Short Evening Session and Really Greedy River Dee Pike

  This week whilst talking to a mate in work about pike on the Bridgewater canal the conversation got onto the fact that pike actually eat small baby ducklings, I have actually seen this happen a few times myself over the years whilst fishing the canal and if I remember rightly there was an article in the Angling Times last year about a young angler that was making his own home made lures for targeting pike in this way.

  As luck would have it a thread was posted on the maggot drowners forum including a video of this actually taking place, what amazes me is the size of the pike, the pike looks to be only a few pound.   I had always thought it was much larger pike that fed of this type of prey.  It also goes a long way to explaining why we see  large clutches of ducklings one day only to go back a few days later to find only half of them left yet we very rarely see baby ducklings dead in the canal.

More on those toothy critters to come later in the blog.......

Pike eating duckling video

 
  This week I took delivery of my new pole and the speed at which it was delivered took me by surprise, I ordered the pole from www.climaxtackle.com on my dinner hour on Thursday afternoon and was amazed to get a phone call from my Fiance on Friday to say a rather large package had been delivered.

  With a fishing trip one evening this coming week being penciled in for the commercial I decided to devote all Saturday to buying all the gear to elasticate my 4 top sections and setting them up.  Saturday morning saw us making a early trip down the M6 to Stapley Water Gardens stopping off at Cheerbrooks Farm for full English breakfast, highly recommended if your down that way!! A quick trip round Stapley and Daves of middlewich and I was all set to tackle to job of elasticating my top sections.

 With a lot of help from my Uncle we quickly elasticated both the top sections and the power sections.  I decided to put black hydro in both power tops and white and blue hydro in the match sections and I cant wait to try the power tops out this coming week on the commercial.

  On to this weeks fishing and Wednesday evening saw both me, my uncle and his mate from work all meeting up at 5pm for a evening session on Flushing meadows fishery I arrived there early and was already set up by the time the others arrived and was straight into a carp, a great start to the night!! but unfortunately the hook pulled and the first chance of the session was lost 1-0 to the carp.

  Not to be disheartened it was back in over my small pot of bait, I was very optimistic as there was so much activity in the water and it wasn't long before the float was buried and I was playing another hard fighting carp these carp really are great fun on the pole and as you can see on the picture above  they are quite chunky fish.

  The  swim was bubbling like someone had put an alkaseltzer in the water but in the short time I have fished this venue I have learnt that this is always a sign of small skimmer bream being in the swim.  On this venue you don't really catch carp after carp but more catch one and wait at least 15 minutes while the skimmers knock your bait while you wait for another carp to come in a engulf the bait and it wasn't long before this was the case again.

  My uncle was the next to connect with a carp after wading through a few skimmers and I was also enjoying a hot spell as I hooked into my third carp of the session within the first hour.

  My uncles mate, Curly, could not for the life of him get past the large shoal of skimmers he had in his peg and he was catching one every put in for the majority of the session.  After the carp above my swim went very quiet with all the tell tale knocks on the bait I had experience earlier coming to an end.  My approach when fishing here is big fish or broke so I fully expect their to be lulls in the action while I wait for the bigger fish to move in.  It was not until around 7.30 I got my next bite and it was so violent I didn't even have to see the float go under as the carp literally hooked itself and darted for the deeper water in the middle,  it showed me how easy it is for people to look away for one minute only to find their pole or rod heading towards to water.

Not even the biggest fish of the session, maybe even the smallest but definitely the hardest fighting.

  The swim again went quiet for a while but the next action was a lost fish which felt bigger than anything I had hooked on there before and literally went off like a steam train and there was nothing I could do to turn it and the hook pulled.  

Last fish of the session:

 We left the fishery around 9.30pm with all three of us having different fortunes but as is the way when fishing commercials of an evening you never know who has fished your swim in the day and how much bait was put in, both these factors I am sure have a great effect on your success come the evening time.

Sunday 31st July

  Today saw both me and my uncle back on the banks of the River Dee my uncles plan was to pole fish the slack into a deep hole in the edge while my plan was to wait it out for bigger fish on the feeder.  We arrived under the cover of darkness just as the light blue glow of the new day was appearing in the distance,  as we approached our chosen swim we were surrounded by colony of bats skimming the surface of the water as they greedily hunted for a last gasp meal before the impending daylight forced them back into hiding for another day.

  Since I have purchased my new holdall I can now leave my feeder rod set up ready to go, so it wasn't long before I was using the little light that was in the sky to see the tip of my rod.

  There was a few large knocks on the tip but nothing worth striking at and the only excitement of the morning from my swims point of view came as the group of local swans made their way upstream.  I said a while back that I would follow their progress as much as possible and unfortunately looking at the video it seems like a few of the cygnets have not made it this far with only two surviving.

  The fishing was very poor to be honest and I was facing a big fat blank straight in the face as I still hadn't had a bite at 10.30am while my uncle was just getting a few decent roach on caster but they were few and far between.

  What followed still amazes me as i write this now, my uncle was bringing in a roach approaching a pound when a jack pike shot out from no where a started attacking the roach, chasing it around the swim.  The roach survived with only slight cuts to its back but the pike decided he was still hungry and was lying at the base of the keep net eyeing up another potential meal.

  I quickly set up a pike rig and hooked on a small gudgeon,  no sooner had it hit the water the pike was onto it and making its way back under the raft or debris to the left of the swim, I struck and the fish was on and boy was he an angry little fellow, tail walking and doing his best to throw the hooks.  Not long later and he was on the mat having his picture taken I estimated him to weigh around 3lb,

To enable my uncle to start catching again I put the fish back away from the swim please excuse the music but this song was in my head the whole morning while this was unfolding.

  I walked back to sit with my uncle for a minute and have a brew when my uncle, now in a pike free swim got a bite and as he was bringing the fish in, Bang!! the fish was gone and the line was cut clean, not another pike!!.  Luckily the previous gudgeon we had used was till usable as bait and back in it went and straight away and other jack pike was on.

The two pike where two separate fish with the first being slightly larger than the second but to catch two in such quick succession shows why your swim on the river can go very quiet very quickly.  After all the commotion of these two pike in the swim the fishing never really recovered and we called it a day at noon.

This coming week I hope to spend an evening on the commercial with my new pole and hopefully next weekend try and get onto a new river or new venue.

Till next week 

tight lines

Danny

Margin Pole Gets Commercial Workout.......

  I will start off this weeks blog entry with an update on a purchase I am planning to make in the next few days,  July is always the month in work we all look forward too as at the end of it you always get your yearly bonus in your pay.  I am a fond believer in the principle of I work hard for a year so I deserve a treat and this year I have decided to purchase myself my first ever "proper" pole.

  As you can see from the picture above I have decided to go with the TKS 125 13 metre pole,  it is within my price range and has got good reviews from people on the Internet.  The deal I am looking at comes with 2 match kits and 2 power kits and I will be looking at putting blue hydro-elastic in one match with a slightly heavier one in the other for silver fishing on canals and the river and I am putting black hydro-elastic in the power kits for purely commercial carp fishing and spring tench fishing.

  Hopefully the addition of this pole to my collection will enable to move away from the rivers from time to time onto local canals,ponds and commercial fisheries. All that remains is the daunting task of cutting back my new pole.  The pole should be with me in the next 2 weeks and will give a full product review on it after I have used it for a while.

 On to this weeks fishing and this weeks blog update has gave me an unexpected headache in I caught so many fish and I have been trying to work out how to put it all down in the space provided so here goes.

Thursday 21st July


I finished work at 5pm on Wednesday and having received a text form my uncle who said he was fishing a local commercial I decided to have a drive down and sit with him for a few hours, Flushing Meadows was the fishery and as I arrived my uncle was already set up fishing and while I was there he landed a nice carp below:

There was only one thing on my mind the rest of that night and that was going fishing, so Wednesday night I made up a few pole rigs and got the gear ready to put into the car the following morning.  The car loaded and I headed off to work hoping a praying there would be space for me to take a cheeky half day leave, fingers crossed!!.  I arrived at work and was delighted to hear there was a space available, the few hours I had in work flew by and I was soon sat on the bank on the fishery plumbing up my chosen swim.

The Swim:

  My chosen method of attack was to fish on the bottom of the shelf using my "white knuckle" margin pole with the heaviest 22 elasticated top section, before Thursday I had never fished anywhere that had required me to even unpack this section.

  The fishing was slow from the off and it wasn't till around the hour mark and after wading through countless Rudd I connected with my first carp of the day.

The fight:

The fish didn't half put up a fight and took me what seemed like an eternity to get in, this being the biggest fish I had ever caught on a pole I was not going to rush it and for long parts of the fight I wondered who was playing who!! Eventually I slid the net under a mirror carp.

Mirror Carp:

The next bite came around 2pm again after catching a number of skimmers a Rudd but eventually another carp moved in and made its way for the far bank.

Resulting in another hard fighting carp on the bank:

The next fish was not far behind this one and again I managed to capture some of the fight it put up on the pole.

And another carp on the bank:

The next fish to come fought like stink and I could see from where i was sat it was a lighter coloured fish and when I got it in I was amazed when I saw it was a Ghost Carp a species I have never caught before.

A quick check of the watch revealed time really had flown by and it was 5pm, the old saying about time flying when your having fun, from then on it just got better and better as the evening progressed and the next 3 hours where action packed with more carp of the same size coming with a total for the session standing 15, I took pictures of most of these and have put them in a slide show below. (some I could not take a picture of as I put them straight back as not to look like an idiot while speaking to a fellow fisherman lol)

All in all my second visit to a commercial really opened my eyes to why people fish these places week in and week out the fish fight hard and the places are full of them in reflection I feel I need to put I a lighter elastic in my margin pole possibly a black hydro or 16 hollow elastic.

Saturday 23rd July


  After the success of Thursday my dad wanted a slice of the action so it was back to flushing meadows for round two,  we arrived at the gates at 6.45 just as the farmer was opening them and it was straight to the pool I had fished earlier in the week.

The fish came early on and I lost another fish not long but that was it for me, meanwhile my dad fared better with a mixed bag of carp, tench and bream.

My dads first carp of the day:

Tench:

The day for my dad just went from strength to strength and he fully enjoyed himself as he winkled out a few more carp from his peg.

carp:

and another:

and another:

by now he was just plain showing off as I assumed the role of gillie:

  My dad really enjoyed his day on the commercial and after being really apprehensive about going before hand he is now looking forward to our next visit!! The day taught me that even a commercial fishery can be hard to fish and although there are high stocking densities on these waters they don't always play game.

  I really enjoyed my two visits to the fishery and I cant wait to get back on there with my new pole to test it out and see what the far side has to offer on there.

till next week

tight lines

danny

The Rudd, The Barbel And The Really Ugly

  This weekend saw the final of Fisho-mania grace our screens and having never watched it before I decided to plan this weekends fishing trip with a view to watching this competition as it unfolded on sky sports.  Being an all round pleasure angler myself it was truly an eye opening experience to see the amount of bait they used and also the amount of tackle each angler had assembled at their disposal ready to swap and change in a moments breath should the conditions change.

 The main thing I will take from watching the final is how important taking your time when you arrive at your venue is,  taking time to make sure your set up is the best it can be and making sure you have everything to hand before you start fishing,  all too often I am guilty of rushing to get a line in the water as soon as possible.

  Listening to the commentators during the event revealed the momentous weights of fish that needed to be caught by each angler to qualify for the final, with at least one angler catching a weight of over 200lb!!  It is no wonder when I visit the river I see so many empty lay byes along the roads that run adjacent to the river, why would people want walk a few farmers fields to a peg, to sit, most of the time uncomfortably, on the banks of a muddy river trotting maggots for silver fish when they can pay a few quid at a commercial fishery where they can park right next to the water, sit on spacious level fishing platforms and be almost guaranteed a decent bag of fish due to the high stocking densities of some of theses waters.    I hasten to add I have nothing against that type of fishing or the people that choose to fish these venues and will be doing some if it myself in the near future,  but it does go a long way to explaining why most of our local rivers are vacant of anglers.

On to this weeks fishing a a quick look at the weather forecast on Tuesday morning showed we were in for a big change in weather from Thursday onwards, so with that in mind and also the fact I knew I wouldn't be going out on Saturday I booked a half day off work on Wednesday to try out a local pond that I hadn't fished for a few years.  

To say the morning shift in worked dragged was an understatement, looking out of my desk side window my mind was already sat by the side of the pond watching my float and eventually my mind was joined there by my body as I arrived at the pond around 1pm to find it bathed in bright sunlight and fish topping all over.

My plan for today was to fish on the bottom just off the reeds using my margin pole, to be as accurate as possible I also used my home made cupping pot to introduce my bait of maggots and sweetcorn.  First put in and the float buried straight away and it was a really nice Rudd that put up a really good fight and showed me that this place has potential.

First put in Rudd

  In with some more maggots and you could see the small Rudd on the top fighting each other for the bait if I had shallowed up to under my float and fired maggots in I could have caught these little Rudd and roach all day,  but I was after finding out what bigger fish called this place home and as the maggots went in so the better fished moved in and of course my next decent fish was a ever hungry stripey perch.

Lovely marked Stripey

The fishing was a bite a chuck with either a small Rudd of roach taking my bait as it was dropping through the upper layers but it was the amount of decent roach and Rudd I was catching that had me amazed at this venue as well as the condition they were in, they were all in top nick.

Another Hand sized Rudd

  In the sunlight I kept getting a glance of a big bream cruising the upper water layers on the edge of the weed, dropping the bait on his nose wasn't going to be the way to catch this wary fish and after a few attempts it was back over my baited spot for some more fun with the silver fish which by now I had weaned onto an all sweetcorn diet and was rewarded with the best Rudd of the day a really fat fish with blood red fins a real ambassador for the species or was it??

plump rudd
Looking at the fish now it looks like it may be a possibly a roach/Rudd hybrid.  I continued to catch more of these nice sized fish and was spoilt for choice for pictures to use for this blog update for these fish.  At around 3.30, just before I was due to be joined by my mate Ian from work and his dog zook, I struck into a fish that came straight to the top with no fight at all and when I got a sight of it I must admit to contemplating cutting my line,  the fish that I had seen cruising need the weed had found my bed of bait and he didn't look as handsome out of the water, a proper zoo creature!!!

It wasn't long after this fish that I hooked into a fish that had the elastic right out and was doing its best to get into the thick weed on the other side of the pond, with no carp showing themselves in the bright sun this was a fish I definitely did not want to loose!! After a short battle the fish came to the top and with a flash of olive green as it dived I knew I was into a tench and it was doing all it could to snag me, fortunately for me i managed to get it to the top again and quickly scooped it into the net.

  I called it a day around 5pm but not before catching another good roach.

Not bad for a few hours fishing and right on my doorstep as well a venue I will definitely be visiting again this summer.

Sunday - River Dee

Sunday saw both me and my uncle back on the banks of the river Dee, my plan was to wait it out for as barbel while my uncle was set up for a mornings trotting for silvers.  The weather going down the M56 was wet to say the least and the prospects for the day ahead looked bleak.  We arrived in the swims and the weather broke and for a good few hours we avoided all the really bad weather with only the odd small shower.

  As the swims were quite far apart I can only report on how my day went, but judging by my uncles net of fish at the end he had a good day. To be honest I am on a steep learning curve with this barbel fishing, my main problem is striking too early when the fish pick up and drop the bait and not waiting for the fish to hook itself.  It wasn't till around 11am when I was all ready to sign that dreaded "blankety Blank" cheque that I hooked into a fish that headed straight into the fast flow and felt a good fish but with one shake of its head and the hook pulled....Gutted!! would that be my last chance of the day with us leaving at noon?? I hoped not but for the next hour the barbel tormented me by knocking the bait and it wasn't till I was began packing my gear away that the rod finally hooped over violently and I struck into another babel, this fish was nowhere near in the league of the previous one I lost but still welcome all the same.

Welcome Blank saving Bertie:

Uncles Net of fish (it is so hard to take a picture of a net of fish and the pictures never do a session justice)

A quick update on the blog sections I made a start on the River and Still water venues on Saturday whilst watching fishomania, more will be added as and when I get time. 

till next week

tight lines

Danny

 

Blog Update and two short sessions on the dee.....

  This week I would like to start the blog entry by talking about a few changes that I will be making to the blog in the coming weeks, some of you may have noticed the page links now situated towards the top of the blog highlighted in the picture below.

  Recently I have received a few messages from people who follow this blog who also know me from the maggot drowners forum and it was really great to hear from people who read the blog about their impressions of it and also to read about how they are doing on their own angling adventures.  It got me thinking though about the people who don't know me from posting on there and may also want to contact me so I have set up a contact me section for people to contact me on about any aspect of the blog and any questions you may have on waters mentioned.

  I also thought it would be a good idea for the blog to have a section dedicated to the waters I fish both still water and rivers and it is my aim to provide as much information as I can in giving a description of the waters and some pictures to show what will greet you should you want to visit these waters yourself.

  The "contact me" section and "about us" section should both be up and live now and for the next few weeks will be a work in progress and obviously the still water and river sections will take more work so will also be updated as and when I get some free time.  Other sections I have in mind but not yet 100% definite are sections on product reviews and possibly a angling news section, I hope you will like the new developments to the blog and find it very useful once its completed.

 
  Any way onto this weeks fishing and the river Dee again was this weeks destination with two short morning trips both on Saturday and Sunday.  Saturdays fishing trip was to a small secluded feeder stream of the river Dee in pursuit of the lady of the stream and trout. We arrived again nice and early and was treated to of the sight a pair of bats effortlessly hunting in the twilight,  its amazing to see these creatures hunting and I must admit to standing for a good twenty minutes watching them before unloading the gear from the car.

  The river was slightly up due to the overnight rain and there was a good flow pushing through which would improve our chances of connecting with the target species.  In no time we were in the swim,  the darkness was lifting and the birds were in full song signalling the start of another day and there is no better feeling than watching the world around you wake up whilst you are stood in the river trotting.

first fish of the day

 
  I find most of the time when trotting a small stream that the first cast of the day usually brings a decent fish and today was no exception with this greedy trout being the first fish on the bank. Trout and salmon par truly are beautifully marked fish and although not my favourite fish to catch they are definitely along with the grayling the most beautiful on the eye.

  As the bait started to go in I connected and landed a nice grayling but it was the trout that were bossing the swim with four or more decent sized trout coming during the session and it seems the more bait you put in the more you can guarantee a trout in your swim on this little stream.

  As the hemp started to work its magic a few dace started to show up as did a few salmon par.  But the day was unfortunately cut short around 9am when I began to feel really ill to the point where I had to call it a day, very unusual for me as I usually have to be dragged away from the river.  Had we stayed we would have had a really good day as the fish where still darting across the pool as we left, still for a few hours fishing the net below provided some great sport on the centre pin.

  As we were heading back towards the car we were watched the whole way down the country lane by some really young cows who's curiosity got the best of them and they really do make me laugh with the way the look at you almost to say "hey up what's going on here, better make sure we see this rabble off".

  Sunday saw both me and my uncle on the banks of the river Dee trotting for silvers and I must say since fishing with him my trotting technique and baiting has really come along from what it was and although today neither of us emptied the river for a good hour I had the fish where I wanted them and I was getting a bite a cast over my bed of hemp, nothing that would break any records but when trotting maggot the challenge is more a case of quantity and not quality.

Today's swim and I was amazed no chub turned up today with such a lovely trot down to a overhanging tree:

  None of the fish caught really warranted a picture taken but I did manage to get my camera out to capture a very large group of noisy Canada geese (i think lol) moving down river.

very noisy rabble!!

  Today I spent the morning trotting and practising getting my line and feeding right and I was really happy with my net of fish come the end of our session, I had really worked hard for every bite today and I can feel me getting more confident with each session I spend trotting on the Dee and hopefully as time passes the bags will increase but if not, as always when out with my dad and uncle you can guarantee a good laugh and that's what its all about.

Today's bag or roach and dace:

  As with all our fishing on Sundays, with work on Monday in mind we called it a day around noon and a good call it was as no sooner had be got in the car the heavens opened.

Until next week

tight lines

Danny

You never know what else is fishing in your swim........

  As I write this blog now sat in the glorious evening sunshine in the garden I like many other river anglers are praying for a bit of rain this week to give our rivers a good flush through for next weekend.  These low water conditions over the past few weeks have made me put off going to one of my favourite rivers, the river Dane as its painfully low so much so on our opening weekend visit some swims you would dread falling into you found yourself standing in without getting a welly full.

  Having suffered lugging all our rods, bank sticks, umbrellas and rod rests around all clumped clumsily together me and my dad decided on Friday night enough was enough and we purchased a rod holdall and after a quick browse of the tackle shop we decided to go with the Korum Total protection 3 rod holdall and after using it both days this weekend I am really impressed with it and made the walk to the river so much more comfortable and I'm sure it will become a priceless bit of kit when we travel in the coming weeks to the River Dane and hopefully to the Warrington Anglers stretch of the River Ribble which I read is a bit of a hike.

  Anyway on to this weeks fishing as Saturday saw me and my dad back on the banks of the River Dee and we were greeted by an ice cold dense fog as we approached our chosen swim, down the banks to the river and she looked painfully low but running through nicely and with our chosen swim being around 5-6 foot deep I knew we would be in for a few fish.

  I was busy setting up my trotting rod when my dad, due to now being able to leave his feeder rod set up in the new holdall was already into his first fish a fin perfect small dace.  I was still trying to thread my line through the last few eyes on my rod in the early morning gloom when my dad hit a decent fish that like last week stayed deep until the last minute, briefly showing its self to be a nice chub before unfortunately, like last week, shedding the barbless hook.

  We had been using barbless hooks all summer on the still waters on the Warrington card and had no problem at all but on the river last week we lost so many fish we decided this week to purchase some barbed hooks to combat this as again my dad had lost another nice fish due to the fish throwing the hook. 

  On with a new whisker barbed hook and back in and it wasn't long before he was again bringing in another nice dace and by this time I was also getting into some plump roach and for the next hour or so we both enjoyed catching roach, dace and salmon Parr.

  Around half eight my dads puddle chucker was bent over and he was into another decent fish that went  straight out into the main flow with lightning speed, ripping the line the 4lb line from the reel as it went.  I instantly knew what he had hooked from the past few sessions on there but knowing my dad had never caught this species of fish before I didn't want to jinx him by informing him he was actually fighting a barbel.  A few moments later and my dad was slipping the net under his first ever barbel which again illustrates the diversity of species you can catch on the Dee.

My dad posing with his first ever Barbel:

  Not long after this I lost what looked like a barbel of around 2lb in a bank side snag as it made a last dart for freedom and with that the baking hot sun began to burn through the mist and my swim became stuffed with small dace greedily eating as many maggots as I could throw in and consequently no bait was getting down the swim to hold the bigger roach and for the next few hours we caught the odd better roach but mainly small dace and salmon par and we called it a day around noon happy we had done all we could and looking at the bag at the end we hadn't done too bad.  One side note from Saturdays session was seeing a massive eel swimming on the surface down stream in the edge and was a real sight to behold.

Saturdays bag of fish:

Sunday 03rd July

  Sunday saw both me and my unlce again visit the banks of the River Dee and I was set up to go all out for a barbel on a bigger bait while my uncles approach was to fish to a deep hole in the shadows of a bank side tree on the pole. 

  It very quickly became apparent I had a massive snag in my swim and after loosing two hook lengths on it you could say things were not going to plan for me,  mean while my uncle was building up his swim nicely with some really mint condition roach being taken on a variety of baits.

  I quickly set up another rig and cast on the same line but further down stream of the snag and it wasn't long before my rod rattled round and I struck and it all instantly went solid whatever it was had me well and truly in the snag and knew exactly where it had to go in times of danger.  A quick change of angle and the fish kicked out of the snag and came in quite easily and it was no surprise it was a chub and a river Dee personal best at that, she turned the scales to 1lb 8oz but looking at the pictures she looked and felt alot bigger but i cant complain my first proper chub from the Dee.

Proper River Dee chub:

  This for me was all I had to show on the feeder rod but my uncle was really building up his swim and catching big roach and some really big gudgeon.  The slow action on the feeder had me soon trotting a glide close by using up the remaining maggots from yesterdays session and in the meantime catching some nice dace right at the bottom of the swim.

  My uncles swim was going through some really long lulls with alot of fishing coming in a short time followed by nothing, like last week I said its either big fish or a pike and just as I said it my uncle hooked a fish and the line snapped, a clean break in the line.  Instantly he was again into a better stamp on roach and dace and I continued to catch a few on the the trotting rod.  As I was talking to him as I put a small dace in the net he was bringing in a small roach which as it was just about to be lifted in a massive swirl and the fish was gone, definitely a hungry pike. 

  This marked the end of the session as it was time to pack up and we quickly weighed the net of fish we had caught, the lions share definitely caught by my uncle with a total combined weight of 10lb 11oz.

Net of fish:

  With the pike in mind I quickly set up a pike outfit an it wasn't long before the hungry pike came to out of its gloomy sunken tree lair to dine and with that I was in to a small jack pike of around 2 to 3lb that did its best to get back to where it had came but in reality was no match for my very stout barbel rod and was soon having its picture taken the unhooking mat, incidentally my first ever river pike and just goes to show how much these fish eat with this one eating at least three fish during the session and goes to show how just a small pike effects the fishing and you never really know what else is fishing in your swim!!

First ever river pike:

And with that we called it a day two very happy anglers and topped of a good weekend on the River Dee.

Till next week

tight lines

Danny