Winter Looms and Paternoster Booms...

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update and first of all I want to cover what there was no update on the blog last week.  I was asked at the start of September if i would like to feature as a guest blog on the Angling Gazettes website and after thinking about it for around 2 seconds i said yes, of course i said yes and i was over the moon to have been asked to write a piece for a website i think so highly of.   September was always going to be a hectic month for me when with going on holiday at the start of it and having the Minke fishing tool review to write as soon as i got off holiday i knew time would be tight so i agreed with the Angling Gazette that i would get the blog over to them towards the end of September beginning of October.  Last weeks blog update was that guest blog and I sent the blog over to them on Friday morning and it is currently being edited by their team so i will post a new blog on here when it goes live on their page in the near future with the link on it, so watch out for that one.

So moving on to this weeks update and its been a really good week for me as I have had a few people get in touch with me on the blogs email address and as you all know i love it when readers of the blog get in touch, some just want to say hi and say how much they enjoy reading the blog, some get in touch with pointers and tips for myself and others get in touch looking for help on venues i have fished or on writing a blog, all of these emails i love receiving and i hope all the people who have ever got in touch with me would go away and say that i have always done my best to help them and been honest in my emails to them if i cant.  There are some times that you just cant help people and some aspects of my angling that i do not divulge in private emails and these normally circle around piking spots which is down to protecting this species that does not really take well to angling pressure.

If the email is not your thing the blog does have a Twitter page and a Facebook page, both of which are regularly updated and a great place to keep up with the blog and pictures that do not make it into the weekly blog and unlike some Facebook pages out there feel free to post your catches on the page its there for everyone to interact on and not just for me to post on so why not join others on there and let me know how you are getting on with your fishing.

Blog Facebook Page:https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dannys-Angling-Blog/282860255069146
Blog Twitter Page:  https://twitter.com/satonmyperchor follow @Satonmyperch

 The trees are starting to loose their leaves and coating the ground with natures carpet, trips to the river from now on will be met with a steady stream of browns, oranges and yellows fluttering through the swims. The silver fish will be starting to shoal up and begin to think about migrating to their winter haunts and behind them dressed in a full dinner suit of speckled green will be the hungry pike lurking in the shadows, chub will be feeling the pinch as the natural larder runs dry and the grayling well the grayling will still think its summer and behave accordingly and carry on as if nothing has changed ........winter is just around the corner and as i write this blog on a dark Wednesday night its safe to say the weather has taken a turn for the worse.  There is a draft coming in from the open window to my left and  there is certainly a nip in the air tonight and for the first time this year i think it may be time for the heating to get put on, roll out the extra blankets and on with the slippers.  In fishing terms it means it is time to brush down the thermal pants and bob hat in preparation for the colder sessions ahead and i always like to be prepared for my sessions and in winter this certainly means being warm. This year we will also have the luxury of warm food on the bank as we make the most of the Calor Grill to Go I reviewed in the summer and i said back then i would get my use out of it in the colder months and i am sure sessions like this freezing cold session where the landing net froze upside down and i had icicles in my keep net will be so much easier with a hot meal inside me.

freezing nets blog: http://www.satonmyperch.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/ice-ice-baby.html

In terms of actual fishing it normally starts the feeling inside of freezing cold trips on the River trotting for dace and grayling but this year i am going to try and go down a different line with my fishing.  There will of course be trips trotting for Dace and chub on the blog but i am going to try and add some variety to my fishing with sessions specifically targeting Pike and i am setting myself a target of a 15lb plus pike for this winter, a target i feel is achievable and a target i almost hit in the guest blog i wrote for the Angling Gazette.  It would be so easy for me here to come out and say, right my target is the stereotypical 20lb pike but when i set these targets they are more there for me to keep myself on track and although i ultimately want to beat the target i do not see it as a do or die target as in reality i am happy with whatever i catch on the day whether that be a 3lb or a 10lb pike as i just love admiring the personality of each individual pike and how beautiful their markings are when they come from our rivers.

The one hope i have this year is just to spend some more time on the river bank as last year was a complete washout with the heavy rain, snow and subsequent floods it seemed the river was never really right and was not on proper form till February or march time.  One thing that is going to be hard for us if we get another winter like that is finding somewhere on the river to fish as we used to head to a inlet on the river where the fish used to back into in floods but that is no longer available so we will have to look into alternatives and that may well mean trips to the canal or purchasing a different card with a river that drops quicker than the river dee, one thing that is guaranteed is it will be a cracking adventure finding out what the next few months have in store as we move onto what i regard as the best time of the year....

and with that its on to this weeks fishing...

Winter Looms and Paternoster Booms 

After last weeks trip to the river where we landed a few pike we decided to venture to the same stretch again but this time i set my stall out for just pike.  On the previous trip we had both trotted for a few hours in the morning but we both came to the conclusion that we were fighting for the same fish as one person would be catching solid and the other would be struggling and then vice versa throughout the day so with this in mind i made the decision to go all out for a predatory pike.

It really amazes me when i go out dace fishing just how many times i am approached by anglers fishing for a pike who ask you if you can catch them a dace or a roach and as a rule i generally say no as surely to be able to catch a pike you first have to have the ability to catch the bait? surely catching the bait is part of the whole process, at least it is in my eyes.  With this in mind i spent around a hour or so in the morning catching a few baits for my pike fishing session ahead, only a few and i always make a point of not using baits that are too big although after getting some advice from pike anglers this week this could be one reason i cant get over the 14lb mark and i suppose the theory of big bait big fish can be logical in pike fishing. 

The bait safe and sound in the keep net it was away with the float gear and out with the pike rod and for sessions where i am going to target pike direct on the river i always go with a paternoster rig.  They are fool proof really in their design and i go with the Greys Prowla 360 degree pike boom as this also comes with a up trace and the system is really simple you attach a weak link on the bottom with a lead on the end and set the depth with a slip knot so the bait is held in position at the depth you want.  The trace is attached via a snap link to the boom so its really easy to change trace should a pike make a mess of your trace.  

I only started using these last year and honestly can say i would not be without it now it completely takes away the moving of a bait all the time when it heads for snags like all baits invariably do and on occasions last year i have put a bait in on a short line below a float and not got a bite and then changed over to this and its gone instantly and i am sure this is down to the face this paternoster puts the bait further down in the water column and given sometimes i am fishing in 10ft plus of water it can make the difference. The rig as it would sit in theory is shown below:

My uncle was further upstream and he set out his stall for dace and roach using maggot and hemp tactics and was having a steady session with bites coming steady for longer periods since i stopped feeding my trotting line.  All set up and ready for action i slid down the bank and into my first swim of the afternoon armed with the minimal of tackle i tested the depth to make sure that if a pike did take it did not have enough slack to swallow the bait without me knowing as the last thing we want is a deeply hooked pike and with the depth set it was a case of adding the bait before lowering the it in position.

There is one thing that you can almost guarantee with pike and its if you drop a bait in the right place and there is a pike about they normally do not mess around and today was no different as the float had only settled for a minute or so before it slid away and i always think its almost a sinister look as the float submerges and you loose sight of the bright red top of the pike bung.  I never leave it too long before striking preferring to lose the fish than risk deep hooking one so i gave it a second before striking and setting the hooks and one of the best feelings for me with pike fishing is that feeling of solid resistance on that first strike, whether the pike is big or small that original contact gives nothing away of the fishes size, although i may have to retract that comment if i ever connect with one of the big girls. 

The fish made a hard run for the middle of the river and pulled some line from the spool but at this point i felt the fish did not really know it was hooked as its run was halted it seemed to hold for a second in the fast flow before showing its self just below the surface as it eased back into the slack its tail just caressing the water before with one rapid flick of its tail it flared its anal fins and tail and made a hard run for the submerged tree to my left, this esox certainly knew where home was as it made for this snag twice more during the fight but each subsequent time i was one step ahead and quickly applied the brakes giving no quarter and it was not long after that the fish rolled on the top and i took my opportunity to slide the net under the fish. On the scales it went exactly 8lb and i was over the moon as it was only early on in the session and this fish was a solid start.

The fish rested in the margins upstream of our position till it regained its strength in the landing net before being released it was time for me to rest the pike swim for 15 minutes while i chatted away with my uncle and spent a few minutes watching how my uncle goes about trotting his swim all the time learning little hints and tricks and not only watching what he does but asking why and that is the important part about it i find knowing why he makes a change and what he hopes to achieve from it.  These little bits of information hopefully will all come together to improve my river float fishing when the winter comes and we start to target the big shoals of dace. 

My trotting lesson and two brews later i returned to my pike swim and after no initial take i relaxed into my peg and took in my wonderful surroundings and fully enjoyed being beside the river.  When you are trotting a float you are constantly concentrating and focused on presenting the float right and sometimes this does mean you miss some of the sights and sounds of the river but Saturday, for me, was different i was well and truly spoilt by the nature that resides on the banks of the river dee.  On the day i enjoyed watching a kingfisher work the river upstream form his tiny perch while breaking through the background noise of the river flowing over the shallows upstream was the faintest tap tap tap of a woodpecker searching the bark for grubs.  Later on in the day the warmer air thermals saw a pair of buzzards riding high above much to the annoyance of the local crows who hounded them ferociously causing them to move on out of sight while my session from a nature point of view was topped of with this lovely butterfly that behaved so well letting me have its picture taken. 

Judging by the striking upstream my uncle was still getting a few fish and upon checking my watch it had been a good two hours since my last fish so i upped sticks and dropped in another swim i had my eye on looking to give it half an hour or so.  In total i tried 2 more swims before returning back to my original swim for the rest of the session and after getting to that point you think its not going to happen the float dipped a few times but unlike the normal ebbing and flowing of the float that goes with the occasional swirl of water through the swim these dips where more purposeful and direct and a few seconds later the float skulked away towards the middle of the river.  

This fish felt bigger than the first one during the fight and like the first it knew all about that snag to my left  but unlike the first one i was all onto that tactic from the off and was waiting for it to make for it.  Last year i got some great advice on the blogs Facebook page about line for pike and took their advice and moved over to a strong braided line and i am so glad i did it puts you right in touch with the fish and gives you so much control and this extra confidence in your tackle really puts you in the driving seat when trying to land pike that can be really strong with their runs.  The fish on the bank it had a strange deformation on its back which was well healed and at first i thought it was a cormorant bite but upon checking further along the pikes back there where further marks and it looked like it had been grabbed by a much bigger pike, these wounds were old and healed but proves there are bigger pike in this area. 

During the unhooking i caught my knuckle on the the hook in the pikes mouth as i chinned the fish out of the net which was a shock to say the least and this is the slight bit of blood you can see on the pikes gill plate.  After resting the pike in the margin till it was fully recovered it was time to see it swim away back into its watery home a practise that should be part of any anglers day, that is putting the pike back and not taking them home as unfortunately there are still people on the bank in the early hours looking to catch pike and take them for the table no matter what the size.

pike going back

After this pike i gave the swim another 20 mins while my uncles keep net dried out but no more pike where forthcoming.  My uncle had a good day for the time of year when the dace can be quite dispersed still putting together a 8lb net of dace and i think the odd roach.

the best fish on the day was this fin perfect dace which looked great with a few other decent fish form the session.

All in all i was well pleased with the session, two more pike to add to the pike form last week and with one pike into double figures and a number of separate pike all just under the 10lb mark i feel i have made a steady start to my piking campaign.  With regards the targeting of bigger size pike i think i am going to keep on the way i am at the moment as i am obviously naturally picking the right areas and pike are coming to the bank so i will continue with how i am doing it before i look at making changes. 

A silver itch to scratch - Sunday 6th October

Although i thoroughly enjoyed my pike fishing on Saturday it still left me with a silver fishing itch to scratch so early on Sunday morning i set out for a local pond hoping to put together a nice net of silvers.  Driving along the road to the pond the sky i front was a real picture and i just had to take a detour to capture a picture of such a glorious morning, to all those people who think there is only one 6 o'clock in the day you are missing out big time.

sunrise over the river Mersey. 

The session was one where i got plenty of bites and had a very enjoyable morning on the bank as predicted the carp moved in as the weather warmed and on a number 5 elastic i was not offering up much resistance to these small carp.  I looked back thinking should i have gone heavier and all out for the carp given how close to winter we are but thinking about it in the afternoon after the session i went for roach and rudd and set my stall out for them and i caught my target for the session so looking back on the session i was happy with the result and the carp can wait for another day.

The final net was testament to a steady mornings fishing and although the better roach failed to show i couldn't think of a better way to pass a few hours. 

This weekend we are hoping to get on one of the canals but with the weather turning cold we may end up on the river.

till next week

tight lines 

Danny

Slurpin Carp and Angling Gazette Top 10

A warm welcome to this week’s blog update and I am really proud to announce that the blog has made it into the Angling Gazette’s Top 10 blogs for June 2013.  This is the second time the blog has made the shortlist with the last time being when the blog had around 60,000 views.  The Angling Gazette where very generous with their praise and had the following to say on the blog:

Danny’s Angling Blog - Sat on My Perch

Danny’s blog made our list way back in March.  We love his sense of humour and we love the way he writes.  However, what makes Danny’s blog stand out is not just the fact that he talks about his ups and downs of fishing, but that he talks about other things going on in the angling world too (even us !).

He’s a genuine guy and that comes across in his writing and he represents 80% of anglers out there in the UK right now.  If you like to fish, don’t mind admitting when you blank, get excited about hooking a big one and are in angling for pleasure, you will love Danny’s blog.

It is feedback like this and the generous praise I receive form people who contact me via the blogs email address that, not keep you going as I do the blog because I love writing it and of course going fishing, but make it feel like what you do is worthwhile and that people do enjoy reading what I write.  So thank you to the Angling Gazette for their praise of the blog and well done to the other 9 blogs that joined me on the list for this month.

A link to the full list can be found here:  http://www.anglinggazette.co.uk/the-best-10-angling-blogs-weve-read-this-month-june-2013/

There is a big iron in the fire at the moment regarding the expansion of the blog and discussions are on-going but it is looking good at the moment that this will go ahead and mean the blog will be featured on another format but there will be more on that in the coming weeks should the agreement come together.

This week I have to admit I have had little time for all things angling related as work has been so busy and when I have come home it has been so warm I have wanted to do little else than just chill out and spend time with my missus and little girl.  The system I have been working on goes live on Monday so after that point I should have some more time on my hands to get out in the week and wet a line.  I have been meaning to make the most of this bright sunshine and get down the local canal with a floating setup and see if I can nab the odd carp or too, maybe I will do that one night next week or over the weekend.

Away from my fishing there has been little that has caught my attention this week and you may think that to be a strange comment given the fact it was the weekend on the Fish-o-Mania final but the reality is this first year in what I can remember that I have not had Sky Sports to watch the final on.  It is, being honest, purely down to a cost issue with it as it has become so expensive now to add these extra three channels to your existing package that I just cannot justify the extra money to buy them although when I was sat there on Sunday thinking about what I was missing (we all know the International Event on the Sunday is where it is at lol) I was very nearly tempted into a rash decision but alas it will no doubt be left up to the new footie season to start to see me totally crumble.

I did think about easing my pain on Sunday with a trip to the river after those barbel  and chub but given how hot it has been and the lack of rain I just knew the river would be dreadfully low and clear and given I had planned an afternoon session I must admit to getting a bit lazy in my old age and decided against it, but who knows what this weekend may hold, so far so good.

On to this wee’s blog update.

“Waking the Neighbours and Bread Slurping Carp.”

You may have noticed the past week or so we have been avoiding our favourite river the river Dee and this has been with good reason as it really has not been fishing well.  Myself and my uncle spend have spent a fair amount of time on her over the past two years and over that time have built up some really good friendships with fellow anglers who also love fishing this river and all the reports I have been getting in have been confirming what we have been finding that the river is just not fishing at the moment so with that we drew up a shortlist of ideas from the crazy of night fishing to the sensible of having a lie in and fishing a commercial.

We ended up doing a mixture of the two as we came up with a great plan of fishing the tiny River Gowy in the morning and moving onto a local carp pool around 7am to try for a few carp off the top.   This plan would give us an idea of how the river Gowy was fishing by fishing the best part of the day when you would expect any big fish to show up if they were about and also meant that by spending only a few hours on there you were in fact gathering information for free as the water we was visiting didn’t open till 7am any way so we got the best of both worlds.

Arriving at the car park at the nags head we unloaded a single rod and a few essential bits and pieces and made our way down the very overgrown path down the river.  I had decided not to fish and to watch my uncle fish the swim we had chosen this was a decision that was made just because of the little amount of time we had before moving on and also it is always great to see how my uncle would tackle a brand new river for example the line he fished was completely different to where I would have fished, lesson learnt.

We were as quiet as possible setting up and getting into position but still managed to wake the locals up, never a great start on a relatively new venue but thankfully they settled back down.

The fishing was as we thought it would be very slow and for what seemed an eternity the delicate 6 number 4 stickfloat trundled down the swim without any interest.  The one thing I learned from this session bears no reference to the fishing but to our noisy neighbours across the river, I never in my life knew just how much these animals coughed and I mean it sounded like they were right behind us each time they did it.   In between these bouts of bovine throat clearing my uncle did put a few fish on the bank in the form of small perch and a single gudgen.

The end net would have not done the session justice and I suppose we packed in having caught around 12 perch and a single gudgeon for hour short session but we left with the though “where there are small perch, there are big perch”

As we pulled out of the Car park we were greeted by this lovely summer scene of fields upon fields of bails of straw waiting to be collected by the farmer.

We left the river behind and made our way to a local carp pool where given the forecast of a scorching hot day we were odds on to encounter a carp or two.   I committed the cardinal sin of any angler though and had already decided how I was going to fish before I had even arrived at my peg the plan was to fish luncheon meat and hemp seed on the inside shelf and feed it on the heavy side hence the fact I travelled with two whole tins of luncheon meat ready cut into centre metre cubes. 

Pulling into the car park at 7.30am it we already warming up and it was obvious from the crystal clear blue skies we were in for a really warm day so I knew I only had an hour or so if my plan was going to work before all the carp where up on top.  I fed the swim with two big pots of bait and then left it while I set up the rig for the session ahead.

The first put in over this line resulted in plenty of knocks on the float which I instantly knew where skimmer bream and eventually the float buried and my initial thoughts where proved right as a 5oz skimmer graced my palm.  That is pretty much how the swim continued to go for the majority of the morning with a continuous line of small skimmers making a trip to the bank I suppose they would have made up a cracking looking net had keepnet’s been allowed.  I persevered with this line until the bites dried up but I was over the moon to have connected with one of the better skimmers in this bream below which at this point of the day I was more than made up with as the carp had failed to turn up to the party.

As the session moved on and the sun began to rise further in the sky its rays of warmth drew the carp up in the water and I began to see the jet black ghostly shadows of carp cruising just under the surface.  Its times like this in the past I have cursed my luck and thought if only I had some bread with me now but I have certainly been there and done that and I suppose it is only time on the bank and experience of these situations that’s make you think more about the session ahead and with that out came the good old Warbutons Super Toastie crusts.

There are many rigs out there which will swear to you they are the must have item for surface fishing and make you feel like you will not catch without them which I suppose may be true in some situations but in most the good old methods work just fine and you cannot go wrong with a simple hook tied to a good long piece of line attached to the end of the pole, simple and as cheap as it comes and boy does it work.

I took 9 carp in total with the best of the initial group shown above and all put up a really good scrap on the white hydro elastic.  It is always the case with any type of surface or shallow fishing that the fish do wise up, well the better fish at least and and the more the session goes on the harder it gets I find and I guess that’s what separates casual anglers from the greats as they know how to keep the fishing coming.

The best fish on the day was saved till last for me and it was through pure skill I managed to hook the fish as I delicately placed a crust that had been out for some time and was completely saturated with water right on top of a passing carps mouth and she slurped it down like it porridge oats down a sink.  The fish in this place a rumoured to go over 20lb but I have found the vast majority to be in the 3-5lb bracket with a really good fish pushing 9lb and this was certainly the latter as I could not for the life of me get it off the bottom and try as I may the fish just lazily but purposefully swam around the swim at its leisure.  The fist one of these carp you hook your heart is in your mouth but now after catching I few I knew it was time to let the elastic do the work.

The fish must have taken a good 5-10 minutes to get in but I was in no rush to bully the fish, I do use a pulla-kit but believe it is there to give you more control when the fish is in close and not too exert maximum pressure on the fish to get it in quicker, I let the elastic do the work and enjoyed the chess like battle that goes with a better fish on the pole as you guess and counter guess the fish’s next move.  It was soon checkmate and a stunning 8lb 5oz carp was in the net.

This fish topped of a very enjoyable surface fishing session for myself and I called it a day around 2pm as the fish where not playing ball and also I was beginning to flag after over 24 hours without a sleep.

Till next time I wish you all

Tight lines

Danny

Barbel and Chub Fishing...just what the doctor ordered

A warm welcome to this week’s blog update and what a difference a week can make and as I mentioned in last week’s mini update you have to stick with it and eventually your luck will change and those bad trips become trips to remember, more about that later on in the update.

Firstly this week I would like to declare utter astonishment at the fact Warrington Anglers have managed to negotiate the lease of a new water, sorry 3 waters in a complex.  I have to admit I nearly choked on my breakfast reading the news on the Warrington Blog on Wednesday morning but then I read further and it all became clear why Warrington would be so interested in this water, firstly it is not very local with it being situated in Flintshire, secondly they have leased the water without knowing the stocking levels of the waters and thirdly they were asking for volunteers to clear out the overgrown swims so it seems it ticks all the boxes needed to be a quality Warrington anglers water.

Joking aside it is great to see new waters on the card, admittedly I would have preferred any new water to be of the “flowing” variety but the club need to be commended for being positive in looking for new waters for the card.  I really do hope the club decide to make these three pools into a mixed fishery venture that accommodates the all year round fishing and don’t just continue with their policy of filing the place in with 3lb carp.  If my blog has proved anything over the past few months it is that nature can cope with the predation from cormorants, there are plenty of waters where silver fish are thriving and there is no reason why these three waters wouldn’t be any different given the right amount of cover and stocking levels.

For those interested the water is called Offa’s Dyke Fishery situated in Flintshire, I have done a little bit of research on the internet for anyone looking to go once its open.  The first report was slightly worrying in saying it used to fish well till the owner suffered a major fish kill one winter but then I read further down and there are some positive reports with on saying:

“Had a look at Offfas Dyke pools today, looks a nice piece of water, very fishable. 
Talking to one chap there said he had been smashed up a number of times with big carp 
and had landed a few doubles, at £5 a day is not bad”

That aside the other bit of news that humoured me this week was the story in the news about the “jobs worth” Environment Agency officer that ironically “opened a big can of worms” (sorry couldn’t help myself) by fining a carp angler for not being in full control of his fishing equipment! I had a quick glance at my calendar whilst reading this story on the Angling Gazzette news page to make sure we hadn’t gone back in time to April 1^st but alas no this was a true story and the angler in question had been charged with this offence.  I am not a night angler myself but knowing how much my dad likes to take a nap whilst fishing I can see him struggling to keep his licence for a full season.

The full story is here:  http://www.anglinggazette.co.uk/sleeping-carp-angler-charged-by-ea-environment-agency-official-response/

Aside from humouring myself with internet news and spending time with my little girl I have been fortunate enough this week to have shared along walk with the new internet sensation that is “Otto” a dog that has his own blog that is written rather wittingly as if through the eyes of a young German shepherd and his thoughts on the walks his rather eccentric owne takes him on.   I and my little companion Pippa decided to join otto on one of his adventures this week and it was a joy to discover a part of my local area I never knew existed.

Here is a link to Otto’s blog:  http://ottogoeswalking.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/the-pipster.html

And with that on to this week’s fishing:

The River’s to this point had offered little to remove the thoughts of another failure on the bank from my head I was torn between venues and low on confidence and it seems when you are in this frame of mind you can fall into the trap of either trying too hard or jumping from one bad decision straight into another and I must admit it was the latter that entered my head as I went about completing my homework on a new stretch of river.

The word was the stretch held a good number of chub and barbel and also a good number of dace, roach and perch to keep the day ticking over.  I had seriously thought about giving the fishing a few weeks off to let the rivers get a good flush through but I decided to go with the old adage that a change was as good as a rest and with that on Saturday morning we headed off on another aveture.

In the murky light of dawn we stalked the bank trying to assess the potential of each swim as we arrived in it.  The dark hided the lack of depth in the swims but we both settled into a swims we thought would produce a few fish.   We both started on our standard trotting setup of 4lb 4oz main line down to a 1lb 7oz bottom with a size 18 hook on the business end.

The first four trots down my swim resulted in four new rigs being tied with me finding snag after snag with great ease and more annoyingly was the fact I hadn’t trotted down the swim once without hitting a different snag, frustrated wasn’t the word.   Whilst setting up for the fifth time I saw a few fish jump in the swim which gave me a real confidence boost to keep going as I knew it was just about getting the float going through the swim where I wanted it and not let it go down the snag entwined inside line.   I decided at this point to get in the river as it was only shallow beneath my feet and wow what a difference it made as the float disappeared right over my bed of hemp, a snag for sure I thought as I struck into solid resistance, you can imagine my relief as I felt the fish kick.

The fish thudded for the far side in a short direct pulls which instantly gave this fish away as a chub but with a 1lb 7oz bottom where was little room to bully this fish so I took my time and made sure I got the fish in and boy was I made up as a big pair of white lips slip over the rim of my landing net.  The fish in the net I was amazed firstly by the condition of the fish apart from an old scar on its back it was in good nick but I was more impressed with its dark almost mahogany colouring across its back which gave way to a tail fin that was as black as coal a real lovely looking fish, 4lb 3oz of British wildlife at its best right there in my hands.

The chub rested in the landing net and it was put into the keep net for safe keeping, a quick look at the watch and it was a bleary eyed 6am, most of the world was still in bed if only they knew what they were missing.  A quick call to my uncle upstream revealed he had been snapped twice and lost a small chub at the net so obviously the fish where about.

I continued to trot away happily with no reward for the next couple of hours hoping the fish would move back in but as time moved on so my concentration lapsed and my mind wandered from the task in hand.  I placed my rod on my bait waited and grabbed my phone to ring home, no answer! A text would have to do so as I began writing the text I saw the tip of my rod was suddenly pointing upstream and my rod was fast on its way to finding a new watery home!! I grabbed the rod and felt the fish on the other end but it was solid and in one run the fish torpedoed upstream and the line just snapped as the fish made off. Whatever it was it was big.

I set up again and with plenty of practice that day it wasn’t too long before I was back trotting again and first trot down BANG I struck into another fish that again snapped me clean, clearly it was time to do away with the bottom and after all it wasn’t as if I was catching and small species.   So with 4lb line all the way through I set about trotting again hoping I hadn’t ruined my chances of another big fish encounter.  My uncle appeared in the swim with his flask in hand as is the norm on our trips and I explained what had happened as I continued to trot away, as luck would have it I struck at a lightning fast bite which I was certain was the bottom will it accelerated out of the swim and peeled off a good 20 yards of line as it bolted upstream, clearly another good fish which at the time I said I thought was a carp. 

With the lightest of hands I played the fish under the tuition of my uncle and prayed it stayed upstream and in front of me away from the snags downstream, I certainly didn’t want the fish coming near in while it was still fresh.  The fight now a good few minutes long was no nearer its conclusion as the fish kept deep and made its way up and down the swim in long hard runs that went from line oozing from the reel to me reeling like a mad man to catch up with it as it swam towards me, just don’t come off I prayed!  Eventually the fish came up in the water as she tired and a flash of bronze and orange confirmed it was in fact a barbel and easily the biggest one I have ever caught.

Eventually the fish tired and came up to the net and like a scoop though a soft ice cream my uncle scooped up the fish and I took a second to compose myself.

The fish was again in beautiful nick, not a mark on it or a scale out of place and again I was taken back at the beautiful colours of the fish with its deep bronze flanks and giving way to a white belly.  I don’t catch many of these fish so I took a quick second the savour the moment before quickly taking my pictures and weighing the fish, 5lb 5oz.

As I mentioned I don’t do much barbel fishing but it pays to do your homework on these fish and I knew from reading the literature on the internet that these fish are similar to grayling in they give all in the fight so time must be taken to ensure the fish I rested.  As you can see below the first picture is the fish when it was first in the edge resting and the second is the fish upright supporting its own weight and pushing against the mesh to swim off, fully recuperated this took a good 10 minutes for it to get to this sage but us anglers have a risibility to treat fish with the ultimate respect and I know this fish went back in exactly the same condition as it was before I caught it.  

Rest pic 1

Rest pic 2

The fish returned it was time to get back to it I didn’t fancy the float rod to not only produce another fish but get another in, it was finally time for my Shimano Purist BARBEL rod to be used for its intended purpose….catching barbel as over the years it has been the most versatile rod I own catching me carp, tench, pike and of course some other barbel from the river Dee.  I cast I over my bait and sat back expecting a relaxing last hour to the session little did I know just 10 minutes later the tip of my rod would wrap round almost 90 degrees and line would rip form the bait runner.

I lifted into a fish that I knew instantly form the previous fight was a barbell but this time I was calling the shots a bit more as I was armed with a bigger hook and 10lb line so this fight was certainly a lot more controlled than the previous one but still had plenty of long runs that peeled line form the reel.  The fish was obviously bigger than the previous one and it looked in my eyes to be a good two or three pound bigger as it was so long and deep so I was amazed when it went just a few ounces bigger at 6lb exactly.

’

That was it for my fishing and we called it a day not long after.  My uncle added two nice chub to this tally but lost a few fish to being snapped like I had on a light hook length.  Still we both agreed we couldn’t complain and would certainly be back to this new stretch.

I must admit as I walked the bank back to the car I was on cloud nine and the past weeks tough sessions left my body they just flowed away just like the water through the very river I had fished.  It is amazing what one session can do to your mind set.

Till next week its tight lines from me and even tighter lines from Boris the barbel.

danny

Angling Gazette Recognition and Dannys wild Side

A warm welcome to this week’s blog update and this week it comes with a bit of a difference as it will be an update that will not feature any angling from this week as basically the put it bluntly there hasn’t been any hehe.  Last weekend the country was thick with snow and all the venues locally where cased in a layer of ice.  The conditions we were faced with on the morning of the planned trip just meant it wasn’t worth the risk to even make the journey to pick my uncle up given the gradient of the hill at his house.  I did think whether it was worth doing a blog update this week but I think it does no harm to keep in the routine and also it gives me an opportunity to devote a small update to a side of myself I try to portray in my angling updates but find it hard to do well given the nature of the fishing I do and that is my love of wildlife.  So in this update I hope to show you some of the different ways I feed my love of both British and wildlife form around the world.

Spring???

Before me move onto the meat and bones of this update it is with great pride I share with you that the blog made the top 10 blogs list for march 2013 on the Angling Gazette Website.  The piece they wrote about the blog was really nice and although I don’t see writing this blog as anything more than an add on to my fishing it really moved me to read someone else saying such nice things about a blog I write and it really did mean a lot to myself.  Thank you so much to Angling Gazette for picking my blog out for recognition and congratulations to all the other blogs on that list.

Here is the write up it received:

 Danny’s Angling Blog (satonmyperch)

We absolutely love this blog. On it you can follow the exploits of Danny, his dad and his uncle as they go on fishing trips around the north west of England. They catch everything from Dace to Carp and have some brilliant images of the river Dee in the gallery. This site captures the true spirit of blogging and we can see why Danny’s blog has had over 67,000 views

And here is a link to the page on their website where you can view all the other blogs represented in the March 2013 list: http://www.anglinggazette.co.uk/the-best-10-angling-blogs-weve-read-this-month-march-2013/

I would also like the thank the people who run the Twitter account at Angling Gazette for their promotion of all Amateur Blogs as they regularly Retweet blog update Tweets from the many blogs on the internet and I would like to say a big thank you too them for taking the time to do this.

Chester Zoo Trip 2013

Chester Zoo is a place I have visited every year of my life, even as a kid it was a once a year trip during the summer holidays to this place.  It was a place that allowed me to see the all the animals I was watching on David Attenborough’s Wildlife on One in the flesh and has always been a place that has captured my imagination and still continues to do so.  

As many of you will know last Wednesday last week was budget day and it was also a strike day for many civil servants across the country.  Many of the long term followers of the blog will remember I went fishing on the one a year or so back but this year with a family your plans and thinking change and a day off from work that coincided with my partners day free day was only going to mean one thing in my eyes and that was a family day out to Chester zoo.  At this time of year you miss the hustle and bustle that goes with the summer trips where you can barely move and spend any amount of time looking at the animals before feeling you are ruining someone else view or taking too much time.  At this time of year most of the animals are out and about and it is quiet enough for you to spend a decent amount of time looking at the animals in peace.  This year has been a extraordinary year at the zoo with so many babies being born with the Rhinos, elephants and giraffes being the main attractions.

Here are a few of the pictures we took on the day.

One thing I love about Chester Zoo is how they reinvest the money back into to Zoo, each year there is something new opening and it is always great to see how they also put money back into conservation of endangered species both in captive breeding programmes and in the wild, a truly remarkable place to visit and one I hold many fond memories of and highly recommend.

Dyfi Osprey Project

Towards the end of last year a good friend of mine in work opened my eyes to the magnificent world of the Dyfi osprey Project and its pair of breeding Ospreys, Monty and Nora.  When I was introduced to this Facebook page last year it was coming towards the end of their breeding cycle and the birds and their young were just about ready to migrate back to Africa but those last few weeks I spent watching the lives of these magnificent birds stole a place in my heart and from the moment they migrated I longed for their return and I am pleased to say they are due back any time soon and I cannot wait to experience a whole breeding season with this lovely birds.

If you are on Facebook you can keep up with this project on the following link:

http://www.facebook.com/dyfiospreyproject/photos_stream

They also have a website here: http://dyfiospreyproject.com/

I hope you will enjoy checking out my new found friends and get as much enjoyment from this as I will this year.

Nottingham University Peregrine Falcons

Again introduced to me by the same good friend in work and this one is a new one this year for me and is a webcam set up by Nottingham University to watch a pair of falcons that call the rooftops of this university home.  This, as I said, is a new one for me this season and I am really looking forward to having an insight into the nest of what is in my eyes the greatest of all birds of prey.

Here is a link to the site: http://www.ntu.ac.uk/ecoweb/biodiversity/falcons/index.html

Falconry in the blood

As you can probably tell I hold a special place for birds of prey and I was fortunate enough to have been bought a falconry experience day by my mum and dad for my 21^st birthday.  I was really apprehensive about the day but it really was a special day and I couldn’t thank my mum and dad enough for their thoughtful gift.  I went to Cheshire Falconry for this day experience and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it.  If getting close to these birds or even flying them is something you think you would like to do then I really recommend this place.

Here is a link to their site: http://www.cheshirefalconry.com/falconry_taster.htm?gclid=CN_YmrGFo7YCFcHHtAodRjAAEA

Any that is that for this week’s update I am sorry it wasn’t the normal update I write but it is an update I have wanted to cover for some time now and this gap in the fishing gave me a little gap to put this together I hoped you liked it and I hope if you are out on the bank this weekend then it’s a huge

Tight lines

danny