Three Weeks In…The Hiatus at Home

A Long Season Behind & a Long non-statutory Close Season to Follow

There was a time when life was simple

A time when a close season was accepted, when fishing was uncomplicated and when people knew where they stood

They knew right from wrong, in a sense

The glorious 16th. Of spring fishes, sharp mornings, misty views, gritty eyes and the heartbeat of uncertainty

Those of unfathomable feathered feats of migration would start to trickle in. A few waders, the odd martin or swallow; overwintering chiffchaff and blackcap might start to sing, boosted by a far greater number of visitors and, conversely, some would leave; redwing and fieldfare most notably, but they can also be noted hanging around seemingly far too long (7 fieldfare in a mature garden aspen just 2  weekends ago)

Wildfowl leave and wildfowl return; cetaceans follow prey into the waves warming coastal waters and, somewhat intriguingly, become spotters’ fantasy sightings

Frogs, toads and newts; snakes and lizards; invertebrates; fish; every living thing becomes caught-up in the palpable swell of Spring

Except this year, 2020, when we British humans are to be denied our Spring

Questions are begged

"But what about the League?!"

Liverpool, perhaps Coventry City, Celtic, Dundee Utd, Cove Rangers they could all be declared champs and not many would be bothered but when it concerns tight current positions like those of Leeds, Crewe/Swindon, Raith Rovers, etc., plus the numerous also rans seeking promotion and those trying to drag their legs from the rubber towel holder of relegation, what’s to do? Well okay the, disrespectfully so called, lower leagues have been scrubbed but firstly, does it not seem quite incredible that none of the leagues seem to have rules set-out under the heading “Massive Disaster Contingency Plans”, especially as the majority of them survived at least one and probably two World Wars?

Surely the simplest solution is that if a delay of more than ‘X’-weeks occurs the places each team occupied at the time of suspension will be their finishing positions. If the rules state it there is no doubt and everyone goes into it with their eyes open, but to take decisions in multi-million pound situations mid-flow could/would result in complete chaos with the legal system being swamped with claims and counter-claims arising therefrom. One would think they’d be ready

So that’s just one issue in this crazy COVID-19 world of isolation. I’m told there may be others


For F, F&F though there are bigger fish to skin and many ways of frying a cat (to use dear old Psycho’s method of phraseology. For the can’t be bothered at heart, he once said, “We could see the carrot at the end of the tunnel”) and some of those creatures will be positively contributing to this, the Hiatus at Home, while others will suffer

Research, conservation, breeding, crime, birth rates, death rates, sales, mental illness, wealth, etc., will all have wildly swinging fluctuations of fortune and we’ve just got to bite the bullet and make the most of what we have without any great release other than conversation, community spirit, siege mentality, gardening, home decorating, health and fitness, families being drawn together, helping each other, playing games, cooking. Blimey, sounds quite plausible actually.

So, for our part, it’s been a case of writing up angling notes, imagining what one might need to prepare for and what options might present dependent upon the timing of our release.

Revisiting those notes is always rewarding, not least because the number of hopeless trips become apparent and being confined to literal gardening duty seems nicely profitable in comparison to those

One aspect, it being a Bloggers’ Challenge season, is the noting of those slightly more special fish. There’s a little schedule that qualifies a fish in FFF-land and anything above gets underlined in red. So it’s quick to glance through and see how successful a period has been in terms of fish that have hit the mark of being noteworthy, albeit they all get noted anyway

They’ve become known as Stone-fish

PB’s merit a red box around them. Any type of PB. Best for rivers, canals, lakes; best for individual watercourses or lakes or of course the actual overall, indisputable, species, ‘with knobs on’, Lifetime Personal Best

PB’s came along like mornings when the Float & Flannel elements of the Blog were growing and the first Bloggers’ Challenge entered was underway. A few years on, a PB has become more of a rarity as the number of pyramid topping species has racked-up. Indeed, it’s become more a case of seeking epic moments than PB’s in their own right.

But is this right? Is angling all about breaking previous barriers?

The Bloggers’ Challenge  is all consuming.

The inner competitor breaks-out of dormancy and influences every move.

What points-scoring fish do current conditions suggest the most likely? Catching it is uplifting but there are many, many failures and its easy to look back at a year via the notes and (lack of) underlining to see the fact

Some nice fish have been to grace the net, certainly, but the whole period has been more about quantity and filling the scoreboard with ‘nice fish’. The final part of the plan, this current river close season from mid-March to mid-June, was to have been the icing on the cake but of course, chances are it won’t now happen at all

Post-Coronavirus I envision a world quite different

When nature bites humankind on the proverbial, there is usually a quick return to whatever normality is, and it’ll be different things emerging from this pandemic that will stay with us. Sadly however, it will probably be the easy things that have little effect on people’s everyday lives that will be retained

In reality of course its the more fundamental far-reaching changes that need to become the norm, family, community, walking, supporting nature, growing food; all locally undertaken. British holidays, and, as the air now clears, a massive reduction in air and car travel, and so on

Personally it strikes me that if this lockdown has taught us anything surely it is that we’ve lost touch with the natural pace of life. The increasingly confusing, rushed, frantic daily grind that is neither natural nor healthy, nor sustainable is the new black. A place of darkness driven by the constant search for economic growth. More of this, more of that and less/no actual time to simply live. A pace careering to an inevitable collision with mental health and physical issues, which all begs the simple question, “Why?”.

One final question:
Could CORVID-19 be caused by a flock of rooks?


Seat photograph: Copyright Florian Müller

Bloggers Challenge Run-in

Onset of April marks the start of the final month of the Bloggers Challenge 2017/18.

One or two anglers have been able to put some good points on the scales since the New Year but most of us have struggled. However, today is the turning point in the weather with temperatures set to rise over the next fortnight to fifteen centigrade in the day but more importantly five degrees plus overnight, enabling the stillwaters and canals to boost the possibilities of some late 'summer fish'

Brian had a tremendous burst of quality fish toward the end of the river season which cemented his place in third for the time being, a hundred points behind my dear old self, sat 200 behind runaway leader James.

Scorecard

So, in the knowledge that 100 points is just three cracking fish for Brian to overtake me, I've set myself the challenge within a challenge of adding as many points in the next four weeks as I can glean and really give it a go; almost as if it had only just commenced.

It can be a fizzling last few weeks of the competition and so the prospect of some excitement in it is not to be sniffed at.

Scouring the potential identified a few species that slipped through the gaping holes in the ramshackle landing net, some of which (say it quietly) should be quite easy to catch. Others not so.

This past weekend The Canon took me to a pond known to contain ide. Thinking of it as a day-ticket fishery it still appeared to be one as I arrived, if a little full to overflowing across the path in places. On closer inspection however it was clear that under that increased water level sat platforms seemingly inches apart; a sure sign that this was a commercial fishery.

I immediately felt quite queasy but found putting my fingers in my ears and repeating, "La la la la", helped, as I stemmed the flow of blood, quite neatly actually, with sticks of pop-up foam in each nostril.

Now I had never seen an ide and had to Google it so that I could recognise one and apparently it's just a naturally coloured orfe. If a zander is a 'pike-perch' (it isn't) then an ide is a chub-roach.

A bit more research suggested the most likely method, keeping it simple, would be float fishing on the drop with regular maggot feed. I knew it could rain all morning and so rod and line was preferred to the pole.

The Canon left me to it and wandered off to find a suitable bread punch swim peg (commercial after all) less affected by the high water having advised the water was 18"-2' up on normal...and it was coloured. Well, I knew such fisheries were often coloured due simply to the action of their inhabitants and, looking at it, I felt if it had been a river I would be rubbing my hands. I set sail therefore with some self-promoted confidence.

At this point there was no one else there but, slowly, a trickle of vans bounced and splashed through the water-filled potholes just behind me and as the first one passed, a bite, a strike and the devil incarnate was hooked...a commercial carp.

Clearly there would be some risks taken here; I was after ide in a venue the population of which was generally unknown to me so I set up with a 16 hook to a 3.5lbs fluorocarbon hooklength and 4.4lbs reel line. A 4BB insert waggler with 3no.8's down the line would act as the middleman. This set-up would give me some chance of landing Satan should he bite without too much affecting the ide prospects, or so I thought.

So this carp is hooked but the hook pulls out soon thereafter. Minutes later the same event precisely. Then I hook one that doesn't seem to be in danger of coming-off and my light match rod suddenly seemed incredibly under-gunned making the fight long and, toward the end arm-achingly long-winded. Upon inspection of this 6lbs 8oz common carp the reason for the lost fish became evident. No lips. Let's call him "Marchello".

At this point a little flurry of estates and vans pass and pull-up 100 yards to my left, the occupants of which then disembark and proceed to shout to each other about the conditions.

"He's catching down there", floats down wind into the shell-like. Well, why wouldn't you? It's coloured and clearly stuffed with fish.

Soon after, a 7.4 version was dragged to the net like an unwieldy channel swimmer...with horns. This one, hooked on the outside of the orifice formerly known as a mouth, was never slipping the hook.

The maggots continued to be drizzled in. 10 at a time and constant, rather like scaled-up squatt fishing. In fact it took me back about 30 years.

So, here I am on my lightweight chair, under the gamp with my trusty centrepin offering encouragement to the blinkered pole fishing masses who decide to stay, unlike previous visitors who turned straight round and headed for breakfast.

I think there's five in this mass and they're having a 'match' albeit they seem to choose their pegs but I simply may have missed the drawer for numbers. They shout at each other while moving their gear.

"He's got another" accompanied the second fish as a water vole, yes a water vole, swam between banks. Apart from the ide the highlight of the morning.

On the drop - a smaller fish. It could be a roach, rudd, hybrid...or...the target. On the retieve it became roach or ide alternately two or three times before I swung it to hand and my first ide was banked at 8ozs. Unfortunately, in the rain and excitement, I forgot to photograph it and then dropped it back in anyway but thankfully the Challenge guys agreed the six points could count.

"You had a bite yet?"

"No mate"

"You on pellet?"

I hook and lose, after a long battle, a third sack of evil.

"You got one?"

"Yeah"

...."You lost it?"

"Yeah it's come off"

At which point the rest of the competitors shout and laugh at him. Inwardly I'm thinking, "Really?!.

The Grumpy Old Man in me is tempted to comment that, in my day, open matches started at thirty anglers and went up to 200 plus. On the odd occasion something went wrong and only a handful turned-up we'd go pleasure fishing. This wasn't a match, it was at best a knock-up and at worst a practice session. Let's face it, you'd only get Matchman of the Year points if there were a minimum of 60 competitors.

It gets harder now. I try chopped worm and hook a fourth of these dark satanic ills that again pulls-out.

The float rig gets an even more risky 18 hook in the hope of a further ide but the only other bite comes from a bream of 3.1

So I've had seventeen pounds odd of fish and lost (taking an average carp size as six pounds) 24lbs = circa 41lbs of fish due to the light tackle. The two matchmen in my 'section' are blanking.

I pack the stuff in the car and visit the Canon, who slips in that he has started catching bream...on bread punch. No pellets here either? How odd.

Approach the venue; assess the situation; fish to the conditions. It's not, as they say, rocket science, but then it's the match angler's job to know that, not mine.


With apologies to the memory of William Blake

Ice and a Slice

Dawn was sullen. Cold and unmoving in the crystalline shroud

Fingers burnt to metal, numbness pervading. Conductivity seeking to turn flesh to ice. Hard pellets of snow blistering the complexion like a hundred wind-driven air guns

The cocoon would stretch to its limit by both the day's acts of God and chronic Festive fall-out. The nylon mushroom, stout as a defence, would only offset so much bitterness

Gulls cackled in a rural melee as wild duck took flight and out of the fear a solitary brown, beautifully tortoisehell-marked, downy feather braked from a burst of turbulence and floated to earth, landing suspended by its quill, from least year's dock. A reminder of a fragility we oft-times lose sight of

There was tingling water; there were clouds indistinct from the frozen pearls that swept in arcs towards the pitch and there were open fields; ridge and furrow magnified by a coat of pristine perfection but, sub-surface, who could predict? Any attempt would be decorated with more pessimism than encouragement but the pitch was free and, with an unstinting confidence in the outcome, we embarked on this foreseen 'one bite, one fish' morning with, at times, as many as three hands tied behind our back; the first by winter

A guru, once deposed, but an oracle nevertheless, advised that if anything would be sufficiently enticing in a challenge such as this it would be a caster. We had bread and lamprey; the latter in preparation for an inaccessible location this easily avoidable invisible sunrise

Two hands tied

Knowledge though was on our side we thought. Banking on success in bad days on the bank, seek out the banker location. The outcome would never be in doubt. The inevitable speck dispatched into the margin swayed and drifted down so slowly that it seemed never likely to disappear from view, but it did, captured by the brown hand of the depths and dragged into the dark. The top quarter of the mirror visible to the straining eye

Pre-planning had been absolute, nothing forgotten yet nothing unnecessary

Some overspill attractant flicked along the path of geological soup for those more in need would be consumed by a bouncing female bomb of that contradiction, a brown blackbird, followed by the red of breast in waiting for the red of fin

Flow

Week in. Week out. The Captains were afloat, nothing contains a percentage. Not even this most miserable of days.

Within a hour three had slipped past with the barest hint of commotion but we knew that, on days such as this, when tranquillity would deliver the prize, this would clamp our third hand, shackled and useless...and so it continued

Once the hour-glass was spent the sand settled the account at zero, the motions to be repeated. An uninviting yet disarmingly productive desperation spot took the imagination and soon the cast was made into the by now enlarged stars of ice that floated toward the face like perforated marshmallows, iced and sliced

That thing that is always against us would soon bring itself to bear. The cocoon at thermal breaking point, the ice water trickling down to the boots of mud-pie. It would not be long before a line had to be drawn and tidied away

Endurance is one thing, stupidity another. The latter was on the white horizon

The lamprey rod broken-down and all peripheral paraphernalia packed; a quick glance, a twitch, a lift and that confirmatory delay. A strike, a curve, a whispered, "Yes!"

"It's a roach", the fight said

"Now don't come off"

"Ooh, a nice one too"

The obligatory, "C'mon you beauty", over the net and lifted clear without so much as a splash

"Not quite a pound, I'm giving it 0.14.8", was the internal reaction to this lifesaving chill pill

The scales suggested 0.15.10 over three measurements but never has a fish been so beautiful, so pleasing

So huge

Signs of Impending Reward

So steady weather floating above freezing is upon us and some consistency in approach can be relied upon for the time being

Let's face it, this is always the most difficult time of year to put fish in the net but, at last, there is some hope

Last week The Boy Wonder and I found an only partly frozen stretch of the Grand Union Canal, complete with its own little car park, which, despite being a more coloured than would be perfect, did offer some encouragement. For his part, chopped worm was to be the option while bread would, as always, be deployed on the next peg. As a secondary option, and with a hint at what was set to come, sleeper rods offering roach heads or tails on single hooks were also cast to features to check-out the predator potential

Pretty much straight-off the worm produced a nice perch and soon after a decent hybrid to bread but angling wise that appeared to be that. We dabbled with some lures but nothing lead us to conclude this was an ideal day for them
 

It was prime cheddar feeding time, a known fact with an iced surface of course. I had this tidy bag on a roach head and was close to competing with TBW's pair of boxers from the cut a few weeks back. 'Not taken one on a dead bait before

Charlie though had a problem. A rabbit carcass was floating in the water a couple of metres from the bank and the little fella decided it must be lunch. No spring chicken but, as would be seen, a springing mutt he was and so he leapt, headlong into the freezing water. His elderly handler had some literal action to undertake, instantly kneeling and hoiking the canine miscreant from the surface with a shrill and tremulous, "Charlie!, Charlie!". In a flash, what now appeared to be a mobile pink chammy leather, was back on formerly dry land and coughing like a woodbine-smoking micro-pig

"I think he fancied a swim", someone quipped. There were only three of us.

"He's never done that before", she said...and he wouldn't be doing it again judging by that cough. He'd've been covered in ice by the time he got back, and so would she, having instinctively picked him up to carry him home.

Poor old Charlie. I wonder if he lived.

Next day it was predator time at The Stillwater. TBW was feeling under the weather and fell asleep as we left home, waking some two hours or so later having missed the excitement of the first run.

Four runs later and we were no closer to actually hooking anything than Stuart Brad and so we slipped-off home to contemplate the next piscatorial half-volley

What followed was something of a fishing-fest...type, thing

The Leam produced nothing other than an interesting discussion with Stalwart Club Member of thirty years' experience on the water and a take from a less than two pound pike that showed an unrealistic yet fleeting attraction to a four ounce roach deadbait but saw sense as well as daylight when his gape released the unsuspecting corpse into the cold air

The Avon - a single chub of three pounds three ounces

The Canal - nothing

The Avon, again - a single chub of a pound and a half, but wait, there was more to that trip...

Hon Gen Sec did not believe there were rats present but each time I stayed after dark there they, it, was, scuttling under the phragmites debris, the punctured footballs (the rusting bicycles), ballcocks and plastic lighters

"But what would they eat?", he questioned. Bread mash, that's what

This rat was the Louis Smith of the rodent world. No speck or blob of mash was beyond his reach and, with the inability to see his beholder in red-filtered light, he wasn't leaving any for the mammals formerly known as long-tailed field mice in his super-rat efforts to clamber up and down the reeds, from land or water, seeking out every freezing splash. He did get a touch over-familiar toward the end, but then, he was a rat after all


The Stillwater again. Early morning. Completely still water. Two hours to take the challenge score higher, if only a pike would have a nibble. -4degC on arrival. Zero on departure. Between times - a single run. This time connected and again the multi-purpose Avon admirably dealt with this pilferer of the mirrored surfaced as the water burst to foam

The pike squirmed as it sought freedom on the bank but in excellent chunky pre-spawning condition it turned the scales to 177 ounces, less the bag at fifteen, ten pounds two ounces of living excitement. At last twenty-odd points to show for the effort

This leaves just two more weeks to try the same trick on the river and add anything else possible before that particular meandering avenue of alders is chopped down in March to regenerate in June

Oh yes!...and finally - the lamp shade needs wiping, somebody

Ref:
Apologies to the Modfather himself

Christmas is here and the Fish are getting Festively Fat

 

 

The Christmas period has not been quite what one would have hoped on the piscatorial front, notwithstanding those who are, and have been, flooded-out of their precious homes in various parts of the country. Unthinkable for those fortunate enough to have been spared as we have in these parts

The river was to be my personal target but it soon struck-out into the fields, after I finished that which must be done to earn one's daily Warburton's blue, and has pretty much stayed there since thanks to regular bursts of heavy rain

So from wet stuff to White Stuff it was. Armed with wrigglers and then vouchers to pass the time

This was on my Christmas list and didn't materialise...
 

 

...but these beauties did!

The canal may therefore seem an obvious refuge under such circumstances but the eastern end of the cut, which, again, I had ear-marked for the break, would be unfishable due to the heavy colour it takes-on. It would be the western part below the locks that would have to be concentrated on, and this would limit possibilities

I did very gratefully receive a wide array of bird feeders to set-up in the currently overgrown garden of the new house at Christmas though. This followed a seriously hot bonfire that cleared a good chunk of the debris

Some of the feeders became instant squirrel magnets but, thankfully, others are proofed from the pilferers. No major surprises have been spotted as yet but when it gets seriously cold, and I understand that process may well start tonight, that is bound to change. Highlights so far have been a wintering male blackcap, green and great spotted woodpecker, coal and long-tailed tit and fifteen collared dove sheltering in the apple tree away from yesterdays gales.

A pictoral record of the few trips and interludes of the past week or so follows:

The above 4 photos all from the same early session on a peg that has, as yet, produced no fish under a pound that I recall. Hybrid 2lbs, perch 1lb 14ozs, zander 1lb 4ozs (and that boosts my Blogger's challenge score by 1 point - big news!)

A single bite at dusk produced this cracking roachXbream hybrid of 2.10.0 on the next trip.

Two consecutive catches above dominated by, apparently current or recently spawning, perch to 1.6.4

Biggest roach of the week came today at 1.3.14. A spotty youth at that.

Have a Great New year all!

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!

BIG Challenges All Round



I hadn't prepared myself for the break. So consumed was I by the challenge of the River Leam that the somewhat sudden end, even though I was working towards it, caught me napping. Captivated, enthralled, enthused, maybe even obsessed and possessed, I had been by its secretive charm but now it had come to a close

Improving temperatures over the past three weeks or so tempted me to spend some time birding and plumbing some pegs on The Stillwater (yes I did say "stillwater", it may be something of a shock to my regular reader but it is true) more out of fancying a walk in the sunshine than anything else

Last Sunday was glorious of course. I was severely overdressed, having arrived before the temperatures soared, and lost about a stone during the day's wandering. Something I can ill afford

I found some enticing pegs in areas I hadn't been to for some time and a number of interesting birds, the highlight of which, though I wouldn't have found it myself as it wasn't on my walking route, thanks to another generous birder's 'scope was being able to view (and he confirmed as) a white wagtail. Frankly I couldn't have i.d'd it without some guidance as the heat-haze we were peering through barely made it recognisable as a wagtail...or even a bird! Nevertheless, a lifetime first it was, I'm told   

From the lawn: Pied not White...the murky underside is the give
away, even though the nape/back interface here is quite crisp

After enjoying the sight of a small foraging flock of tree sparrows, which is never anything less than an absolute pleasure, I found a swim I felt might do the job for the spring. A little weedy it was, but that makes two of us, and I was hopeful that if I could get the fish feeding there they might help to clear it over the forthcoming poaching months until June 16th obliges us with the mental moral right to continue to do the same until this time next year when we revert to doing so guiltily, as we do now

So the plan was hatched to concentrate on the stillwater, intermingled with the canal when conditions we were too poor to be exposed on an unforgiving lake, until June

In parallel with all this however came discussions with south-west blogger, talented angler and catcher of goldfish Russell Hilton of 'Tales of the Towpath' with a view to establishing a bloggers challenge for 2015/2016.
Russell's idea had gradually been honed in discussion with myself and Jeff Hatt (who took part in previous challenges until they petered-out two years or so ago and was full of sage wisdom, as ever)
The final challenge is very engaging and has me fired-up already with still a month to go until the mid-close season starting pistol fires.
Of course the only way these things can succeed is through the honesty of the participants and one thing I have learnt since starting this middling blog is that the level of integrity among angling bloggers is set very high and this gives me, and I hope many others, the confidence to get stuck in and take part in what promises to be an excellent event, with points available for 20 species across each water type of rivers/drains, stillwaters and canals relating your best fish to the British record
In trials it has proven perfectly possible that an angler seeking a wide number of species of relatively modest size might challenge the water/species specialist with four or five really big fish so, as planned, we hope it genuinely will prove a challenge for bloggers across the whole spectrum - from out and out specimen hunters to those who simply like to write about the pleasure of angling.
Personally I fall somewhere between the two (tending to fish certain appealing venues for larger than average fish), and I suspect most of us do, so I expect this to suit our category of angler rather nicely.
I will leave Russell to explain the machinations and how to enter here:
http://canalangler.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/blogger-challenge-who-in.html
and I very much hope you are as enthralled by the prospect as I and the Boy Wonder are

 

- - - - - -

 

Seven days on and The Stillwater campaign has now reached the fifth session (15 hours) and has yet to give up any secrets of the, not so, deep. Increasing air temperatures through the week, water which is no longer cold to the touch and latterly, and certainly today and yesterday, windy conditions that can only serve to bring spring time to the sub-surface world ever more quickly. So I remain optimistic that soon the tip will wang round or the plunge into the depths, be it quiver or float, sometime soon

 

One brief (overslept!) Grand Union visit produced little of value except the unusual experience of a canal rudd around eight ounces and some unremarkable roach

 

Meanwhile life is not all about (lack of) fish. I preoccupy myself with my favourite bin's, a treasured possession, scouring the water every twenty minutes or so to see what has moved-in or has appeared overhead. An old pair of reasonable quality 8x40's are ideal for this task. They give just enough magnification, aren't too heavy to carry with the tackle and let a good deal of light in when needed at those awkward times of day; so much so in fact that it is as if a light has been switched-on when raising them to straining eyes

 

Signs of the changing season came in the form of chiffchaffs with this early arriving warbler singing and suddenly apparent all over the countryside last weekend, and sand martins have reached us too, flicking their delicate yet effective brown wings against the wind into which they face, just above the water's surface, making consumate headway against the odds. It's truly amazing they find enough to eat when they first fall upon us with little invertebrate activity evident to the human eye

 

The week has produced an interesting if not mind blowing bird list but today I got to thinking...got to thinking about mammals...

 

How often does one see an array of mammal species, or even any (other than brown rats), while dabbling at the water's edge? Rarely, yet the signs are often there. At my peg and as I pottered back windswept this morning, with the forecast heavy rain hinting by gentle splashes on the personal rain detector (bald patch) I found evidence of shrew and badger (both in my peg), fox, muntjac and mole. I could probably have found vole or field mouse too with a little more effort and yet, in terms of actual sightings, it's was as though they didn't exist



Badger latrine...nice! Somehow I lost my pic of fox poo, how sad

Shrew hole 

Muntjac hoof prints 

Mole

 

Anyway enough of this, I'm off to plan the attack for the Bloggers Challenge 2015/16. Only 33.5 sleeps to go until the 00.01hrs May 1st start!