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