Big Chub Nets And Piking On Ice....

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you all well and your new year nets wetter than 2014.  The sessions mentioned in this blog will round up the fishing action for 2014.  Introduction wise we discuss how the festive period has been for myself with the new family member,  I look back on my best session of 2014 and although i still have a few pike sessions to cover i begin to look at what the next month holds as we move into the best time of year for a big predator.

Festive Times The Best Ever....

So its safe to say Christmas 2014 has been a Christmas like no other in our household as we welcomed our little man to the world on the 19th and eventually got out of hospital on the 22nd December right in time for manic preparations for Christmas (and a cheeky Christmas eve fishing trip ha-ha).  The festive period being my little girls first where she knew about Father Christmas really brought the magic back to what had been quite a sad occasion since my mums passing and just seeing her face on Christmas Day really put a new light and brought the magic of Christmas back again for me and i cant wait for the years of Christmas days to come.

Speaking of our little girl she is really coming on now and shocking us all with her development and i certainly think a short trip to the canal or local pond to catch her fist ever fish might be on the cards this spring.  A session i can not wait to get out and experience and then blog about as it will be such a special occasion for me.  She will of course in time choose her own path and if angling is top be part of that then i will be happy to teach her the little i know but if not then i am surely going to enjoy the enforced fishing trips till she makes her mind up.

Christmas always gets you thinking about family and this year i am determined to get my dad out on the bank more with us again.  I am hoping to do a few sessions on the canal we used to fish all those years ago to see how it has changed and see if those big bronze slabs are still around.  Fishing is always a family affair with myself any how what with most of my trips being trips with my uncle its safe to say I'm hoping 2015 is going to be a year around family.

The Session Of 2014.....

I mentioned in a recent blog update that i had been asked about writing a recap of 2014 by a blog follower and that i was apprehensive to do so as i feel my year runs march to march with the closing of the river seasons.   What i have decided to do is pick out one session that stood out for me in 2014.

The year of 2014 was really good to me and if it was a wine it would certainly be classed as a vintage year.  It was a year where all our hard work paid off, all these trips to flooded rivers blanking and all those times travelling to a different area of a flooded river and catching all come good, all those hours searching on google earth for new areas of river and then walking farmers fields to wet a line in their unexplored depths.  This year was certainly good to us and i do feel those trips put us in a situation where we could pick and choose each week from 4-5 areas on different rivers to trot a float through with confidence but it was a new exploration into the world of dead baiting for pike that bought about me session of 2014.

I had dipped my foot in the water of dead baiting for pike from January to February of 2014 and under the tuition of Garry learnt some of the fundamentals of dead baiting for pike.  October and i was ready to cut my teeth and the early session in October saw me break my Pike Pb with a 15lb pike but it was the very next session that will live forever in my memory.  Sat on the banks of the river i noticed my right hand float twitch and then again and then slowly move along the surface, i struck and the rest is in the following update if you want to read about the session.

link: My First 20lb Pike 

Planning for January and February....

At the beginning of the pike season i set my self a target of catching 100 pike.  This total seemed large at the time and knew it was going to be a huge achievement if i got there.  With this total in mind and two serious fish under my belt in October my mindset since then has been more about numbers of fish than size of fish.  That has meant me concentrating on one location on a consistent basis, a place that of course could throw up a big fish, but in reality i was settling for the fact most of the fish i was going to catch were going to be between 4lb-7lb with the odd rare upper single or double.

early season nice fish

This proved a very good tactic with at least one or two fish coming on most trips to this location.  This of course led to the odd recapture but that's pike fishing and at the time of writing this (SPOILER ALERT) i am on a total of 56 fish caught.  I will be returning to work next week so the chances of me getting close to 100 pike is very slim indeed.  The whole challenge started of with plenty of momentum but in reality work and family commitments has seen fishing time for two of the people doing the challenge hard to come by and for myself and Ste changeable conditions has made the piking really difficult as the prey fish are not yet shoaled hard in their winter spots and as a consequence the pike are still quite spread out.

With this in mind i have made a conscious decision from now on to concentrate on areas that might produce less fish but the fish will be of better quality and also give me a serious chance of ending the session with a special capture.  There will be a full round up of the challenge at the end of the season on how i feel it has gone and the pros and cons of chasing such a total.  So to this point i feel i have done all i can to get to 56 pike, i have hit the bank every time i could and fished as good as my angling ability will let me i can honestly say i have not left the bank thinking i didn't do everything i could on the session.

So fingers crossed in the next one or two months we can put a few nice fish in the bank and also get some where near the total.

On to this weeks fishing....

Piking on the Off Chance of a Bite....

With a number of jobs completed in the morning and my partners mother coming round for a few hours i jumped at the opportunity of a few hours on the bank.  It was already gone 1pm when i loaded the car and left for the bank  I was a little unsure as to whether it was worth going after a sharp overnight frost but i knew the spot i was going to there was always a chance of a bite.  My confidence was hit a little as i received a phone call on the way from Ste saying he had struggled on the same waterway with his mate and not had a touch all morning.

I cast in a Herring tail on one rod and a smelt on the other, both loaded with oil, and hoped for the best.  It was early on during my vigil waiting for one of the floats to go that i got speaking to another angler lure fishing.  I did not get his name but we spent a good hour chatting about angling and some of the perils on being in Warrington Anglers and it seemed we shared the same view on a number of subject around silver fishing and the excessive amount being ploughed into carp.

I was quite honest with the man about the location and what to expect from fishing the stretch and i remember saying that most fish will be small singles with the outside chance of a double.  No sooner had the words left my mouth than he said "your floats moving there" a sharp glance round and the tentative bobs had turned into a solid run and the float slowly began to move off as i picked up the rod.  A few seconds as it was a nice piece of herring as bait and i struck into the fish.  The rod hooped over and stayed over as the fish kept deep and i instantly knew i was into a nice fish.

Eventually the fish came up to the surface and the good gentleman netted the fish for me.  Its sods law that fish come along that make a liar out of you as this was comfortably a double figure pike.  It went 13lb on the scales and i again thank the guy for taking the time to take a picture.

This was it for fish for this short session and i left around 3.45pm happy with the result of the session and another double added to the list.  Pike fishing can be a funny old game some days you spend all day without a sniff and other a hour or so produces a decent fish.

Stick Float Fishing For Chub...

The stick float rod had been a rare addition to the boot of my car before this session with its space taken firmly by two pike dead bait rods.  The ease of these pike sessions just fitting in perfectly with my the arrival of our second child but there certainly was an itch that needed scratching and it was with great excitement we headed out for a days stick float fishing on the river.

The river does contain a mixed selection of species including dace, gudgeon, roach, perch, trout and chub and it was really exiting setting up on the peg not knowing what lay i your swim.  The set up for the session was my 17ft trotting rod and a reel loaded with 4,4oz line down to a 6 number 4 float a hook length of 2lb line down to a tiny size 18 hook.  Situated in a swim i had fished before and with a river fining off after recent rain i was confident of a fish or two it all depended on whether the fish had migrated away from this area.

I had been feeding the swim from the off with maggot and hemp so it came as no surprise that the float buried on the first trot down and at first i thought i was into a small chub but as the fish hit the surface it soon became clear as the fish jumped and flapped about that it was a brown trout.   i was not surprised by this as these fish are hungry and greedy fish at the best of times never mind in winter when competition for food is high and these fish with their extra size will easily muscle out dace and roach.  I carried on trotting the float through with no activity more often than not and i remember getting a hour and a half into to session with 3 trout under my belt thinking maybe its time to get mobile and find some fish.

It was just as this thought was in my mind i struck into an altogether different animal that held station in the current in a defiant stand as only chub do and i knew there and then that i had a chub on the other end.  The fish fought well in the current and it was a struggle to land it with the flow in front of my peg but i did manage in the end to slide the net under the brassy flanks of a chub.

The swim i was fishing was shallow in front of me, probably only two feet, but it then fell into a deeper hole and then below that lies a big fish holding feature so in my mind i had eventually drawn one chub up from the feature into my trot.  As soon as this chub was in the keep net my confidence rocketed as where there was one chub there was certainly more in this swim so i almost began to concentrate more and of course upped the feed slightly and also experimented with hook baits.

This chub came at 10.17am and it was another half an hour of trotting the float through before the next fish came at 10.37 and again another chub.  What was noticeable with these fish was the fact the trout completely where removed from the equation in the periods between the chub almost as if the chub where there and it was a case of getting presentation right to catch them.  The theme of fish every 20-30 minutes kept true with more fish coming at 10.50, 11.27 and when my uncle visited i had four chub in the onion sack, my uncle had also done well with 6 chub to show for his mornings efforts.

My uncle left to return to his peg and as he did my peg took off as i landed 10 chub in the next two hours to 2pm, i can only guess the steady feeding of hemp and maggot mixed with the colder conditions brought a shoal of the chub up the swim and they got their heads down.  The crazy thing about this period was i lost just as many fish in this period which showed just how hard they were on the feed.

As always with these sessions the end comes too quick although i have to admit for the last hour the bites tailed off completely and the odd trout moved into the swim again almost as if the absence of the chub allowed them to feed and goes to show in the feeding order the chub is king.

With me doing a lot of piking of late i had been taking my weigh scales in my pike box so unfortunately on this session i could not put a weight to the net but with around 12-16 chub and chublets in the net all between i would say 1/2 a pound and probably 3lb i must have been over the 20lb mark.

my final net

My uncle had also got into a good number of chub on his peg.

All in all it was a session like i had never experienced before with chub.  I had done well before for chub with my best net of proper chub containing around 6 fish but this was a net like i had only seen my uncle catch in recent weeks.  A few years ago when me and my uncle started going fishing he used to tell me stories of chub nets from years ago where he would struggle to lift the net and that we would find them and one day i would see.  Well Azza we found them mate and i was over the moon.


 Piking on Ice....

The temperature read a bone chilling -1 as i left my house and started the car and this temperature only plummeted further as i left the confines of my town.  I had set up to fish the local waterway and as i drove to the first venue i walked along the track to find it covered in a thick layer of ice all the way across the water and the full length of the stretch, there was no way i was wetting a line here today.

I got back in the car and drove around for what seemed an age as i searched out areas that might not had frozen overnight and i eventually did find what was a little short bit of ice free water.  I say ice free water it literally was a short 10 yard bit of water blocked either end by ice and my rubbish first cast showed just how thick the ice was either side of me.

The baits in position i had to constantly edge the flows of ice back and i have to say it was the first time i have ever been happy to see ducks in the area as their gentle milling on the far bank certainly helped my cause.

Some say anglers are mad to even go fishing in the first place to out wit a fish and then you get the ones who say to go out in such conditions fishing you must be puddled and i must say on this session i was beginning to see their point.  Although the cold and wind is never ever something that decides if i go fishing or not as in my opinion you never know what fishing is like in certain conditions unless you go and sometimes you can be surprised.

I must say a quick word at this point for anyone reading this thinking about going fishing in these conditions you do need to be prepared clothes wise ideally with thermal boots and a thermal under layer at the bare minimum and of course a flask of something hot.  This session i was only out for the morning and after all the driving round it was gone 9am by the time i cast in.

After a hour of inactivity i was beginning to wonder if i was wasting my time and my mind wandered to those chub on the river and maybe i should have gone for another dabble at those.  Fishing the gaps in the ice meant the water i was fishing was like a mill pond and flat calm and it meant the slight flicks of the float as a pike showed interest where picked up straight away.  I quickly marched to the rod full of excitement as the float gently cocked and moved along the water towards the ice before in true jaws style it hit the corned and submerged below the ice flow.

It was a hard one to balance as i knew i didn't have much of a run for the fish to take the bait but i also had to leave it long enough for the bait to be taken as on a day like this it was a fish i didn't want to lose.  A short hard side strike saw the fish come straight back at me from under the ice flow as a small jack came up to the top.  The rod i was using made little of the fight but i was happy for it on the fish as i might have been in trouble had it been a double.

The next activity did not come round till almost packing in time and this time some of the ice had moved on and i could tell from the run that this was a solid take as the float moved solidly through the water and under the float went.  Sometimes you know its a small 2-3lb jack just by the jagged float pulls as the fish tries to eat the bait.  I will always remember this fish as it put up one hell of a scrap and i mist say as i slid it under the net i thought it was a better fish as it was so long.

The fish on the mat was as skinny a pike as i have ever seen it has loads of length and a big head but it looked like it needed a good meal.  The pike went 6lb on the scales and marked an end to the session for me.  A freezing cold day and two fish on the bank i was a happy camper as i have been on days where conditions have looked better and not had a sniff.  Two fish well earned and shows if you get past the mindset of the weather is bad and get a bait in the water you never know, not massive fish but certainly better than being at home tuning into Discovery Shed seeing Matt hayes circa 1990 repeats.

All in all the session proved to be a success, i head out to the bank piking hoping for one chance of a fish and if i take it then great and anything more is a bonus.

Thank you for checking out my angling blog and i hope you have enjoyed following my fishing in this weeks update.  I am still quite a bit behind on the blogs so there is plenty more fishing still to see the open pages of this blog.

Till next time i wish you tight lines

Danny

Tough Times After such a High....But Come Through...

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you well and your nets wet.  Well what can i say but a huge thank you to all the people who went out of their way to contact me, comment on the blog/Forums or via social media to congratulate me on the capture of my first 20lb pike, thank you all so much and it was great to hear from people who had read my blog for a long time and shared the highs and lows to that point.  I have always wanted my blog top be a true representation of my angling and the pike fishing has been a prime example of that, from casting out and blanking on the first of January this year when i first cast a dead bait out for pike to that point has in reality been a short journey and i have been fortunate to hit a mile stone so early on but boy has it been a steep learning curve.

In this update i hope to cover the time after the capture, my emotions and how it made me feel towards my angling and it may surprise you the emotions i went through.  I also hope to cover a little bit on how to unhook pike and work around the business end of a pike and also go back down memory lane to my early fishing after a recent trip home.

The reality of hitting a milestone........

As i mentioned in last weeks blog a huge part of my piking over the years, whether that be live baiting or dead baiting, has been searching the waterways hoping to see just what a big pike looks like as it breaks the surface of the water and comes into my landing net.  On the 15th October i got my wish and while i was unhooking the pike, taking the pictures and letting her rest in the net i was pumped with emotion and buzzing and made a point of making sure i took every moment of the short time i had with this pike in as it was a long time coming.  

The pike released i sat back in my chair and it was a good 20 minutes before i cast back in, eventually i did and then i sat back and experienced the most unusual of feelings, one one hand i was tingling with excitement as i though "Jesus, Danny your new Pike Pb is 21 pound" but on the other i felt sadness as the realisation hit me that i may never ever beat that personal best again, never experience the excitement of a new PB Pike and most of all i felt lost as my fire and drive had been to experience that moment when a big girl comes up through the water and the sheer feeling of terror as you realise what you are attached too, well, this had been experienced.

I was sat there with two rods in the water and the next hours till i had the next run passed by in a blur and i really could not have cared less if the rods had gone or not at this point.  Garry often comments on how wired and on edge i am when piking as the slightest breath of wind on the float gets me up and walking the bank so to go from starting the session wired to being so unmotivated was a strange experience. 

I also felt i had missed out a huge part of the progression of my piking by not experiencing what an upper double looked like and it would have been nice to go from 15lb to say a 18lb and then break the 20 but i guess that's a perfect world and we definitely do not live in a perfect world.  Strangely enough the next two fish did little to change my demina.

I have said many a time on this blog that having pike anglers around you is such a blessing, comradely, for help with piking but also advice and strangely enough it was a conversation a week or so later whilst sat beside a huge mere that got me my mojo back.  I was sat speaking to Ste, himself has caught many big fish over 20lb and even 30, i asked him straight out did he feel a lull after his first 20lb fish and just to hear that he did and it was normal made me feel so much better and he was right in the next few days the bug bit again and the urge to get out was there. Thanks mate.

Unhooking Pike....

I am never a person who writes this blog preaching about how to fish but i do try and involve as much information as possible about the fishing i do as rigs, type of tackle and how to unhook a pike are easily the most common question i get emails about.  Pike have a fearsome reputation for being aggressive biting machines when on the bank and i think, like the perch, this aggressive nature both in and out the water can lead to people thinking they are quite harden fish but the reality could not be further from the truth.  This little section here about simple unhooking technique is simple aimed at people reading my blog who might want to try for a pike themselves from reading it and hopefully this little inclusion will help them when that first pike is on the bank. 

Preparation
Before you even cast in make sure you have an unhooking matt set up and your tools for unhooking close to hand.  Believe me from experience of fish escaping the net in the margin while you search for your gear, you want that fish out of the water and unhooked asap and having your matt and tools ready set up means you can lift the fish straight out and onto the matt after capture to unhook immediately.

Unhookimg the pike
So the pike is on the mat, there are many ways people unhook pike but the way i do it is to kneel down with the pike between your legs so your are straddling the pike, this will keep the pike still and free form flapping off the matt.

If you turn the pike over onto its back and lift the gill cover like shown above you will see there is a bony recess on the inside of the jaw, if you place your hand here you can get a grip on the pike, but be careful not to be too aggressive as there is a thin layer of skin as well in this area as shown in the pic below, only a little pressure and you can see my fingers.

If you the pull slowly back towards you the pikes head will rise towards you and its mouth will be open wide and you can begin to see where the hooks are as shown below. 

As you can see doing it this way the pikes mouth is open wide and you can see there is plenty of room in there to work.  Some pike are quite active on the bank and you can tell when they are going to flip as they tense up just before so you can almost prepare yourself for it.

Staying Calm
It is so easy when you get that pike on the bank for the adrenalin of the capture to take over and if the pike is deep hooked it is very easy for panic to set in but the best thing to try and do is remain calm and work methodically around the fishes mouth. 

I also wrote a little on this subject early in the year so if you are looking at fishing for pike for the first time check out this blog here: http://satonmyperch.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/dead-baiting-for-pike-effort-equals.html

Memory Lane..

Earlier this week i was back in my old neck of the woods where i grew up as a kid and it brought a tear to my eye as i walked the route me and my dad walked so many times to go fishing when i was younger.  We would walk up to the local canal normally with our rods still set up, much to mums disapproval of them being on the stairs, up through the lights and up these steps to the canal. 

Walking up these steps i still got the same sense of excitement as all those years ago as i knew at the top of them i would get my first glimpse of the canal.

In those early days i always remember setting up at first light with the sound of a wood pigeon in the trees, it was just part and parcel of it. As was the choice of destination, no apps then to tell you a hour by hour report it was a quick look at the sky and from that you where either fishing the open length or under the bridge.  Happy memories for sure and a licence i will be buying next year so i cant wait to get out and relive those memories of spiny perch and bronze bream.

on to this weeks fishing....

From Ecstasy to Frustration....

After the capture of my new Pb pike i thought i would be riding a wave of confidence and would hopefully build upon that to continue to pick up pike steady but the reality was far different.  The next session out was the Saturday after catching the pike and i naturally found myself sat in the same swim i had caught in on the Wednesday.  My tactics where exactly the same as the previous session but for 5 hours i sat behind motionless floats.  Normally i would have stuck it out but i found myself moving locations to another spot where a mixture of ramblers, drunken youths and the one run i did get coming off  putting an end to a sorry day on the bank. A day with so much expectation was met with a cold hard reality of a blank, the closest i got was a badly mouthed roach bait.

The next session out was a afternoon into evening session with Garry where we planned to see what potential lay in fishing into dark.  We arrived with enough time to set up and have our baits in the water for a good hour or so.  We then moved over to a spot where we hoped the pike would be lurking as the depths deepened.  We certainly can not be called for not putting the effort in as we stood in the dark till around 8pm hoping for a chance to come to one of us crazy pike hunters.  A nice evening with some funny moments involving people not accustomed to anglers being around at that time.  The realty again was that the rods remained motionless.

The next session came on a gruelling weekend a few weeks back when it seemed the whole world was against me.  Trouble with my job and a strange noise coming from the bonnet of my car that just screamed "MONEY" was met with me needing to get out on the bank. I should not have bothered.   The session in its entirety saw me getting stuck on bottom 4 times and straightening out the hooks, loosing one complete set up and then resetting up only for my float to tangle around the line right by my reel so after setting up it needed to be set up from scratch again.  Enough was enough at that point and i gave in and went home, three trips and three blanks and i hadn't a clue where my next bite was coming from.

Learning to Ledger for pike.....

The next session out was with Garry on a location we had caught well on recently.  We had a session planned for the coming weeks on a big mere where ledgering was the only option at ranges of 30 to 60 yards.  Ledgering for pike is something i have only ever done once and that was on a a short sesison with Garry a week or so back and in reality it was the rod going rather than an alarm that alerted me so this was little test for a proper ledger session for pike.

In reality the set up for ledgering is even easier than the float rig but the real art to learn here is knowing when to strike as you have no float for indication and to judge how far the pike has gone with the bait and knowing when to strike all comes form experience and feeling the pike on the other end.  The simple ledger rig is literally a lead and a trace where you would normally tie your hook length for carp fishing with a buffer bead and a low Resistance run ring to reduce resistance.  My delkim alarms i had bought for carp fishing had remained motionless all season so i hoped and prayed for a single bite on them but with 3 blanks under my belt i was not confident at all.

Within seconds of setting up Garry had a run under his feet, a solid run but it was so weird when he struck nothing was there. I have never ever seen anything like it as the float was moving as he struck, weird. It proved the pike were feeding though so my levels of confidence improved.  It didn't take long for the pikes interest to be regained and it was Garry who put the first fish of the day on the bank, a great start.

From this early run till 10am the rods remained eerily quiet and it was while enjoying a brew on Garry's peg i heard my alarm screaming off and the tip was banging away.  I got to the rod and gently reeled down the line and felt for the fish taking line solid, line peeling off i struck and was into a fish.  The water was deep so the fish felt really big as i played it and i was sure it was a big fish.  The fish came up and it was a jack around 5-6lb.  The fight on the ledger was completely different and the fish did feel bigger and much harder to get in.  The blank streak broken with a nice pike i was over the moon.

The fish returned i set about re baiting the rod as the bait had come off in the fight or was in the pike belly.  I re baited and cast back out and rejoined Garry on his peg.  I don't know how long i was sat there but it didn't seem any time till the rod was off again and this time the fish did feel a better fish and put up a great fish as it came in with line tearing runs and plenty of action under the tip.  She looked every part 7lb-8lb fish but it wasn't until i lifted her out i thought maybe a double as she weighed a bit.

She went 9lb 9oz on the scales so just under a double but two pike in no time.

The fish again took the bait so it was re baited and returned back to the spot and i set about recasting my other rod.  It was while setting the bobbin on the rod the other rod screamed off again and i struck into a fish that felt nice but did not feel right as i could feel the head shakes suggesting it was not well hooked. Half way in the fish come off with a violent head shake, i was gutted as you always feel with any lost fish but with so much activity surely i would get another chance.

It took another 15 minutes before the rod screamed off again and i gave line only to strike thin air and bring back a bare set of trebles and no bait, weird!  In the space of an hour i had 4 runs on the Leger but little did i know then that was my lot for the day as my rods remained silent all afternoon despite numerous recasts.  Right on last knockings Garry's ledger rod beeped into life with a really cagey run one beep, gap, another beep, gap, then beep as it roared off.  Striking he hooked into a pike right in the middle that fought like mad all the way in, slipping the net under our fourth pike of the day it felt like a fish well earned us both sticking it out in the bite less afternoon and we left happy anglers with four fish added to the tally.

Huge Step Up.....Step too Far??

A few days alter was the trip to a mere and it would involve us casting 30-60 yards on ledgers into a mere that as we approached looked huge, easily the biggest span of water i have ever fished.  Wading out to put my bank sticks in the dark it was a place full of atmosphere and you could tell it held some special fish.   The sun just rising over the trees offered a perfect opportunity for a picture.

We were just all about settled in when Ryan hooked into a fish right in the margins, a place we had all written off and on the float as well, hats off to him for sticking to his guns as on this trip it certainly worked. The smile on his face showing just how happy this capture made him feel.

The next hour Garry had a dropped run and i had a few occurrences on my rods but being new to ledgering i was unsure if it was weed on the line or a run, they certainly where not the screaming runs of the session with Garry. 

Dinner time came round and in my haste to get out the house i had left a cup behind so it was improvisation time for me and i must say a brew from a cut in half pot noodle cup is.......absolutely disgusting!  Two pike came out to a guy up the bank but that was it for pike action on the day.  A tough place indeed and certainly a step up and i really did feel daunted by the whole place and i was certainly out of my depth for sure.  An experience i am glad i have done but i think it is something that will be the odd session for me rather than the normal for at least this year while i am still learning.

Well that's just about it for this week i am still a bit behind with the blog so there are a few nice captures to come but right now i am looking forward to a mornings pike fishing tomorrow and a days trotting with my uncle on Sunday which will be a welcome change form the piking.

Till next time

tight lines

Danny

//7

My First 20lb Pike....

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you all well and your nets wet.  With all the fishing i have done recently for pike this trip has taken its time coming round to be blogged but let me tell you the whole events of this session are as clear as day in my head having been relived so many times since the session you are about to read about.  I normally write a fair introduction to each of my blogs but i thought for this one i would let the session speak for itself and only include some information on the set up i use for my fishing, so sit back and join me back on the bank on the most special of fishing days.

My First 20lb Pike.......

I will start this update by covering what tactics i have been using for 99% of my pike fishing to this point and it really is simplicity itself.  I fish mainly with two rods fished with a float set up which has quite a short list of components and like with my chub fishing rigs everything has to earn its place in the set up by adding something.  My float pike rig set up consists of the following elements from top to bottom:

- Fox Braid Float Stop
- Rubber Bead
- 20g Pike Float
- 18g Stubby Fox Sinker
- Fox Quick change link
- 30lb Carbo flex Wire tied with two size 6 or 4 hooks with Large rubber cover(tied myself)

That is my set up i take everywhere with me on my pike trips tot his point.  The Weight is purposely less than the float to allow me to not only fish a bait lying on the bottom but also allow me some extra weight so the float can suspend a decent dead bait off the bottom without sinking the float.  The quick change link means i can leave the rods set up and simply attach my desired pike trace on the bank and i am away fishing and the large rubber on the trace means i can pull it up over the quick swivel and quick change link to eliminate the chances of the hooks on the trace tangling on the eyes on the cast.

This is a rig i can take to any location i fish although in the weeks since this session i have been experimenting with ledgering dead baits for pike which is even simpler but involves a lot more technique and practise to learn when to strike as you have no visible float to act as a indicator of when to strike so i am very much still learning this method with the help of Garry and Ste.   Well that my set up for pike and in the short time i have been pike fishing dead beats its accounted for all sized pike from tiny jacks to the fish in the this update.

On to the session...

The 15th of October and thanks to this Governments offer of another below inflation 1% pay rise i found myself left being again asked by the union to take industrial action.  I am not going to lie here i could not give to rats about the pay rise and if i was offered the choice not to be paid if i did not go into work for the day i would be a very poor man as i would be on the bank more than in work.  It may well be wrong of me but i always take these strike days off and just go fishing, wrong? maybe but id rather be striking a pike rod than striking on a damp picket line any day of the week and with that the night before my rods where in the hall of my house waiting for first light the next day.

I awoke the next morning and had a solid idea of where i wanted to go fishing but with the car loaded i suddenly found myself questioning my choice of destination and leaning towards a more local destination.  The place i had intended to fish i had little experience on and in reality had only done one session previous and that was with Garry surely the right thing to do was to fish somewhere i had fished a number of times or maybe the place i had broke my PB a few days earlier, yes, that's the place to go surely a full day would yield a number of fish.

The car loaded i set off and i really do not know why but for some reason i found myself on the motorway to the destination i had planned to go, half way there in fact before i realised.  Too late to turn back if i wanted to be casting out at first light i continued on my way to the venue.  Arriving and unloading the car in the dark a thick fog covered the valley and i was not confident at all, in fact i felt like i was wasting my time, weird considering i had broke my PB at the weekend.

Set up in a peg i fancied on our social trip a few weeks earlier i presented one bait in the deep water and another in the margin.  The depths at the location go from 7ft in the margin to around 12ft in the middle and in this particular swim i had found a drop in depth to around 13-14ft and a perfect ambush point.  The bait, a roach was loaded with oil and presented near the drop off while the next rod was fished in the margin on a sardine again loaded with oil.

6.55am and i had both rods out just as the world around me woke and the early morning mist rolled eerily around me, i had the location to myself and normally i would have been just leaving the house for my morning commute to work.  To be honest not a lot happened and i spent the next hour and half chewing the fat on the Internet with the rest of the group and it wasn't till 8.30am i had my first run and it was the rod down the middle that slowly moved off and slid away, a strong strike and i was into my first fish that i got all the way in for the small jack to come off with a violent head shake right in the edge.

The normal banter was received as i reported back i had lost one and it was met with the sympathy you would expect from a group of piking piscators or should i say p'sstakers.  I have said it before and i will no doubt say it again many times before this season is out, i go for one one chance as my target and go from there but i must admit when the next hour passed without event i began to think i had blown my chance and i thought about a move.

9.55am on the 15th October 2014 will be a moment that will live with my till my dying day as out of the corner of my eye i saw my right hand float twitch and cock vertical and begin to slowly bounce along the top, here we go i thought a jack for sure as i grabbed my rod.  The line snagged on a bramble i violently pulled the line free and hoped the aggressive pull in the line did not alert the pike.  Thankfully it did not and the float was still bouncing along the top before it slowly sunk into the deeper water and out of sight.  Reeling down and striking expecting to feel the jagged fight of a jack pike i was instantly shocked as when i struck the rod stayed bent as i struck into a solid weight that was no jack pike.

At this point i thought i was playing a double so with the challenge in mind i was hoping to get it in but as the fight went on and the fish still stayed deep i began to think it might be something special.  The fish was solid on the bottom making hard runs for what seemed an age but eventually it did come up through the water columns and as it did i got a glimpse of what i was connected too, Jesus Christ! it was massive and as it turned i knew i was connected to a PB.  I remember my arm at this point was aching and i could feel the adrenalin pumping through my veins as i played the fish.

At this stage i was praying to anyone that was out there for it not to come off as it made a long run and line was peeling off the reel as she made for the bottom, "please don't come off" "please don't come off" i dared to whisper as the fish came up and a massive head broke the surface.   I knew it was big when the 30 inch net that my dad thinks i take out for catching butterflies looked like the fish wont fit into it.  In a stroke of luck the fish went head first into the net first time and i must admit there was no messing about with the fish getting out of the net as i lifted it straight out onto the unhooking matt.  On the net i knew it was a PB and thought i had a 17-18lb fish on my hands but it was not until i began to get into position to unhook the fish i saw the width and depth of the pike and i began to think a bit bigger.

Looking for the  hooks my heart sank as i could not see the wire, last thing i needed was a deep hooked pike, not one this size.  Then i realised there was no line in the hooks mouth and the hooks had fell out in the net, lucky or what.  The first thing i did was move the rod and set about weighing the fish.  The scales bounced round to past 20lb with ease and at first i was shaking so much they where going round to 28-29lb but they settled on 22lb 12oz.  I later weighed the net and it went 1.5lb so left me with a new personal best of 21lb 4oz fish.

I always pack my carp weigh sling so at this point i placed the fish in the sling and left her to rest a little in the margins while i took a moment to set up my phone to take some self shots, compose myself and also message the guys on facebook messenger.  I must admit at this point i was in a daze, numb at what lay at my feet and i did sit down and take a minute, i had too.  The camera set i set about taking a few shots and while i did i was over the moon when two guys turned up over my shoulder and i was over happy when they agreed to do me a few pictures.

The guys took the pics congratulated me and moved off to set up in another swim for silvers.  I quickly took the moment to take a quick video and even now looking back i cant believe it as i prepare it for publishing.

The time had come to release her back to her watery home and a moment i  will never ever forget about this capture was the 5-10 minutes i had alone with this beauty of a fish while she rested in the margin in my landing net.  One of the huge parts of my pike fishing over the years has been wondering just what a big pike looks like, i have seen many 20lb pike but only as they have swirled and taken a dace on the river dee but here at my feet i had one of those fish in the flesh and i guess this video sums up the feelings while she rested.

The fish kicking hard in the next it was time to let her go and away she went straight down to sulk on the bottom.  i think at this point i rang everyone i could think off to tell them but i started off with the most important person, my dad, a man who i had learnt to fish with and also a person i have shared so many of my ambitions with on a Friday night and who suffers my constant fishing talk.  Azza, Garry and Ste where all called and i must say from a pike point of view a special thank you to Garry for all his help and support with tactics and pointers, introducing me to new spots and sharing information and techniques that took me from blanking with dead baits on a lake we both happened to fish to the capture of this fish, thank you mucka and too ste again for the help, tips and the advice on what camo to pick for my next seasons piking, joking aside there is a lot to be said for the comradely that comes with the group we have with the pike fishing and believe me it certainly helps having pikers there when you see the run of blanks i go on after this fish.

In all honesty i sat there for around 20 minutes with no rod in the water as i just literally sat there and took in what had just happened, it may have even been longer and i did make a video to capture the moment but that will stay private as it holds special value to myself and i believe you do have to hold some things back.

I did eventually cast both rods back in but to say i was fishing was an joke as i day dreamed and relived the moments that had passed and constantly looked over my photos, i could have just packed in there and then.

It took a while for the next bite to come but when it did my heart was pounding, a lot of people say when that float goes you just dint know, i had subscribed to that theory but never really struck expecting anything but a jack.  Things where different now though having seen the monsters that lurk in our waters.   The time to strike come and although not in the league of the monster previous i was made up with this fish and another one was added to the challenge list.

The final bite of the day took a long time coming and it was right on last knockings and with the light fading i began to think here we go could be a special end to a special day.  Striking i honestly thought the fish had spat the bait till it broke the surface.  How mad that two fish from the same swim could be so different in size, one 20lb one possibly 20 ounces.  All part of the learning curve of pike fishing.

Not long after i did the photo i called it a day and headed off home.  Loading the car i did take a moment to think to myself that i wont be loading the car up too many times after such a fishing session and with that the music was put on loud and off i went on my way.

Till next time,

a very special tight lines

Danny