Top Stick Float Tips, River Season Hopes and Reflections..

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you well and your nets wet.  Planning for the written blog is going well, i find myself on my dinner hour again putting together this written blog and so far so good, i am half way through the first paragraph and writers block has not set in yet. There is time.

So i thought it would be good in this blog update to have a look at my hopes and ambitions for the upcoming river season and at the same time a bit of reflection on the 3 month closed season.  What went well and what i could have maybe done better.  The blog update finishes with a session in search of tench, a species its been far too long since it featured on my blog.

Top 5 Stick Float Tips...

So this week the second video in the midweek vlog series went live on the youtube channel.  I had received a question in around my tips for stick float fishing for someone new to the rivers and as its my main type of fishing i thought i would devote on midweek blog to some basic river tips.  Stick float, rod and line choices feature as does some tips on plumming up the depth and some basic watercraft at the end.

If you read this blog and like the river fishing but are a bit daunted by the thought of fishing a river then give this midweek vlog a watch and get yourself out on the bank, you will not regret it.

A Closed Season With Cheshire Particle Hemp Oil..

So here we are at the end of our three month exile from running waters and the freedom and tranquillity they bring.  I am far from anti social but at the same time i can only take so much shouting and "banter" when i am fishing and i have to say thet my listening to "banter with mates on the bank" from the anglers around me is just teetering on the edge of madness.  That said though i have had to endure far worse closed seasons with regards dealing with idiots on the bank and this season they do only seem to have arose on the commercial scene.

"Cheshire Particle Hemp Oil The Find Of The Summer"

With the closing of the river season I normally move over to the canals for my fishing but as you have all read and witnessed on the youtube blogs fising has led me down a different path this closed season.  The finding of my Drennan Puddle Chucker and my unexpected thirst for wanting to get to grips with commercial fishing has seen my canal fishing plans fall by the side.

This diversion onto commercials and method feeder fishing has seen my use of hemp seed in my fishing go with it too but what this change did do is highlight to me the fantastic Cheshire Particle Product that is Cheshire Particle Hemp Oil.  When this oil is added to their fantastic hemp seed before a session it can be hard to judge how much impact the hemp oil is having, this last 3 months has shown me just how much fish pulling power this oil has.

Added the oil to my pellets after they have been prepared ready for the method feeder has provided me with a pungent heady hemp based pellet mix that when tested in the margins leaked for well over 50 minutes off one small nugget of pellet.  This fantastic addition to the pellets along with watercraft in placing the bait in the right place has seen me cross paths with some fantastic fish this spring and early summer.

Below just a handful of fish i have had the joy in sharing a few special moments on the bank side with..

In short this summer has shown me how good this hemp oil is on its own so when the season arrives for the rivers and its added to the fresh hemp seed Cheshire Particle are famous for it will be done with 100% confidence.  A little goes a long way and at just over 4 quid a bottle it will last you ages.

Grab a bottle here:https://cheshireparticle.com/collections/liquid-range/products/hemp-oil-250ml

The Season To Come...

The season is now literally days away and the reels are loaded with new line and the tackle box has been given a nice tidy up and organised.  The bag of hemp seed has been split down into pint session bags and i am all set for the season to come.

Early season will be all about getting back into the groove of river fishing with a few stick float sessions on the smaller rivers but this year i am alos going to try my best to devote time on the bank to targeting the barbel.  The barbel is a fish that has featured very sparsely on the blog and i have tried on one or two occasions to change that but not being really close to a barbel holding river it can make finding time very hard.

So barbel are certainly on the agenda for sure and i am also hoping as the season goes on to also delve deeper into a bait that i have never fished before in tares.  A lot of rivers i fish are abundant in roach so it would make sense for me to try and expand into this area to try and get the best from  the river i fish.

Fishing for me is all about learning and trying the develop my knowledge of all aspects of fishing so i can try and be the best anger i can be and along the way share that learning journey with yourselves through the blog.  This year has plenty of promise and i am excited to see what adventures lie along the way.

Summer is far from finished and i am hoping to also get out on the bank still for the tench and carp as i have really loved the adventures so far this year.  On that front a 20lb carp would be a lovely milestone to achieve and is at least a possibility now with the waters i am fishing, so that might happen any time which is exciting.

With regards content on the blog i don't think the blog has ever been so diversified with regards species and content as well as formats to follow it on.  I am hoping to introduce more live streaming on the blog on facebook so that's something else to look out for.

A Tench Session On The Tip....

All spring and summer i had spent time on the bank targeting carp on method feeder tactics and over that time i had began to notice a few things that worked with regards my baiting approach.  The hook bait aside for now and talking about the mix of pellets i had noticed that the micro pellets along brought bites but the addition of  4 mil pellets into this mix certainly brought the better carp onto the method.

Additives to the mix over this period have been stinky stuff sprays and Cheshire particle hemp seed oil and i have found both to be beneficial in attracting fish into the swim and are additives i certainly have confidence in when i cast them out.

The main feed sorted i now look to hook baits and one bait has been doing the business for me this season and it has been Bait Techs's the Juice dumbells.  What can i say about this bait other than it has caught me so many fish it is untrue.  It has caught me fish on commercials and natural waters.  So in these two paragraphs lays the trap i have been setting up till about two weeks ago for all my carp fishing.

A new card and a chance to try new waters and early on Saturday morning i found myself on the banks of a new club water.  Out went a method feeder and with it out went an approach i have so much confidence in.  The bait presented in an area i seen as a patrol route for fish and where they would feed confident in feeding i was out to play the waiting game and leave the feeder there until the tip pulled round on my drennan puddle chucker.

The sun creeping over the horizon to my right and its rays just starting to illuminate the bank behind me i sat listening to the early morning bird song.  A heron circling above out looking for its breakfast soon landed a few yards down the bank, good enough for him good enough for me.  A tap on the feeder alerted me to something in the area and over excited i went to grab the rod.  It can be hard to sit on your hands with this but you really have to wait for that wrap round.

Eventually it came and lifting the rod i was instantly locked into a battle of wills as a fish made hard for the reeds.  Persistent pressure soon turned the fish that by now knew it was in trouble and made for the lillies.  At a fair distance it was a tough battle but soon the power in the puddle chucker brought the fish into open water and then i knew, baring a hook pull, a fish would soon be on the bank.

Played out nicely a lovely tench was soon posing for the camera.

The fish returned i was straight back out and knowing how fast the bite had come i was optimistic of more.  A passer by stopped by for a chat and he was lovely to speak to and was intrigued by how the method feeder works.  The mechanics explained the wrap round on the tip soon showed him the results and what a fish to show someone how good a method feeder can be as though us both laughing at the battle this fish gave me as it went hard for any dark snags it could find.

A had said moments earlier if i hit a carp it would be interesting and so it proved as one hell of a tussle was played out in front of us both.  A lovely dark common carp of 9lb was my prize.

It was a fantastic start to my first session on here and i was pleased my confidence in my set up had come through.  Confidence in angling is huge i feel, it means you leave the bait longer in the good spots you find and you know that time is the only deciding factor in getting a bite.  The time it takes a fish to find your trap.

Over the next few hours a few more tench and bream fell for the trap set, check out the video below for the full story and the end of this adventure.

Till next time,

Tight lines

Danny

Fishing Republic Theseus Carp Cradle and Weigh Sling Review....

Hello and and welcome to this product review of the Theseus Carp Cradle and Carp weigh sling currently on sale from Fishing Republic.   These products where sent to me a few weeks ago for me to use and review on the blog.  After extensive period of use across many different types of fishing please find the review below of both products and a review video i have posted on the blogs you tube channel.

Youtube video review:

Theseus Carp Cradle and Carp Sling Review..

Product info:
Name: Theseus Carp Cradle
Dimensions: 115cm long x 55cm Wide x 26cm high
Link to Product: THESEUS CARP CRADLE LINK
Price: £25.00


Product Info:
Name: Theseus Carp Sling
Dimensions: 125cm Long x 60cm Deep x 45cm Wide
Link to product: THESEUS CARP SLING LINK
Price £25.00


Review

The Carp Cradle -

When the carp cradle first dropped on my doorstep and i opened it up i was genuinely shocked at two aspects of this product from the outset, one was how light the carp cradle was and two i was really impressed with how neatly it was all packed away.  My expectations all week had been for a large heavy and quite bulky product.

The actual cradle comes in two parts, a padded base and then the cradle with a mesh bottom and both fold in half and are held securely in place by two straps at either end which wrap completely round both produces when placed side by side to hold them securely.  I will go more into this feature later as this i found hugely beneficial when transporting both products together.

The water i chose to put this item through its paces was a local pool with a good head of small carp and a few bigger originals into double figures.  This pool i had fished for the past few years and i had used a small cheap unhooking mat during that time and i had found it really difficult from a blogging point of view to "process" the carp from catching them to unhooking them and then keeping them under control on a slippery mat with no side. at times it certainly made for a frustrating experience.

"From a Blogging point of View the Cradle has been a God send"

The biggest compliment i can pay this product is how it has revolutionised my experience on the bank fishing for carp and blogging.  The fact the fish can be placed inside this padded cradle and i feel confident the fish can come to no harm encased inside its sides.  The fish has plenty of space to move and the well padded bottom and sides ensure no damage to the fish.  As a blogger it makes the process of unhooking the fish and holding it up for a photo a very smooth process.

As regular blog readers will know i am not a angler who is going to catch a 20 to 30lb carp any time soon but i wanted to also show how this sling can be used in other ways and with that i went down the road of using it as a piece of apparatus that has its uses in match fishing.  On a recent session on Cheshire Fishery i knew i was in for a decent net of carp so i brought the cradle along for the final net shots to show the catch.

"My fishing might not see me put a 6olb carp in the cradle so i filled it with 60lb of carp"

Again from a blogging point of view this kit came up trumps again for me.  Many times when i have large nets and a good days fishing i can find dealing with the net at the end very hard work and the true scale of how good a session i have had can be hard to capture.  On this session i had over 60lb of carp and the cradle and the sling made light but quick work of the final nets.

The matt had more than enough room to fit all the carp and its high sides and fish friendly material ensured no damage to the carp when i took this quick photo.  This certainly could have benefits for those anglers looking for good shots at the end of their commercial fishing sessions.

The final good point i found with this kit was the material it was made from.  We all get it in the ear when our kit comes home smelling of fishing but this material meant a quick trip to the hose in the garden when i got home and it was easily cleaned and did dry quite quickly.

The Carp Sling -

This piece of kit i feel completes the package and I do feel to get the most out of them you do require them both.  The sling fits perfectly into the cradle so when i had a fish i knew i wanted to weigh the sling sat nicely over the edges of the cradle and the recess in the middle was created for the carp to sit in the middle.

The material inside the sling felt of a high quality and the mixture of mesh and material with holes in ensured the water drained quickly when you wanted to weight the fish and also the holes and mesh meant that water could completely fill the sling and allow a flow of water through the sling when it was submerged with the fish in the margin.

"With Plenty of Holes and mesh it allowed for the free movement of water through the sling for resting the fish"

A complete wrap round zip ensured the fish could not escape and although i never night fish so did not ever need the rest a fish in the sling for any amount of time to get pictures i did testing and the floatation tops on the sling ensured the sling held in place.  A huge amount of space in the compartment to hold any size fish you are likely to encounter i tested the sling with weights up to 60lb and straps coped with it easily.

Again as a package the sling slides in between the base of the cradle and the cradle to make the package easy to carp and transport to the bank.  I like to be mobile when fishing and these two going together so easily made it easy to move around swims and never felt like i was over burdened and not wanting to move with a view of the gear being a problem.

Final thoughts

All in all two products that really surprised me, i am not going to lie it presented some real challenges to incorporate it into my fishing but with a little thought and imagination i found products that dovetailed nicely and will certainly be a piece of kit that will feature in many more of my photos and sessions for both carp and pike.  Being a blogger i saw huge benefits in me dealing with fish on the bank and having more control of the fish when on the Matt, the camera set pics where obtained or video pieces recorded in quick time.  One bloggers life made a lot easier, now to catch a carp to fill them both :-)

Check out the video review for more info.

Roach Pole Fishing and Autumnal Carp Hunt..

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you all well and your nets wet.  Writing this angling blog over the last few years has been such an enjoyable experience, going fishing then sharing my adventures on this format.  Finding the words to say without sounding repetitive is a constant challenge but i think over the years i have managed to keep it all both interesting and varied.  I just wanted to say a huge thank you to all the people who have ever taken the time to read the blog and a special thank you to the ones who religiously come back to keep up with the adventures.

This weeks blog see's the pike blog go live and with it a few videos to kick start the Youtube channel and i will cover a little bit on why i write the blog the way i do as it has been a subject that comes up quite a bit in the comments and on websites.  The fishing is a session for roach, cant have too much of a good thing right? And then a chase for an autumnal carp to end the season on.

Lets get into the update....

Pike Blog 2016/17 Goes Live....

As you can see form the top bar of the blog the Pike Diary 2016/17 is now live to view.  It will again run in a rolling format reading top to bottom with new trips added as it goes down.  Its a format i have found works well in previous years and with the odd video log added in it will also act as a kind of archive and play list location for these videos.

link to Pike Diary: http://satonmyperch.blogspot.co.uk/p/pike-diary-201617.html

I know the writing is not for everybody so i have set up a Playlist on the Youtube page so if you just want to follow the VLogs then you can watch them all on the play list or subscribe and they will fall into your subscription box as and when each goes live.

I have set up a spreadsheet for this years piking so i know exactly what trips i have done on, what i have caught and what trips i have video logged and uploaded.  This should mean the pike diary this year will certainly be a lot more structured in the updates.  I am thinking of weekly updates on a Friday night and trying to include a video every 2 weeks.

There is currently 3 sessions live now on the youtube page and i have done this to kick start the channel, get a bit of content on there and then settle into a structured format.  Lets just see where this new part of the blog takes us and if it is feasible to continue both given amount of time and effort it takes, especially if vlog lengths increase.

For those looking to subscribe a link to the Channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/feed/subscriptions

Lets Talk Locations and Secret Squirrel Blogs....

So this week i have again been defending my stance on not sharing my locations i am fishing and again been met with accusations that i just write my blog to show off and believe it or not "make money".  I can assure you there is no money to be made in blogspot for writing an angling blog so we can clear that one up right away.

Locations i fish, i do not share them for a number of reasons and i will cover them now.  The first reason i dont share exact locations on my coarse and pike fishing is fish safety, i believe the Internet is the prime area for people poaching our waters to find the good places to go and catch fish for the pot.  I have no problem in people sharing the locations of when they have fished a commercial or a syndicate water as these waters are well protected and it is in the interest of the owners to keep it that way, its their lively hood.

As you will see looking back over the last few years of blogs i am an angler that tends to avoid the popular spots and the places where its like a circus of anglers and prefer to fish the canals, lakes and rivers getting right out of the way.  As such i do fish waters where i see evidence of this poaching and fish being taken, a few years back i witnessed the decimation of the pike stocks on the Dee and right there and then i promised myself my blog would never be the source of this disgraceful act.

Sights like this now are rare on the dee:

We then move over to actual time and effort i put in, i put a huge amount of time and effort into my fishing and subscribe to the moto "fail to prepare, prepare to fail".  If you are willing to put the time into you fishing then you will get the results and this blog proves that, how long is it since i wrote a blog on coarse fishing and blanked?

Roach fishing is a common blog of late on both the rivers and a huge canal that's 22ft deep in places, the blogs show the final result, methods used and a recap on the session but what it doesn't show is the week i went without a dinner hour in work looking on google earth for accessible water and places to park the car, the trip then to the bank at 6am on a Sunday morning to see if any fished topped to give the location and in some cases even the presence of fish.  Then comes the risk and sacrifice, do you not go a water you know you can catch this time of year on in favour of possibly walking a few fields with your gear to blank?  The inner angler in me is an explorer and always want to chase that new adventure.

A swim there somewhere

Maybe with these vlogs i might look for a water and vlog the amount of effort i put into it and have that water as just one water that when its location gets out its done and dusted but it will show the amount of effort i put in.  why should i then just from someone putting a comment on facebook saying "where" give all that effort away to someone who can not even be bothered to say nice net, well done just a "where".  They then proceed to call you all the names under the sun when you don't share it.

Rant over ha ha its been a while and i am still waiting for this person to post their net up as they where adamant my help was not needed and they could use their own water craft and match my nets....i feel i may never see the fruits of their Internet fishing labour....

i feel liberated now lets get into the fishing...

Roach On The Pole...Never Too Much of a Good Thing...

This new area certainly has produced the good the passed few weeks with mid teen nets and a 28lb net for me last week.  When you suss a venue like this the challenge for me then comes in trying to get the best i can out of the venue.  The first week i fished castor on the hook and did not really get a better stamp of fish for my efforts than my uncle on maggot,  I fed little ground bait on this session and did feed heavy on the hemp.   Last week i decided to try and get the bream so i went heavy on the ground bait but i packed the ground bait full of maggot, hemp and micro pellets.

This week i toyed with the idea of again taking castor but decided on a different approach.  I decided to mix up a greater amount of ground bait adding a full kilo of Van Den Enyde Roach to the bucket and riddling before ten adding to it around 3 pints of mole hill soil.  It gave me a lovely fine but heavy mix containing the attraction of the smell of the ground bait but with the fact that at least half of the mix in the moil hill soil was neutral, e.g contains no feed content at all but would add colour.

The mix ready it was time to answer the call of nature and what a view i was met with as i walked the bank, a beautiful morning to be on the bank.

Back to the peg i set up the gear while the ground bait settled, i added a small amount of maggot to the mix as i hoped to attract the roach in with smell but them find my bait quickly.  This week we had moved down stream slightly and was in a new swim.  I got to work with the depth plummet and found the same depth as i had last week on a general slope but it was five sections of pole out and not the three i had fished the previous week.

My uncle had come with a altogether different approach as he decided to fish the whip to hand.  Madly enough we fished around 10 yards apart on this session and it took me right back to when i was a kid on the canal watching him fish the little whip snatcher to hand as so many of my early trips with my dad where on such a pole.

The session started off and i fed three balls of ground bait into the swim, it being a new area i didn't want to ruin it before i started.  My uncles fishing closer in was feeding sloppy ground bait with maggot on the hook.  He was soon into fish which was great to see in the new area.  My swim was really quiet though as i waited it out, my float was set a floats depth over depth to hopefully pick up a bream but for the first part it seemed like i would be lucky to get a bite.

I made a slight change and came up a float depth so i was literally dead depth bit the bottom on the venue and straight away i was into razor blade roach. It really is amazing how much a small change like that can make, from no bites all to literally a bite a chuck!

For the first part of the session the fish where quite small in size but every so often a better fish would show its head.  I was soon into a rhythm of catching roach steady and i was keeping to a set routine of feeding three big balls every 30 minutes and i was feeding a little top up ball every 15 minutes in between like the one shown below.

Keeping the feeding accurate on the spot the fish kept coming and form thinking i would be lucky to get a bite i was soon moving into the afternoon thinking i had into double figures in the onion sack.  My uncle catching steady on the whip was madly enough 10 feet away also bagging up, huge amount of fish in the swims.

As the afternoon wore on and the feed built up my average stamp of roach grew in size and i would say most put ins i was coming back with a roach around 4oz and knowing how the weights last week had come around due to average size and numbers of fish i was confident of a ok net.  My uncle was knee deep in fish and was also getting the odd better roach and a lovely bream around 3lb mark, the challenge now is to work out how to get the shoal in to feed.

As the afternoon wore on towards packing in we had both had a cracking days sport and it was noticeable this week that the fish had kept in the swims all session.  Previous weeks i was adding a section of pole here and moving closer in there, feeding two lines etc etc to keep fish coming but today the fish where in the swim and hard on the feed.

I think this was sheerly down to the drop in temperature this past week and the fish have really sensed it and got their heads down on the feed. We have a new venue to try next week but i am sure as the weeks tick on the fishing will go from strength to strength here as the cold kicks in and the fish come hard on the feed.  I am sure the bream will start to show in more numbers and i am sure this venue has a surprise or two in store for us.

We finished up with two fantastic nets both we agreed where over the 20lb mark and we left made up

my net

uncles net

The Hunt For Autumnal Gold.....

So a week or so back i set off on a little adventure to try and catch one more double figure carp to finish of the season. The water in question holds a lot of singles a sprinkling of low and upper doubles and of course the rumored "twenty pounder".  It was one of these mid to upper doubles i was targeting to end my season.

Arriving at the water there was no signs of fish on the top so i went with my trusty micro pellets and corn approach with an added liberal spray of Stinky Stuff Crayfish.  The swim soon was a jacuzzi of bubbles with a number of carp in the swim on the feed and in no time i had a few single figure carp on the bank as the delkims danced a merry carp tune on a regular basis.

As the sun came over the water and finally began its decent leaving only a mottled light through the brown and orange leaves i spotted a few nice fish up on the top, they where all nice fish and all in the target bracket.  The long summer of being caught had took its toll on these fish and they where in the area full of snags with deep undercut banks and tree roots providing ample areas to relieve themselves of my hook.

A crust of bread was my approach and there was no feeding up to be done here i was hoping to catch the group of guard with one morsel of bread cast in their patrol route.  The first fish came up and turned away, a nice common as well, the next two swam ignorantly under the free offering......"mud pigs?" slurping up anything they can find? not exactly fitting that profile here.

At the end of the group appeared a dark shadow and like as if laser guided it came straight up and took the bait.  Instantly my line went tight and the rod hooped over and in seconds all was solid.  The line whistling in the wind and that awful feeling of line grating against a snag.  Braid was great for floating on the water but i knew its abrasion qualities where not as great.

A change of angle and i felt a kick, i was still attached, i let all go slack for a second and used the oldest trick in the book to wait for the fish to think it was away and swim out of the snag.  A good minute i waited before he line headed out into the middle and the fight continued.  I had the advantage now though as lunges for the same snag where prevented and eventually i slipped the net under her golden autumnal flanks.

A perfect end to a perfect summers carp fishing...

Till next time

tight lines

Danny

First Barbel Trip, Canal Roach and The Hiden Jewel of the Lake!!

A warm welcome to this weeks blog update i hope i find you all well and your nets wet.  The weather has finally turned and we have gone from flooded banks with minimal options to a take your pick type situation with all rivers in fine fettle.   Again we are still in a back log situation with the blog, not helped by me getting out three times this weekend.  Last weeks blog format was well received with it being all about the fishing and with very little to talk about in the angling world for an introduction i reckon the same approach is worth another go.

This weeks blog update see's me hitting the bank for my first ever session just aimed at catching barbel,  we then jump into a pole session on the canal in a swim with plenty of features and we finish it off with a bumper session for carp where believe it or not i catch my 50th carp of the season (still shake my head as i type that as i can not believe i have actually caught some carp on this blog lol) in a session where it certainly was quality rather than quantity.

Sit back, grab a brew and a chocky biscuit, its what i do when i read blogs and lets get right into this update...

First Barbel Session.....

At the start of the week i had decided  to get my act together with the barbel fishing and as with all aspects of fishing preparation is the key.  I knew evenings would be the best time for a bite but i also knew that such a session was never going to happen after work as it stood right now as i had no hemp seed prepared and no meat hook baits prepared either.

There was always the option to go to the tackle shop and just buy loads of tins of hemp seed and pre prepared luncheon meat but come on have you seen the price of these products?? Yes they are convenient and i wont argue in the fact the missus wont kill you for using her best pan to cook your hemp or for turning the house air green with the smell of boiling hemp, but, when you do the sums you realise just how much money money is added to the price of the raw product of hemp seed when you buy it in this form.  Maybe I'm just tight but doing the sums a 20kg bag saves you at least the price of a new fishing rod and on the odd occasion i have bought a tin of hemp i found these tins don't even contain a pint of hemp!  Well in a blog with no introduction we snook a rant in somewhere ha-ha.

So with the hemp cooked in 2 pint bags and the luncheon meat happily marinating in my spicy mix it was a simple case of getting the bait out of the freezer before work so i could hit the bank right away that evening.  A quick check on the EA levels at 4pm showed the river dropping and about foot max above summer levels, this was at 2pm on my break.  I rushed home at 4pm grabbed the gear and then fought my way through rush hour traffic finally arriving on the river banks at around 5.15pm.

Opening the farmers gate i could see the river, odd i thought as you can not normally see her till a little more along the field.  Getting closer i could see she was well up and very very coloured.  I walked the banks to find most of the swims unfishable due to the bottom of the peg being submerged.  The only bit of the stretch that was fishable was the peg i fished the opening week on the stick float where the risen bank i was stood on had created a slack on the inside.  Down the middle it was bombing through with all types of stuff coming down.

I fed the inside heavy with hemp seed trying my best to judge the flow so the hemp was staying in the swim and nog getting washed away.  I set my stall and in went a big pieces of smelly meat.  Sat back well up the bank i was fishing my first ever barbel session on a rising river and although the text books say this is the best conditions, for me, it was a baptism of fire and i was using all my watercraft to try and read a river rising fast, i felt i was in the right spot.  If i was going to get one it would be here.

Bot long after casting in i began to get a few taps on the rod tip, then a few more and the excitement levers rose, i was at least in a spot where fish where holding.  The taps continued until the tip tap round and remained round, i stuck and there was a fish on!! in the flow it felt ok but soon up came a slimy slippery eel!  Not the species i was after but the blank was saved and i felt i was in the right area.

The next few hours i really questioned my sanity as zero taps on the rod and the sight of whole trees coming down the river really did have me thinking of packing in and calling it a wasted trip. A stick in the water was my marker and the river had fully submerged this as was the rise.  9pm and the flow on the river seemed to change and settle and the streams of rubbish had stopped coming down.  Being a stick float angler i rarely see the river in this state so i imagine this was when the river hit its peak and leveled off.

Thew light levels began to go and calm was all around me, it felt right it felt bite time and as soon as i thought that the tip wolloped round, a bite like nothing else i had ever seen,  grabbing the rod i was bent into a fish that felt massive in the flow yet it went from one side to the next effortlessly before coming into the middle of the river and again making hard runs, i felt sure it was a barbel.  It certainly was not a chub,too strong.  Holding in the flow and the fight i felt getting into the middle stages the line come flying back at me as the hook pulled!!    Writing this now the feeling i felt then comes flooding back, i was gutted, i sat there and in short was amazed how the fish had gone on such hard runs but when seemingly under control in the middle of the river the hook pulled.  Fished on into dark but nothing came but the extra time saw me reflecting on the situation.

"my first ever barbel trip on a new river in flooded conditions and i had read the river, fed a swim and got a bite from a barbel.  Yes i was gutted but there where more positives than negatives to take form this session."

Early Morning Canal Session - Bridgewater Canal

A stifling day midweek in work and i decided to escape the beige brick wall i face in work and escape for an opportunistic hour lunch break.  A short drive and i was soon heading down a narrow road leading to a humpback bridge.  A tight turn and i was literally along side the canal looking at a swim that was to die for reeds lined the far bank and all along the length there was sunken trees and surface lillys.  It screamed fish but alas my destiny that day lay back at my desk dreaming of the swim i had just been eating my sandwiches in.

Saturday morning arrived and in the dark i loaded the car and made my way to the swim.  I loaded in my MAP TKS 101 2G pole with two top kits and bait for the day would be ground bait and red maggot.  As regular readers will know i follow a set routine with my canal sessions and the first thing to be done was mixing up the ground bait, this is my opinion, when prepared in the right way, is the key to success on the canal.

I fed the far line just off the cover heavy with two big balls of ground bait loaded with hemp and castor and introduced one ball on my near side line just over the inside shelf.  The inside line was good from the off with skimmers and small roach and perch coming regularly.  Whilst catching these fish i kept the odd pouch of maggots going over the far bank line.

This really is a game of patience on the canal and judgement as the longer you leave that far bank line before fishing it the better the fishing will be but you don't want to leave it too long that the boat traffic starts not long after feeding it.  I think the beauty of this far bank line is the face its settled with no disturbance and there is a bed of bait on the bottom for them to settle over.

With canal sessions i think you get the best results early morning so i get out of the mindset that i will be fishing all day, all my canal sessions are form first light till around 10 to 11am max, earlier if boat traffic is really really heavy.  Early on the inside line fished well but as bank side disturbance grew i knew the fish had backed off and it was time to go over to the far bank.

The far bank line was instantly a bite a chuck and it was not a surprise with it being so close to the cover.  Bites would come on the drop mainly but a better fish was always the result should the bait settle on the bottom, a caster session on this canal is well over due.

Keeping the bait going in saw fish coming regular to the net and at times some quality roach would nip in and these are of course the jewel in the crown for any canal angler.  The session was the relaxing session i had craved in the week, a polar opposite form the beige wall i stared at all week long in work.  A 12lb net was the end outcome of lovely silver fish.

As with all fishing we should leave the banks how we find them, foot prints, spilt bait and the depression from my basket the only sign the bank had been visited.

Doubles Doubles and the Hidden Jewel Of the Lake....

There was no escaping at this point that early morning quick sessions for carp where flowing through my veins.  The sessions where both fun and whats even better, cheap, some sessions costing as little as 35p for a loaf of bread.  The tackle costs where just as minimal with one packet of hooks still going strong with a few left from a pack of ten.

To this point i had been taking two rods with me with one on the bait alarm on the bottom and one on the top with bread, never fishing both at the same time, but alternating between the two.  As the sessions went on it soon became noticeable that fishing a bait on the bottom was just too easy.  I don't say that in a cocky way but once i had found a clear spot, near cover, i found the fish would come and come and come and it was getting a little silly.  I had broke my personal best and i felt that i could possibly break this again with one big fish spotted but i was at the stage where i didn't want to plough through runs to catch one fish i wanted to go for a few hours and have some fun.

That said i started just going with one rod, a net, a bucket with my loaf of bread and unhooking mat in and my licence of course.  Free lining bread on the surface was what i wanted to do and it was such fun.  On this session the morning was very dark and there was plenty of cloud cover as i arrived and i doubted whether i would get the carp up on top at all.  Had i bitten off more than i could chew in taking up this fun challenge.

A few free offerings put in the margins and some in open water i waited with bread in hand ready to make my first cast.  Time would tell if the fish would come up on top.  After what seemed an age....Slurp! and then another Slurp, it was like music to my ears.  The fish was taking right close top a big snag but it was taking the bread down well so i knew if it saw my offering i would have him.  Sure enough up he came and with such a gentle take the bread disappeared, line tightened and i was into my first carp, a nice small common to open my account.

This fish was fish 48 of the season for me and i was hoping for the morning to bring me over the 50 mark.  The carp released i could see a carp taking some bread right on the edges of my baited area.  Using braid certainly caught me this fish as this fish came and looked at the bread and moved on but being able to quickly lift and mend the line as it turned I'm sure the better presentation fooled it as it had a second look.

A 10lb 9oz Carp was the reward and what a reward a stunning double figure ghosite.

I had been drip feeding some bread under my feet for a while and the natural tow of the lake was taking the bread over to the far bank just off a overhanging tree.  To this day i don't know how on earth a damp free lined piece of bread one, managed to stay on the hook after the cast and two managed to land inches off the over hanging tree on the far side.

Land it did with an ever so inviting plop and no sooner had it landed than a huge set of rubber lips rolled on the bread and nailed it.  No strike was need as the rod was nearly pulled out of my hand in a run of pure power!  The line cut across the surface as the fish bolted for open water and keeping deep i was luck it did.  Had it headed for the big snag i would have been in all kinds of trouble.

The rod hooped over it was a fantastic fight that i enjoyed, i don't think i would have been so relaxed had it been my PB a few weeks earlier, now i had a few doubles under my belt i was enjoying the battles more and there where little nerves.  Sliding the net under the fish i peered in and she was a nice common carp.  On the mat peeling back the mesh revealed a stunning fish and i mean stunning she was fin perfect.  Her mouth was clean and her scales immaculate, lifting her dorsal fin revealed, well i will let the pictures below do the talking.

14lb 8oz of pristine common carp, what a fish to bring up the 50!

The fish admired and returned safely back to the water i had a quick coffee break and while i did i fed under my feet again.  All this bread going in i had acquired myself a little pet carp under my feet, i don't think she knew i knew she was there, but i did.  She was there taking the odd piece of bread thinking she was getting one over on me and i hadn't seen her, unfortunately i had.  It was time to cash her in.

Coffee drank i stopped feeding bread for a few minutes  allowing her to mop up the bits as they went passed.  The next one down was the one with my hook in and good as gold she came out of the bank side reed cover and took the bait.  Now bear in mind i had seen this fish quite a bit taking bread but what i had not realised was she was quite a bit carp.  In fact she was one of the better specimens in the lake and she made me know it with a bruising encounter all under the rod tip.

Sliding her into the net i felt like my arm was going to fall off, another common and my third double of the morning at 16lb 10oz.

Two smaller carp got in on the act after this fish and i had noticed when these whipper snappers move in its a sure sign the better fish have moved out.  A quick change of swim i dropped back into a swim close to the car and just before leaving a managed a final double of the morning in a 10lb 6oz mirror carp.

I left around 9am having caught a few fish and certainly had my string pulled.  Home in time for the family to be waking up and ready for a day ahead spent relaxing with the family.  My mind occasionally drifting back to the lake that morning and that magical 14lb pristine carp, the hidden jewel of the lake.

Till next time

tight lines

danny

Pike Ruins Play on River and New Purchases

A warm welcome to this weeks angling blog i hope i find you all well and your nets wet.  This week we left the month of June 2016 behind, officially the wettest June since records began, boy did us river men know it.  No doubt this weather has been fantastic for the anglers out there chasing the big barbel and chub but for anglers wanting to run  a stick float down the river in June its been a nightmare.

This weeks blog is  session on the river where we fishing a new area of river we hit the bank hoping to learn a little about this new area, an enjoyable session but ruined by an unwelcome visitor.  After the river session is another one of the short trips i did recently for carp.  These carp sessions have been well received and thank you to all who emailed me to say they enjoyed this diversity in the blog.

The introduction looks at some purchases i made last week when all the over time came good and my reasoning behind the purchases.  I have also made the decision to start reviewing the tackle i use form day to day.  I have done many reviews on the page for company's but i think it will be fun to write some reviews based on the tackle i use day in and day out.

on to the update

New Purchases - Overtime Comes Good....

As i mentioned a month or two ago i have been hoping to replace my obsolete pole and also pick up a new trotting rod.  The budget of £500 i knew was not the greatest but in all honestly i have no need to spend a fortune on a new pole given how much i use them.

First up was the pole and i had the choice to either spend the whole £500 on just a pole knowing i would prob get a pole slightly lighter and certainly with more top kits for my extra money but i would have to sacrifice a new float rod.  After looking through the Internet at all the reviews of numerous poles and more importantly taking into account when they where released i went with the MAP 101 2G 13m pole.

The main reason for this, apart from price, was the fact that this pole was only released in 2016 so i know i will have a good number of years where i will be able to get spares for this pole, my main problem with the one i have now is the fact i can not replace lost or broken sections.

The MAP 101 2G is an entry level pole and with that i knew i wasn't getting the best pole in the word but, for me, its all i need.  I fish the rivers most of the year and when not doing that i am normally piking.  I only really use a pole in the closed season where i fish the canal or this year a commercial.  I will go into more detail when i write a full review in upcoming blog but it comes with 2 power kits and a match kit so i will be purchasing one more match kit and then i am set for all the angling i do with two top kits for each.

I enquired at the tackle shop if they price matched and they said they did although i don't think they where ready for the price match i had found on line, a whopping £50.00 quid off the RRP.  This extra cash gave me the scope to go from the bottom end of the pole market to purchasing a creme De la creme of stick float rods in the 14ft Drennan Acolyte Plus float rod.

from the first moment i held this rod in a tackle shop i just fell in love with it, so light and a lovely sort action.  Weighing in at 4 grams at 13ft and i think 5 grams at 14ft its feather light to hold and i can assure you having fished with this rod all day Saturday just gone its a beautiful rod so light you could trot with it for a week and not have your arm ache.  There are going to be some fun times ahead when i hit chub i can tell that but what a great piece of kit.

Two pieces of kit bought for just over £500 in the MAP 101 2G and the drennan Aculyte plus i think i did well to get them both for the price and am over the moon.  The pole i was out on the canal on Sunday using and as said above the rod i used Saturday.  The hours and hours of overtime where well worth it, house sorted and now a cracking addition to the fishing gear.

On to the Fishing..

Pike Ruins Second River Session On Stick

The second weekend pf the river season and finally it seemed like the river we wanted to get on would be at a fish able level.  As ling time readers of the blog will know we never really let our feet settle too long in one spot we love to find new areas, try and work them out and then move onto the next adventure.  A lot of time over the passed two years has been spent at the lower end of the river Dane but this year we have moved up into the middle reaches hoping to find better and ore consistent sport and also there is a good chance of me connecting with a barbel, a species i have wanted to target for a while now.

Heading off i again slimmed my gear right down to the bear essentials.  The octoplus infinity tackle box contained all i needed tackle wise and bait wise for the session ahead while my rods and bank sticks in the holdall and my nets in a net bag meant i was travelling as light as i could for a comfortable days fishing, or so i thought!

Assessing some of the swims i decided on fishing a nice glide leading down to a overhanging tree.  It looked fishy although not the comfortable peg i had hoped for and it soon became apparent on getting to water level i would be standing using the bait waiter.

Muddy under foot i knew i was in for an uncomfortable day but hey the passed few years we had been spoiled with the comfy fish on your basket swims.  This was back in at the deep end and that was no joke as literally off the end of that mud it was a good 4-5 feet deep!  Joking aside it was good to be back sliding down banks and making swims as we went, it really can be the beauty of fishing a river, the freedom and the feeling of that is a good spot i will make a peg there.

The good news was i got a sure footing and the first fish was not ling in coming, always a good sign

As i always say on these blogs, i love catching a dace early on, reason being is with dace where there is one there is most certainly more.  The swim an even depth all the way across i started out down the middle loose feeding maggots in front of me and hemp at around 2 oclock.  It soon became obvious there was a snag or some streamer weed right where i wanted to get my bites as the float would slide under and all would go solid before it would pull off.

With trotting its all about building a picture of the swim as you go, swims can change from session to session and seasons to season, over the first hour of the session you do begin to find a line you can fish where you avoid the snags and can get from point A to Point B in one go.  This might need you to hold back over rocks or even mean you fishing a line you never thought you would right close in but over time you do build that picture.  you also build a picture of how the fish are feeding on that session or "how they want it" and that can be the difference some times between catching and not catching.

Holding the bait back just on the hemp was killer on the day and soon chublets with gobs full of chub where coming.

The swim building nicely with fish coming thick and fast i has ideas of a fantastic days fishing.  Getting into a bagging up rhythm of cast in feed maggot sprinkle hemp hold back, let go hold back let go and then strike.  This type of rhythm you soon start putting a weight in the keep net and all the time i was thinking about if those better chub where knocking about ready to move in.

The bites then died a little and i thought here we go.  A change over to corn to see if i could pick up a better fish but alas a float that had been zooming under time and time again was trundling through untouched.  Right down the swim i finally struck into a bite and up through the swim i reeled in a dace twisting and turning in the current.  All of a sudden form no where a flash of green and gold came from nowhere as a pike struck and missed its target.  One lucky dace in the net.

After this it was like the chains ad been released form the pike i next disturbed it in the margin down from my keep net as i think me moving spooked it, all i saw was a bloom of bottom come up.  10 minutes later with not a bite i saw another swirl at my keep net and it was clear this pike was not giving up.  Sods law i left my pike rod at home as that is one down side of going light and splitting your gear you leave stuff.  I always carry a pike rod for this reason, catch the pike and move it on upstream away and you catch again.

This pike was to put it bluntly a right pain in the £$££ trotting away it would take around 20 mins get a bite and on two occasions this veracious pike claimed it as its meal.  I had him on twice but both times the line was bit through.  After the second attack i tied another hook link on and trotting away i could see him lying at the tail of my net.  I called it a day at this point as there was no way he was giving in and the whole swim was spooked.

It was a case of what could of been and next time the river is fish able i will be on the bank but this time armed with my pike rod for sure.  Packing away i was consoled by a very inquisitive heard of bullocks in the field opposite who seemed to stand and stare for an eternity.  Second trip back on the river and an optimistic back to raw river fishing induction, love it.

3 and half Hours Manic Carp Fishing...

By the time this carp session came round in the closed season it was safe to say the carp fishing bug had bit but i dont think it was actually the carp that was drawing me back more the exploration and fun of catching fish on a new water.  When a water gets under your skin it takes over with me and in this scenario i always want to keep on going to try and get the best i possibly can from that water.  In this case it was a case of the venue being so atmospheric and the fish being so much fun to catch.

I was keeping my tactics simple and i do think this is lost hugely in modern carp fishing, its all very complex and in depth when in reality does it really have to be?  To this point and to be honest continuing at the way through i was fishing two rods, one on the top on crust and one on the bottom in a method feeder and corn with the addition of stinky stuff being the added attractant i wanted in the coloured water.

On these early morning sessions i would always start off by introducing some free offerings of bread in the margins and likely looking spots to see if the fish would come up.  The norm was then for you to hear a slurp long before you had even set up the landing net.  Like with the trotting above you soon build up a picture of a water and although you are not making a mind map of the bed of a river with carp fishing i feel like you tap into the day to day lives of the fish within the water.  you learn by how they take the bread if they are having it proper or not and you learn things like how the better fish seemed to go around together so if 3lb carp where slurping up the bread you knew it was a good idea to move.

In the first swim a few fish come up erratically taking the bread swirling as they took, cagey and on edge i knew these would be hard to hook.  There was one fish though coming up slowly taking the whole crust of bread confidently, she was right at the back of the group and i knew if i could get a bait on her line she would be a nice fish to start.  A peach of a cast and rod in hand i was not at all prepared when the line shot across the surface and the rod hooped round.  Making a hard run for the snags i was in trouble from the off, i kept the rod low and prayed and god knows how but she appeared right at my feet swimming right under all the trees, when your lucks in eh!  On the mat a nice 11lb mirror carp.

Taking pictures i could hear the carp behind me slurping down the remaining bread so out went a few more freebies to keep them occupied.  Mainly smaller carp,again swirling at the bread i noticed a fish right in the margin under my feet taking bread confidently and it looked a double.  In complete contrast to the first long distance cast this was a stay well back from the water and placing the bread right on the edge of the Lillie's.  The crayfish stinky stuff colouring the water around the bread it was not long before the carp came out of the Lillie's and seconds after returning one carp i was into another fighting double.  Arriving at 4.30am it was not even 5am and two doubles had graced the net i was buzzing, 3 weeks earlier both would have been a new PB!

This early success was a fantastic start but i was learning on here the smaller carp do move as a shoal and before i knew it 3 smaller carp to 8lb had bullied their way in. Madness as 3 weeks ago they would have tickled my pb and i would have been really excited.

A move was in order and i decided to try and target the bigger fish.  In went a few crusts of bread laced with the crayfish stinky stuff and i sat back and waited for the carp to find the free floating banquet.  Soon enough the swirls started and excitement levels increased as i realised these where proper carp feeding well.

I noticed if the bait was presented tight to an overhanging far bank bush and left to drift down to the waiting fish i soon was getting bites.  Getting the cast right would result in a chance of a fish but hooking up was proving the issue.  A slight refinement in the placement of the surface float turned chances into fish.  Over the next 2o minutes i picked up two more commons both doubles at 11lb and 14lb respectively.

A morning of doubles and leaving a happy angler i tipped my hat to an angler just arriving on the pool, my thoughts where of how much action he had missed and was baffled by his comments of how bad the water was fishing!  Agreeing a headed off on my way...

Till next week

tight lines

Danny