was good; for five minutes there was no COVID, no climate crisis and no war. Anywhere.

A chance call to the farmer had resulted in the syndicate getting access to this excellent stretch of the river where the features almost outnumber fish and offer so many options as to make one all boggly of mind.

As I tested another glide I was feeling that loss of engagement, that prelude to the trudge back to the tank, and through the distraction I became aware of a huge but somehow gentle swirl to my right next to the fallen log the bait rested beneath. Thinking initially, "Giant chub", I became conscious of a seal-like shape slipping underwater on the far side between the, now brown, rushes flat to the surface where up-periscoped an old, distinctly grey haired, Labrador head, or so it seemed, and this guy was not happy.

"Humpf", he exclaimed, inwardly, and all breath-y like, "What's going on here? That wasn't there yesterday!" 

His neck so unfathomably long and able to project so far out of the water as to be unreal, this was the biggest dog otter one could imagine, with rolls in his neck like a 60-year old Mike Tyson. He regarded me, for what seemed quite some time, as I too regarded him - with sheer disbelief - but then, he was gone, and the bubble of apparent fantasy burst.

Things do come in threes after all and this day was no different

 

A Reflective Surface

The fields rolling and falling though marsh to the rush-lined margins, bleached and wrung-out by winter.

A consuming stillness save for the calling raven, finches and thrushes. Artificial yet real, but isn't it all?

Three moorhen career through the pasture's edge headlong as if to fall in a chestward heap, legs in cartoon motion to the rear. How many are they, these ever-present canal rails? Thankfully more than sufficient to gladden the heart on all-but every gongoozling excursion, without doubt.

Here a major chunk of F, F & F history would be recalled. Negotiation, advertisement, commitment, engagement and satisfaction in the pursuit.

This was a stretch of the most picturesque Midlands canal snaking, as it still does, from dark tunnel to complex locks; through ancient parkland with its mature oaks and chestnuts; cutting through sheep pasture like a chisel to linocut. The result the same. A work of human art.

A change had come. Rush beds extended, reedmace beds established. A wide, now narrowed, bend and whereas, in decades past, the plate glass surface would be punctuated by the innumerable concentric rings of myriad small roach. Now- nothing.

Here, one imagined barn owl and drifting hen harrier slipping over rough grassland untouched by beast or harrow from decent to recent times.

There, a badger sett high and deep in the clay bank.

Then otter-marked brick paving. "Private, trespassers will be persecuted", it said to anything capable of interpreting it.

Today so different.

In years gone, sixty brethren would gather in the dawn-time mist. A fleece and nylon clump of pink-eyed expectation and laughter. "That's a posh shirt you're wearing there George. Are you trying to raise the standard of match angling attire?"

Of those a handful would remain to be showered as they coveted; the clump dissolved to all corners; glitter cast on the worthy.

Perhaps a shoal of bream, a 'juicy' tench or carp, a hard-won net of sparkling roach would attain the jewels, and otherwise perhaps just a handful of tiddlers as winter set in.

The crinkle-cut towpath edge, a straightened pastry cutter, still beats out those reminders with a numerical rhythm.

Twenty-three, the first; through thirties, a favourite 52 and up to 74, a narrower tiddler-filled straight.

Today though it was the teens and in pursuit of that toothiest of adversaries, pike. They had always been here. A slowly raking, shallow near shelf overhung by branches but the turbidity would prove to work against us and only the nuthatch, dunnock and siskin would keep us from sliding into tedium.

The historic stone wall, consumed by ivy yet still partly intact beside the massive oak and, more distant, fresh lamb; twins and triplets in red and blue. How closely the ewes knit their lanolin-infiltrated wool to the reins of their excitable young.

March violets quietly bloom, a modesty instilled by evolution, on woodbanks and in the lee of hawthorn hedges. Hints of green among the marginal rushes and young rabbits, all dewy-eyed twinkles and bobbing white tails, conscious of the soaring threat of these cloudy skies.

Spring, and the sweet shop is again open.

Luck in, Look out.

Kingfisher poised overhead

A Long weekend.

Long sessions and an unusually long drive.

Predators were offering themselves in the mind of temptation.

Lamprey, sprat & sardine were stocked with meat, bread & maggot the alternative options.

The days might provide a clay bed, a gravel bottom and chalk without cheese yet all would involve the Avon, both rivers and their respective rods.

Fellow blogger Nathan Walter had, very generously indeed, arranged a guest ticket on a stretch of the Hampshire Avon, in Wiltshire as it happened, but the prelude would play-out on its less vaunted Warwickshire namesake.

----

FRIDAY:

How trusting can wild birds possibly be?

Mute swan, moorhen, robin and even carrion crow all happy to risk trespassing in my space in a place where no doubt they are regularly fattened by the non-believers.

"What is it mummy? A Blackbird?".

"It's looks a bit big for a Blackbird darling".

The robin had a penchant for luncheon meat; the crow for bread and apple core; the moorhen of damaged foot for pretty much anything and the mute swan for floats. It's just not natural...but then fish take bread, pellets, bits of plastic, lures too. 

In reality it's just the natural world surviving by the most readily available means in tough conditions. Who could complain about that? It's not just humans content with an easy life.

For their part (the river fallen, pulling nicely, colour gently departing) the fish did not want bread, lamprey, sprat or herring in slack or along crease but they did have a taste for spam.

Loose feeding 5mm cubes regularly tight across near a distinct feature for an hour before adorning the meat-peppered gravel bottom with a hookbait gave the resident chub time to gain confidence and, without ever being rushed, gradually a very nice net of fish to three and a half pounds was compiled during the rest of the day until dusk. Not that there was any intention of using all the luck up locally with The Trip to follow.

We weren't holding back

Sixteen and a half pounds of fish. Chub from 1.14 plus a single perch of 1.9 on lamprey and a small roach on bread comprised the catch. Tomorrow would surely be an anticlimax after such a rewarding day but, with thoughts of grayling and dreams of giant glistening silver roach, there was no shortage of hope.

----

SATURDAY:

Rain for the two hour journey into Paradise. Rain in paradise. Rain on the way back. A childhood dream nevertheless

Thankfully it was not windy and thus the low air temperatures did not penetrate deeper than layer four of the cocoon.

Nathan paced the porch. Breakfast was not served but, a tap at the window, a cheery chat and soon we were devouring Wiltshire's finest to gird the guts for the challenge ahead.

Walking the stretch, an unseasonal chiffchaff foraged in the dense overhang that would prove to be the swim for the day. A steady seven foot trot down past the branches in water with 'that green tinge'.

My host imagined a dozen fish under each bush along the stretch and it was hard to disagree.

Steady trickling of maggots took a while to produce a bite but the trotting rod and centrepin performed nicely once the extension to fifteen feet was added. The first fish flattered to deceive and a serious impersonation of a big roach was the result.

Nathan and the wandering red or blue man sauntered forth in anticipation but we were all disappointed yet happy that something had been caught an hour or so in. Even if that fish was a chub of just over 2lbs and not the Holy Grail.

As things progressed a very satisfactory couple of hours, topped with three cracking and immaculate fish of 3.13, 4.0.8 and a new river p.b. of 4.4, ensued. All coming to a single red or fluoro maggot trotted under a 4.5 swan chubber.

Grins all round.

Meanwhile Nathan really struggled in a variety of swims but gallantly refused to move elsewhere as long as I was catching. In fact it was very noticeable that he was a thrilled as I was with the experience; and certainly the red or blue man had not caught since we arrived either.

Cetti's warbler and water rail issued their unmistakable calls from the far bank and a tidy bird list extended.

In retrospect it was clear that I had simply been fortunate enough to sit on a shoal and it was panning-out at lunchtime like an end had come to it anyway with only one more 2+ fish coming after a lost leviathon turned downstream and could not be stopped on the fine tackle required to conjure a maggot induced nibble this particular day. A further p.b. outwith the grasp.

We pondered the option of a move but on consulting the Timex there really wouldn't have been time and so the decision was made to stay, although the ghillie would be trying another swim and, for my part, I resolved to start feeding bread mash about two hours before close of play such that it would drift in the flow and settle under the leading face of the bush.

Regular enquiries from small fish kept the trigger finger twitchy and an hour or so later a more pronounced question met with the inevitable and the final chub of the day was on.

This time the two of us were conjoined via a size 8 to 4.4 fluorocarbon.

On the face of it there should only have been one winner and, ultimately,  that of course would be the case but it took a while and the further upstream the fish was drawn the better it felt in the flow, she facing into the aqueous pressure, the trotter with other ideas and angles.

Prior to this day the best fish this rod had handled was only just over two pounds but it really was now showing itself to be an impressive piece of design and engineering. Not the most recent of products but new is not always best and the fighting curve was a joy.

The fish meanwhile was not so impressed by the gear albeit it was getting to subdue this prey slowly.

Soon, mouth out, a gasp of air and a street slide sideways had it in the net.

"Another four!", I muttered to myself.

No reply.

Rod laid to one side and a lift of the net met with nothing. Aha, the net must have been caught but, no, it transpired it was the belly of the fish that caused the issue.

This was no four pounder. Earlier p.b. beware.

I knew the sling weighed around a pound, and 64 ounces on my small yet perfectly formed scales represented 4lbs.

"107 ounces!", the scales pronounced. Less 16odd was looking like 90 ounces.

What did that mean?

I was reckoning on five pounds ten.

Shaking and not unduly stunned I floated along to my partner for the day who simply asked, "What's that?!" upon sight of straining net approaching.

"A massive chub", came the bemused reply, "I reckon it's 90 ounces, 5.10!?".

We gave it a proper, considered, undithering weigh and Nathan confirmed 5 pounds 11 ounces on the button.

Second and massive p.b. of the day

A truly beautiful fish, yet more impressive than that; and in celebration the local otter drifted past and, just as quickly, out of sight.

A conclusion to events and I couldn't thank poor old Nathan enough. He wore Lone Angler and occasionally cut the figure of one but he remained irrepressibly enthusiastic for my catches and that's just fishing; sometimes you're on 'em, sometimes you ain't and there's nowt to be done. At least as the host he could sleep comfortably that night. There is surely nothing worse than inviting an angler and them catching nothing.

Two consecutive river chub p.b's, a catch of 22lbs, a good friend made, tales and knowledge shared and new lessons learned.

What could be better, but hold on!...there's Monday yet.

----

MONDAY:

Warwickshire Avon again...piking.

We track down the topping dawn shoal and good pike tear through very active two to six ounce fish three or four times.

Deadbaits deployed.

Three runs, three inconclusively hooked fish, all lost and one dropped run.

Secondary bread swim primed ready for last two hours of daylight.

Nothing.

As I said, you're either on 'em or your not.


Grim.

Return of the Mysterons

Heavy turbidity as the aftermath of snow melt, rain, silt and road salt eased away. The Stream remained fulsome and hearty but since the preceding tea time Little Johnny Frost had been at work. Sparkled did everything; the grass, teasels, flood flotsam, burdocks, fences, trees and of course the water margins

Over the past two weeks the fortune to see three otters, two certainly dogs, across three watercourses, and all in daylight, has been a dream. Some brethren of the maggot might claim this a nightmare, but not here

These magnificent, intelligent, artful creatures mesmerise like no other. Bites and ravens ignored as peripheral

Hauling-out onto a vast raft of torn-out bulrushes, logs and branches deposited by the first high waters of this turbulent winter the dog otter slipped in and out of the water of this County's primary river and then out of sight just 10m away, oblivious to human presence and the 11m of carbon pole running past his flanks

Later at dusk he returned, swam past this silent still frame, took-up a lounger on the raft again and proceeded to utter a series of chesty coughs. Fish bone stuck? Who knows, but another fascinating moment in the company of a top predator was there to be absorbed

By this time mist, leaning towards fog, was befuddling the autofocus and all we were left with was those Mysteron eyes and ghostly apparitions



Dodgy pic of Mr Ron

----

The canal of childhood development, tough but rewarding, was behaving as is its wont. Perfect colour for fish but Mr Hackett had preceded us and "The Bushes", those that the great Billy Makin would seek on a bee-line after an early bath on another stretch in pursuit of ten pounds of caster roach before tea, were no more. The whole stretch, and indeed every other we have seen, trimmed to the piles (nasty business)

They will regenerate of course but what focusses the piscine attention meanwhile with no cover? Marinas? Quite possibly. One might like to think the fish will spread-out and offer greater eveness throughout the affected parts but that is for the future to solve

One twelve ounce roach (plus a thirteen ounce perch to TBW) and thoughts turned to the flask. Reaching for it a stream of bubbles appeared, diagonally, near side to far, then a log appeared tight to the concrete under brambles followed by the logs head, it had eyes. This beauty was a good four foot long; sleek, oily, alert, and hunting

Capturing inadequate film it turned and zig-zagged bank-to-bank with more bubbles, occasionally raising its head to breathe

The canals in these parts support otter sprainting locations under the majority of bridges, the longer the bridge the more used it seems, yet this was the first canal sighting of His Majesty where, it might be suspected, he and his kith are generally nocturnal given the levels of bankside and waterborne disturbance

Dodgy pic - Ron's Head

----

Back to the stream...

Eventually some topping fish were spotted and three or four nice roach up to three parts of a pound enhanced by two chub of just a big gudgeon over two pounds made for a very nice 6lbs+ catch in the conditions 

 

It was during this period of intense concentration on the pole with bread feeder that a splashy swirl occurred upstream and, turning to view, it was immediately obvious what had caused it.

More bubbling through the swim and head and body popped up some ten metres or so downstream. This one not so big but clearly also hunting among the bankside roots and debris. Suspected as a female, camera in hand the pursuit commenced but she was brighter and was out of sight all-but instantaneously leaving only emptiness and some out of focus film to remember her by, AGAIN, and this time to poor to contemplate sharing
 
With apologies to:

• All otters called Ron
• Gerry Anderson
• My reader
  
  
  

Cold, Clear and Chubby

It was never going to be warm...

 SATURDAY

Canals would be frozen, as would small lakes and with high water having run-off the local upper Avon and Leam these offered the only options. As I've been in eight minds for every trip lately, two choices would prove a bonus.

Saturday the Avon was shrouded in freezing fog and thick frost. The little pond by the gate somewhat remarkably not completely crusty.

Tee shirt, thermal layer, grandad tee, thick shirt, microfleece, fleece gilet, thick fleece, thermal padded coat with zipped-in lining. 9 layers and nothing was getting through this.

Minus two on arrival, but it's been worse. Since my water thermometer became zander bait no temperatures have been taken but I suspected the river would have been around 4degC.

  The colour had dropped out more than expected but that seems to be common with this river these days, quite why is beyond me. The Leam would hold it longer.

As I approached a water rail was silently flushed across into the far side undergrowth and a pair of swans with a still clingy brown-mottled youngster dunked for breakfast.

Somehow I expected roach and it was a little liquidised bread cage feeder that sought to do the business.

 Third cast into the deep hole and a tentative bite was missed but immediately after that unmistakable drag round of the winter chub but it didn't fight like chub staying deep and not diving for the gathered uprooted weed under my feet until well into the battle. From thence he was scooped to the bank however and at 3.7 a nice start.

 In celebration a tiny chestnut bank vole tazzed among the stalks at my feet and was out of sight no sooner than he had been in it.

This was a late start. Firstly I had arrived after the usual faff with gates and as I unloaded realised I hadn't stopped for bread on the way. So the nearest option left me with a Marks & Spencer soft white thick sliced loaf.

"How would this compare with the Blue", I asked myself.

In practice it was a good substitute so if you're ever stuck it's another possibility, albeit medium would have been closer to the mark.

Consequently I contact fishing traffic control to advise of the landing error and was advised I had until lunch time to get over it so things weren't so bad...or so it seemed.

Thankfully the resident ravens kept me amused, as the fishing did not continue as it had started, and as I packed away lifting my seat to expose the last area of frost that hadn't yet thawed it felt a little anticlimactic. Just that one nice chub, always a pleasure in cold weather, but I should be thankful for a bite under such conditions.


SUNDAY:

The following day the second option was taken-up.

The Leam did indeed hold a touch more colour but, as before, it was obvious that the best had passed during the working week.

If Saturday had been the script for Sunday it wouldn't have been a surprise. A decent Leam chub of 2.10 early doors and then flushed green sandpiper and squealing water rail in the phragmites later when roving. Bites in every peg but all tiny tippy-taps and only two sub-sized fish, a roach and a dace to show for it.

A very confident Robin shared each of the first four swims in its search for egg sandwich crumbs and, even though each time I moved scraps would have been left behind, it somehow preferred the challenge of testing its bravery with me sat there.

I'd gone a good year or so away from this stretch until recently and it was incredible how it had changed. The floods can be quite impacting here and it showed in the changes where rafts had been lost and others formed; standing reed and rush beds flattened, dragged-out and reshaped; and whole trees removed. It was as if approaching a new venue in many areas and a few mental notes were made. Dace still lived in the same glide though, as did roach.

Through the meadow back to the car the standing water remained frozen as I cracked-on and with the ram looking a little more lively than some weeks ago I gave him and his flock a wide berth; not that he's ever defensive in his duties, but you never can be certain.

WEDNESDAY

Back to the Avon.

The afternoon fog that appeared to be thickening suddenly slipped away on arrival but the water was clearer still. The flow however remained urgent as I again settled into the mysterious deep hole.

 Again a water rail squealed it's piglet-like call from the far bank and a steady approach, given the continuing cold weather, of liquidised bread in a 15g cage feeder and a smaller than usual flake hookbait combined with the more delicate than usual 9' wand.

A series of unhittable fiddly bites ensued and filled the first hour or more - then an unrelenting pull on the 3/4oz tip resulted in solid resistance.

The Boy Wonder trotted along and removed rod no2 which was dangling a lob down the edge and meanwhile the excellent little lead rod I was relying on that, it turned out, was attached at long last to that elusive for four years 4lb plus chub, coped as well as one with a blue chip reputation would be expected to.

The fish wasn't particularly long and initially it was puzzling as to why it was a struggle to lift it up the bank...until it came fully into view.

"How big do you think it is?", asked TBW.

" I think it's bigger than the one on Saturday but I'm not sure how much more".

Secretly however I felt it might just be tantamount to THAT fish. The fish I set out four years ago to extract from the Leam. A four pounder.

It was in 2016 that I started a new relationship with the Warwickshire Avon though, having been a regular BAA member decades ago. Many say the biggest fish have been removed by the dear old otter and that may well be true so a four pounder could prove to be of greater value than it might immediately seem as time passes.

When TBW asked how many ounces I needed I couldn't bring myself to say and simply asked what it read, praying to myself he would say more than 64.

"66.6", he exclaimed. It must be an omen for a similar Leam fish next surely.

Damien, the chub.

 4 pounds 2 ounces 10 drams. I became a bit Flintoffian.

We anglers often talk of scale or fin perfect fish and on that score this one took some beating

Strangely not the biggest F,F&F chub. That was a 4.6 specimen from a canal back in the 1990's. Okay it wasn't a River Leam fish but, so long in trying, it was very welcome nevertheless.

That ended the afternoon's action but that really was plenty, thank you very much.

A Win Bonus in Tough Times?

The Stillwater is tough. 

So tough that a bite is at the very least a pleasant surprise and, more often in fact, something of a shock.

A couple of weeks ago I felt that floundering feeling when I wasn't enjoying my fishing enough as it seemed to have become directionless and predictable. Too many stretches of canal had turned clear and the banker stretch, although in perfect trim, could only be enthused over so many times.

A decision was made.

Target roach on all venues.

It started with blanks. In fact Monday would have been my sixth consecutive, but no one said it would be easy.

The Stillwater was too still, however I did see some quality fish topping at dawn which gives me future hope, but wind and colour are required.

The hours I whiled away on the banks were exceptional for bird life however and precisely fifty species were listed topped by a fantastic winter visiting firecrest plus a few brief glimpses of an otter bubbling it's way eastward in search of that which I could not find. That tiny bird was the harbinger of what we Burtons call a 'Let's Weep!' moment, such as I last felt when discovering my first ever Dartford warbler in Dorset. Magical.

No bites ensued in two visits and the next thing to make me emotional was meeting a good old friend or two by chance in the tackle shop. About fifteen years they reckon it had been. Cue selfies, tales of days gone by and, I'm told, Facebook may subsequently have been involved, though that is beyond my oldfangledness.

On a tip-off I decided to fine-tune the roach method on another pond where I might get a bite before returning when conditions would be right in search of the prey of palpitations.

As I used to think as a match angler..."You learn nothing if you're not getting any bites".

Arriving before dawn, good fish topped all round with the increasing light and just occasionally some real specimens rolled too.

Fishing two rods at 30m with maggot feeders it was second cast with each rod that the action started and continued unabated until I cut the flavouring from the feeder by way of a reverse experiment and the bites immediately ceased. Amazing proof.

Archie Braddock - you were right, as we're my informal mentors. I was tempted to call them Mentors A & B but that implies a hierarchy so I'm going with Mentor P and Mentor I. I suspect they will become MP and MI in no time...oh, they already have.

Roach, Rudd and a solitary perch completed a lively two hour session with nine pounds of fish which included the golden prize of a rather sneaky p.b. Rudd of 1.2.

Next day the air was a little less welcoming at three degrees but I had a couple more things to try out and so headed to the same peg again. This time for a quarter short of two hours but the hoped-for big roach showed themselves for the first hour of daylight once more.

Second cast again with each rod and two fighters were on the bank. Initially disinterested, but increasingly keen to get away the closer to the bank they came, the unmistakable fight of unseasonal tench was upon us. One could have been lucky, two worthy of comment but to take four up to 5.2.11 was just plain silly. Add to this two roach and three perch, all around ten ounces each and the sixteen pound catch in one and three quarter hours summed-up a commercial-esque(!) session I could never have seen coming.

The second tench, or tenchlet at 1.6, carried festering growths in the roots of its fins and so I slipped it back and thus avoided infecting the keepnet. Photographs are now with the holding club and their experts are on the case to pursue it further. Deer stalkers donned and magnifying lens in hand as I write no doubt.

I think the wind is on the rise in a few days' time, so, having ironed-out a few wrinkles in the method, it's back to The Stillwater to try to tempt the untemptable but until then this alternative is too good to miss for December. Those bigger early-priming roach are there to be had too. The lake is the source of the roach p.b. on stillwaters at 2.1.8 of three decades ago, the best of a magnificent brace and a day when, just minutes later, The Old Duffer nabbed one for himself of 2.0.8 to confirm the venue pedigree.


This morning with, again, very little time to play with, it was back to attempt to tease out those bigger roach that had been active early, a fortunate by-product of this rig-testing industry. It had been a brief frost yesterday evening but, with temperatures due to soar up to 6degC before dawn with some cloud and rain in the early hours, the likelihood of tremulous tench yet ravenous roach became too tempting to ignore.

On arrival it was actually seven degrees but the breeze was biting and I'd forgotten my trousers, or at least my thermal over-trousers, and had to sit like some old(er) boy with a jumper over my thighs looking distinctly as though my carer had cleared-off in search of someone more spritely.

I fancied two options:
A maggot feeder at 30-35m and a flavoured maggot feeder at 60m, both with maggot hook baits.

The result:
4 bites to the flavour in 2.25 hours fishing, all hooked and landed. Zilch on the other. Now there's no doubt that Archie, MI & MP were right.

Encouraging one pound fish to the bank with a slightly over-gunned rod and careful use of the clutch has been interesting in that it has really enabled the identification of the fish by fight characteristics quite easily

So the week ended with a less numerous catch but a nice weight of eight pounds-odd comprising this lovely, yet thermally confused, tench of 5.9:

A probable roach X rudd hybrid of a gnats under a pound:

and two of these chunky footballers:

With an approaching ten days or so to tackle various venues, and the weather looking settled there's genuine optimism in the air, and the water I hope

Predicting the Unpredictable OR the Winter 2015/16 Big Roach Quest

The midlands canal network can be a treacherous place. Boaters slip into locks; country gentlefolk fall into the water near pubs after dark; ponies are drowned and, most worryingly of all, gongoozlers sell cheese.

If you are indigenous and wild there are natural threats. Kingfisher, otter, pike, heron, signal crayfish and of course zander together with the universally disliked mink, not to mention the occasional diving bird, may seek to harm you.

It's a tough world out there.

How tough, is best encapsulated by the following image taken at about 9am today (Saturday) which depicts a group of women afeared of the challenge that walking the towing path might set them. Now admittedly I took the difficult route to the water by descending brick steps but it didn't occur to me for one moment that I would need dayglo clothing and not one but two hi-tech walking sticks to make this dangerous journey. I know for next time however.

Why did I never notice the hazards before? Sometimes I am so stupid. Thank God for Humbrol fluorescent paints. The Walking Wagglers have saved me, and now you I suspect, from a grizzly end, without doubt. Take heed canal users out there, the towpath comprises a route almost as risky as the wilderness of the Scottish Highlands.

Todays risk didn't end there though...

Midweek, the gauntlet had been well and truly thrown down with...(I was going to use the word 'gay' here but, now that the meaning of this word is in its third incarnation in my lifetime, I no longer know what it stands for. So I'm going for a different word as it suits the mood)...dangerous abandon.

The target is to catch a canal roach so huge it will beat the Idler's Quest Authority (IQA, not to be confused with IPA which fuels the associated engine) - accepted British Canal Record of 2.4.0.

Eager for first blood I returned to the spot from whence the 1.13.0 roach, covered in the last post, appeared. It was colder now though. Six degrees C overnight and rain forecast from 9am.

An early start was, as usual, key; especially at a weekend.

In terms of light levels, I had peaked a little soon as I struggled to focus on the yellow-tipped float which sat, apparently motionless, before me. Some twenty minutes it was slumped low, between changes in ever-increasing bait size. The gloom started to lift as the first dog walker of the day appeared to view as far as one could see to the right - a resting carp angler, in uniform, strode toward me with twin sheep dog types afore. Dramatically the float lifted and I struck into a very solid fish. It seemed bream-like and then took on extra power as it headed south causing me, very unusually, to leave my seat and follow it toward where I assumed stealth mode man to be. Only visible by his dogs.

"'Got one on?", came out of the blue, or should that be khaki.

"'Sure have!"

"Ah, there's some lumps along here. Some big Zander too". 

Funny how everyone becomes an expert when they see an angler and yet no one fishes the canals.

"Well it won't be one of those on bread", I replied.

"Unless it's taken the roach that took the bread!", he blurted as he wandered further on...and then stopped as the lump surfaced. I had to ask him to repeat himself as I was strangely distracted at this moment.

"Slab", he said, all matter of fact.

"Hybrid", I said, matter of accuracy...and off he and they went to plot the rounding-up of some named fish elsewhere.

The shocks continue.

There are canal hybrids and then there are super-charged over-sized monster North Oxford Canal hybrids. Like that eel a month or more ago this one needed threading into the net sideways as, even head on, it would only just have fitted.

A couple of years back I recall taking a series of ever-increasing hybrids week by week, peaking at 4.0.3 and growing to love these the most pointless of naturally occurring fish. 

This was clearly over three pounds by some margin. A very roach-like example (if only!) but as chunky as a bag of sugar in the body.

I hung the presumed infertile beast on the scales, knowing the Little Samsons would be somewhat overstretched and feeble, expecting nothing specific but when the read-out hit 84.6 ounces I also knew this was a special moment. Deducting 12.6 for the net was a trifle and I was left with a round 72 ounces and a simple calculation of four pounds eight ounces.

Simple and yet bewildering.

 

One of those rare moments when the overwhelming desire is not to return the fish but continue to admire it. To do so however would be contrary to our ethos as anglers of course and so, reluctantly, I slipped this comfortable P. B. breaker back to observe the power as it surged back into the depths, it's strength recovered.

Despite this incredible capture to add to a run of them recently I expected little more on the day, and little more I got, for the time being at least.

Soon enough though the urge to free-line whole lobworms centrally down the cut to my left set-in. Action was immediate with relatively small perch coming to hand regularly. Then one of a pound six followed by another powerful hybrid of 2.6.0 as the only other bite on bread, apart from nibbling, tugging crayfish.

The perch continued in a steady procession right down to a one ounce fish but then a proper head-banger (pursued closely by another one of 1.6.0) sealed the day putting 1.14.0 and another three pounds of fish onto the tally as a working boat came through spoiling prospects as surely as the spots of rain would send me packing.

The total catch equalled sixteen pounds five ounces and beat my previous best ever North Oxford catch by some three pounds-odd.

The quite staggering run of canal sport continues and, as I write the temperature has risen to around eight degrees above this morning's with moist tropical air blowing in from the south-west ensuring that tomorrow might offer another opportunity to tap into this  geyser of big canal fish before it freezes up.

The bloggers challenge scoreboard is now a struggle. Points are limited with most obvious species categories now pretty much peaked so this hybrid, and the few ounces I managed to add to roach and carp in recent days, may prove to be crucial moments.

For the sad record - Somebodies former pet carp, minus top lip. Obviously someone previously caught the fish in kit form. 4lbs 2ozs.

----

So that was yesterday.

Today (Sunday) started with a better plan.

Or so I thought.

Get there before sunrise and walk into the wilderness towards known big roach territory and seek a quiet spot out of the gales and impending rain.

Technically this worked a treat. Not a ripple. Wind ripping overhead and rain delayed, no doubt by the same phenomenon, and, as I it here around lunch time, still no rain

Usual tactics were deployed but as it grew light the water appeared somewhat changed by yesterday's rain. Visibility was reduced to only 4 to 6 inches down and that required something of a squint.

The bread rig sat untroubled for some time.

The whole lob rig however bent round first cast. Two early and unimagined Chub both just knocking on three pounds, from an area I have never seen one before, followed by a stream of Perch from three ounces to 1.5.2 made up for just two fish on bread, both roach and topped by one of 1.0.3.

The interest this morning though wasn't the fishing but the fish.

Now that may sound a bit odd but nearly all of the fish were streaked with sores if above half pound in weight. Early-on I had seen two cormorants in flight descending and heading for the canal to my left. I can think of no other culprit that could cause this damage.

The location is very secluded and they could comfortably spend an hour or two each morning trying to arrest the escape of anything they can attempt to grip. I have never seen such wholesale harm to a net of fish and can only assume this is indeed a regular hunting ground.

Now dayglo coats would not help these little guys but it just goes to show the Walking Wagglers were right. It just ain't safe out there

...if you're a fish.


The catch totted-up to fourteen pounds two ounces today, boosted of course by 6lbs of Chub in the first three casts. Big fish straight-off at the start is the continuing trend. 'Twas ever thus early on the cut but as long as this ridiculously mild weather continues I see no reason why the fishing should not remain so good and the next few days are forecast to be similar. Now, I need to find those roach again...

Kids and Fishing (Chapter MCMXXVI), and Other Stuff...

There was an air of change.

In a period of a few increasingly short days waterside green had tended to straw and higher up some trees displayed shades of red.

Soon carpets would be suspended by that unfathomable phenomenon, surface film, perhaps as multi-coloured running contorting in the twists and turns of increased flow or caught as decaying rugs in a bay or against a fallen log.

The feeling of being fully alive as the chill takes to the air coincides with migration in birds and, largely throughout the animal world, hunger. This marks September to November as the time the coarse angler expects. Yes, autumn is peak feeding time for most coarse species.

Personally I had set the summer aside to add a few stillwater fish to the Blogger's Challenge scoreboard, in a season I usually avoid, thinking this would give me the best chance of whatever success I could muster but, with only one species to show for it and a handful of canal and river fish from May and the past few weeks, that tactic seems to have been somewhat high-risk. On the upside, there are two or three fish there that will take some beating locally but I am still too short in the stillwater department at a time of year when I will be inclined to fish canals if the rivers are too low and clear through to the season's end. I fear I may have to fit in some more stillwater sessions yet and rely on a more concentrated approach to the other two options later while stillwater fish remain likely to respond.

The Boy Wonder for his part has been unable to fish until the past three weeks but took his first ever ruffe amid great excitement after we discussed free-lining lob tails a fortnight back only to feel that nauseating sensation when he realised a guaranteed twenty points would be precisely zilch upon noting that the species is ineligible!

His high jinx continued to influence my own luck as I blanked that same ruffe day and also this weekend when he caught a two ounce chub in his first session touch-legering (a new method for every occasion this lad!). As we strolled back to the lay-by, inadvertently late for dinner, we pondered how many points this chublet might have been be worth and, assuming the chub record to be around ten pounds, figured ten points to every pound would be somewhere near so surmised one to two points. Tiny result though it was he was chuffed that night, as we filled in the table last thing before he went to sleep, to see that he no longer propped up the leaderboard and had at least five anglers behind him on the river chart.

 

A happy chap he was as I sat back with tipple in hand recalling his thoughts immediately after the points conversation.

"What would happen if you caught a new record chub? How many points would you get then?".

"Well, if you equalled it exactly you'd get one hundred as it would be one hundred percent of the record. So if you caught, let's say, to keep it easy, an eleven pounder how many points would that be worth?".

"Err, a hundred and ten".

"Yes, plus ten more for catching the biggest chub of the challenge...until someone caught a bigger record of course, then they'd get the extra ten".

"Okay, that's what I'll do then", he replied. Matter of fact.

I'm uncertain as to whether he meant the first record, the second or both, but it's gonna be fun finding-out!

We may need a bigger landing net.

In between being jinxed by my now returned companion, I did managed to increase my own river perch from a few ounces to one pound three last week from 'our stretch' of the Leam on a free-lined lob and then increased that again to 1-12-0 just yesterday a mile or so upstream using a 'new' traditional method to me, that of laying-on with a whole lobworm on a 6 hook and a large shot nailed to the bottom. Traditionally of course this would be balanced against a crow or porcupine quill but, in the absence of those, I was employing a thirty year old Max Winters stick float (anyone remember him?)...which I then duly lost on a snag later. The bites were un-missable and totally contradict everything I thought I'd learnt match fishing with, for instance, squatts on 26 hooks and 0.055mm bottoms.



One, three.

 

One, twelve.

Prior to this I had my own one-pointer, a perfectly-formed micro-pike!, and a lovely river roach which couldn't quite tip the scales at a pound, try though it did as I weighed it.

Don't ask

 

The undoubted highlight of the past between posts period followed the sound of crashing below me on 'the day of the ruffe'. The river was bank to bank with rushes downstream of the hole I was dipping tail ends of lobs into without success and as the noise became closer I expected the resident family of swans with four maturing cygnets to appear in series as they reached the open water I surveyed so it was with no little surprise that when ripples started to emanate across the pool nothing appeared to follow them. Until, that was, I became conscious of what could only be described as an intermittent double-snorting or snorkelling effect. Whatever was making the disturbance was tight under the near bank, out of sight, beneath overhanging rushes, nettles and grasses but it didn't take me long with my standard process of elimination to discard whale and dolphin and get to otter as a conclusion.

Just as soon as I thought it relatively risk-free I ran on feet as light as I could make them and approached the ruffe hunter while telepathically praying he would turn round without speaking, which he thankfully did and I was able to give him the accepted 'silence' signal. We sat and waited as I pointed urgently downstream. Nothing. Then, slowly, an impression of sound. Then out came her head, oiled in arrowheads and pallid beneath the cutest of carnivorous chins. Sure enough a female otter in broad daylight. We watched her make her way under far bank hawthorns getting tiny glimpses here and there and all the time conscious of her blowing and then sucking in fresh air between each dive, occasionally punctuated by the crunching of snail of crayfish.

Otter bait

For me the otter remains the holy grail of native mammals and a sight I wouldn't have believed I'd experience locally in my lifetime until maybe five years ago, and now three in a year or so within a mile stretch.

Ripples of the passing otter

Sometimes life really can be so rewarding, it makes those sessions jinxed by The Boy Wonder all the more easily forgotten, until he reminds me of course...

...and when he's not fishing he makes a mean chef too!