Friday 23 November 2012

Puttting The Piking On Hold.......For Now


A warm welcome to this weeks blog update and I start with a thank you to all the people who have contacted me and sent me emails in support of my decision to edit the pictures on last weeks blog update and to air there disgust at the actions being carried out on the River Dee.  What immediately became apparent is the scale of these incidents as it would seem they are now a common scene across the whole of the country on a variety of waters, only last night a post was put up on the Warrington Anglers Facebook page by an angler visiting a club water only to be greeted with a group of people lingering in the car park.  The water in question is really shallow which raises the concern around netting and is a real worry as it’s a seen a one of the jewels in the Warrington Anglers crown and holds some specimen fish.

Closer to home it has come to my attention this week that the Bridgewater Canal in Runcorn which was once owned by Halton Joint Anglers and more recently Runcorn Angling Centre is now free fishing.  There are a few rumours doing the rounds as to why the bait shop closed but I was told on the bank this week that the upside of the shop closing is they no longer hold the tenancy of the stretch so it’s free till a new tenant is found, so get trolley dodging and get catching those carrier bags that strewn the bottom of this urban canal.

The last point I want to get to before I go onto this weeks fishing is the fact I will be ceasing my pike fishing on the River Dee with immediate effect.  I got speaking to an angler on the bank on Saturday and the conversation moved over to pike gear, upon seeing his gear it hit me straight away I have been fishing far too light for these river fish.  The gear I have used for years to catch the pike from the canal has always done me proud with 10lb maxima being my chosen line and so I have kept faith in this line as I moved over to my river piking and after hearing the guy speak it is certainly not up to the task should I connect with a decent upper double specimen, which is highly possible on this productive river system.

I got home and took advice from some really helpful piker’s who follow the blog on Facebook who where great at pointing me in the right direction for a good quality braided line that will be good enough for the job in hand, so I again thank both the angler on the bank and the people on Facebook for their help and understanding, thank you.  So as soon as I have the line sorted and have nailed to new knots to a point where I am confident as I am with my mono knots that they are up to the task I will be back out after those river dee pike and I am actually looking forward to seeing how different the fight is on the braided line.

This week update on the fishing side of things will be quite short and sweet as the fishing was not the best as for some reason the fish where all up in the water and the only bites we could get on the bottom was from tiny dace.  The rising sun and clear water soon revealed that the dace where nailing all the bait just under the surface so no bait was getting any where near the bottom.

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I quickly changed over to my pole and a poly ball to catch these fish on the drop and found it really difficult to hit the rapid bites.  I eventually got to grips with it by tweaking the bait and I also managed to draw the fish closer in which made it a lot easier to control the bait and I was amazed at the quality of the dace just under the water.

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My uncle on the peg up from me was also catching the same small dace on the bottom but persevered with it and made changes to his line and feeding and soon the better fish were showing with some really pristine roach making an appearance.  My dad was getting tonnes of bites on the feeder and was missing them and had we not been on the float rod catching these tiny dace on the bottom he could have been in a situation where he was loosing his mind but in reality you are never going to hit such fast bites on the feeder.

My dads fortunes changed later on in the day when the bigger dace settled on the bottom and he began to catch some quality dace like the one shown below.


Catching the fish on the drop is never a method that is going to catch you fish all day and my bites tailed off and I continued to pick up the odd fish through the afternoon but nothing that was going to put together an amazing net of dace but still I enjoyed my relaxing day on the bank.

My net

Uncles net

As I write this short update the rivers have just had a good run through and hopefully will start to fine off for our trip on Saturday but the reality of it is should be have any more rain between now and Saturday the river is almost certainly going to be a washout.

Till next time I wish you all tight lines

Danny

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