Big Bags of Dace on River Dee To End River Seaon

A warm welcome to this week’s blog update and I start with a huge thank you to all the people who gave last week’s product review post such great feedback, from Re-tweets on Twitter to some nice emails sent to the blogs email address, thank you all so much it really means a lot to receive feedback from regular readers of this blog.

What the future holds with regards more product reviews will be down to the companies involved but if nothing comes from this little venture I thoroughly enjoyed writing last week’s blog and any side ventures like this are always there as a luxury or little bonus for all the hard work I put into writing this blog.

This week’s trip to the bank was the last one of the River for us and I thought it would be good in this week’s introduction to look back over the last river season.  I set myself a target this season of having sessions purposely dedicated to targeting pike and I think I did quite well on this front considering the river was rarely at a steady level for more than a week at a time.  The sessions where I did get out for pike and targeted then I did have a few fish to double figures and the season really culminated for me in that pike in the snow.

Trotting is always my passion on the rivers and with the river being flooded for so many weeks it was always going to take pole position once the river dropped to a near normal level and hence the last few weeks of the season the pike fishing took a bit of a back seat towards the end of the season, had the winter not been so wet my plan was to get my fix of dace fishing out of the way in preparation of targeting the pike in February and march when the fish are fattening up in preparation for spawning, this just serves as a reminder that we can make the best of plans but we are ultimately in the hands of mother nature and the end of the day.

A Positive to take from this season, a season I think we did well to get in so much fishing, was us discovering pastures new in our few trips to the River Ribble, a destination that will live long in the memory with the capture by my uncle of that massive 1lb 3oz dace.  This river really captured both mine and my uncle’s interest after our first session it was hard fishing and we worked for every bite but boy was it exciting and a breath of fresh air from the sometimes predictable nets of dace on the River Dee and there will certainly be more of this river to come next season. 

The fish of the season for me would have to be the perch in the snow from the River Dee, just the day itself with the capture of that perch and the two pike on the way home just topped that session off for me but that perch will live long in the memory for myself and has opened up a whole new avenue of exploration for next winter as I really fancy a session dedicated to targeting these tenacious sergeants.

The next three months are always a time I look forward to being on the bank as I love seeing the world around me wake up from its winter slumber and I also can’t wait to welcome our feathered summer visitors back to our shores in the coming months not to mention the return of those long warm evenings after work as the evenings lengthen chasing tench and carp.  I think there is one thing I want to reintroduce into my fishing this year and that is fun, over the past year I feel I have been in an intense frame of mind on the bank, eager to learn new methods and techniques and develop them to a standard I am happy with and I think this year it’s time to get back to the real reason I fell in love with fishing and that’s the fun and excitement of being on the bank so I can see me mixing it up a bit in the coming months on the bank, maybe blow the cobwebs off my centre-pin and have some fun with that or spend some time targeting carp off the top like I used to do as a kid.  My mind really does go into over time thinking about ideas of what I can do, I just hope mother nature is on my side this year.

Tight lines to all if you either changing over from winter to summer fishing or just blowing the dust of your rods from last summer’s campaign, tight lines and the best of fishes for the coming months, I am off to watch a fish for all seasons by Martin Bowler, a great way to get into spring mode, before writing the rest of this update tomorrow.

On to this week’s adventure:-

The end of the river season? Surely not!!

The end of a gruelling river season had arrived and with it our last chance to trot a float on running water for 3 long months we had only one destination in mind and that was the River Dee, a destination we had spent far too little time on during the course of the year but one that now was in perfect condition for a decent bag of dace.

Fishing on Saturday was chalked off due to a family commitment but whilst enjoying the delights of a pint of lager me and my uncle studied how the river was looking and we both agreed she would be just about perfect when we planned to visit the next day.

The last weekend of the season mixed with how good the river was looking we decided to take no chances in not getting prime position so the alarm clock was set for a ridicules time; all I can say is it was a time that makes it very hard to convince doubters of our mental state of mind wrong! Either way effort this time would surely equal success, well at least we hoped.

Turning the penultimate bend before the stretch and the excitement of not knowing what pegs are free was tangible, would we get a decent peg or would we be left settling for a less fancied area?  I have learned from past disappointments not to let myself even think of fishing a certain peg but you never lose that feeling of knowing where you would like to be.

Creeping slowly round last endless corner I strained my neck slightly trying to make out the faint outlines of cars or bivvys on the bank but low and behold my full beam headlights revealed the whole stretch to be derelict, devoid, absent of anything resembling an angler, Result we thought as we parked up in the areas we wanted to fish.

The dusk till dawn lamp out it was time to get the gear unloaded on on the pegs ready for the session ahead and with a good amount of time till even the most enthusiastic of birds began to clear its throat we had plenty of time to make sure we were set up perfectly, this lamp really has saved us loads of time on the bank.

Anyone who reads my blog with any regularity will know my set up by now for trotting so I won’t go into it again apart from mentioning I decided to go with the 3 gram Dave Harell Bolo over a stick float.  I would say at this point I went with my 17ft rod to give it one final outing for a few months but I have plans to use this rod on a deep pond on the WAA card in the coming weeks.

The dawn began to break and it revealed the river to be in perfect condition, she was flat calm without a breath of wind and was carrying a few feet of water with a tinge of colour but not enough for us to be reaching for the feeder rod.  The conditions were far from ideal though as a icy chill had moved in the valley and with it a smattering a snow than would unfortunately be with us the whole day long

The first cast of the morning is always a special moment in branch of our sport but few branches of our sport is the first cast met with such instant results as the final shot had only just registered as the float zipped under and the first dace of the session graced the palm of my hand and what a pretty sight it was and I remember thinking to myself to make the most of every minute of this session.

The session was a cracker from the off and even the on off snow could not dampen my enthusiasm the fish were there and there in numbers and I was determined to learn from last week and be prepared for the midday lull when the tide came in.  The fish at first where like the one above around the 2-4oz mark and smaller but I wasn’t too bothered as that float was still going under and to me that was all that mattered.  I continued to drip feed the swim and the better fish settled in over my bait and it was during the early stages of the better fish moving I landed one of the most stunning dace I have ever caught, it really was fin perfect, scales like pearls and a fins that went from dark purple to clear at the tips it really was a pleasure to catch this dace.

The action continued to be consistent and the general standard was upheld with the odd splattering of “eyes” but by dinnertime I had no room to complain at all and was more than made up with my efforts.  It was not long after visiting my uncles peg around dinner time that the peg started to change, the bites where coming further and further down the peg and where all over the place instead of in the place I had been getting them all morning, something was aria and I knew exactly what it was, a pike.  Two or three dace came in the space of around half an hour as the peg ground to a halt and then it happened I struck and was met with solid resistance as a large fish swam upstream and held deep, there was that few moments where the pike just thinks its swimming off with its lunch but doesn’t quite know why it can’t move off as smoothly as it would like.

The battle went on for around 5 minutes and I eventually managed to get the fish up near the top and caught a glimpse of it and I estimate it to be around the 5lb mark and with one flip of its tail it made a lunge for the depths and with it my hook came flying back at me. I was more gutted about the fact it had covered my whole swim on its foray for freedom  than I was about losing a jack pike and I knew I was basically back at square one and would have to feed the swim back up again. 

The dace being temporarily moved out seemed to make room for some different species to move in and the first fish I connected with after the pike went was a nice grayling shown above. The grayling was a welcome and refreshing change to the precession of dace I had caught in the morning but unfortunately this grayling was the only diversion away from the dace for the rest of the day, not that I am complaining.

The swim began to again build slowly with smaller dace at first and then the better fish moved in but in all it took a long time for the bigger dace to build their confidence and move into the swim in any numbers.  My uncle fishing the peg just up form me had took a bit longer to get them going but was more than making up for lost time and was caught regular through the whole day on both his trotting line and under his feet.

We both continued to catch steady and was both still catching when we decided to call it a day at 3pm, it was always the plan to pack in at this time to get back for the football but I must admit had I known how close I was to 20lb I would have carried on for another 15 minutes.

It came to the time for us to see what we had caught, we both knew we had caught well and had a very good net and in my head I thought my uncle had piped me because he had caught so steady all day.

My uncle weighed in first and his net look colossal I was certain he had battered me on the scales as they went round to 16lb 9oz.

My turn and as I pulled my net out of the water I was shocked at the weight at what I had caught it was, for me, no matter what the weight a net I was going to be proud of.

The scales went round to an astonishing 19lb 10oz!! I must admit I had to check it again as it was a  new personal best net from this location and I was over the moon.

We both agreed we had given the season a good send off and we packed up and left happy it could not have gone any better and with that we said goodbye to the most majestic of rivers for another 3 months and vowed to return enthusiastic as ever in June, hungry to search out new locations and the summer dace shoals.

Till next time I wish you all tight lines

Danny

  

Short Evening Session and Really Greedy River Dee Pike

  This week whilst talking to a mate in work about pike on the Bridgewater canal the conversation got onto the fact that pike actually eat small baby ducklings, I have actually seen this happen a few times myself over the years whilst fishing the canal and if I remember rightly there was an article in the Angling Times last year about a young angler that was making his own home made lures for targeting pike in this way.

  As luck would have it a thread was posted on the maggot drowners forum including a video of this actually taking place, what amazes me is the size of the pike, the pike looks to be only a few pound.   I had always thought it was much larger pike that fed of this type of prey.  It also goes a long way to explaining why we see  large clutches of ducklings one day only to go back a few days later to find only half of them left yet we very rarely see baby ducklings dead in the canal.

More on those toothy critters to come later in the blog.......

Pike eating duckling video

 
  This week I took delivery of my new pole and the speed at which it was delivered took me by surprise, I ordered the pole from www.climaxtackle.com on my dinner hour on Thursday afternoon and was amazed to get a phone call from my Fiance on Friday to say a rather large package had been delivered.

  With a fishing trip one evening this coming week being penciled in for the commercial I decided to devote all Saturday to buying all the gear to elasticate my 4 top sections and setting them up.  Saturday morning saw us making a early trip down the M6 to Stapley Water Gardens stopping off at Cheerbrooks Farm for full English breakfast, highly recommended if your down that way!! A quick trip round Stapley and Daves of middlewich and I was all set to tackle to job of elasticating my top sections.

 With a lot of help from my Uncle we quickly elasticated both the top sections and the power sections.  I decided to put black hydro in both power tops and white and blue hydro in the match sections and I cant wait to try the power tops out this coming week on the commercial.

  On to this weeks fishing and Wednesday evening saw both me, my uncle and his mate from work all meeting up at 5pm for a evening session on Flushing meadows fishery I arrived there early and was already set up by the time the others arrived and was straight into a carp, a great start to the night!! but unfortunately the hook pulled and the first chance of the session was lost 1-0 to the carp.

  Not to be disheartened it was back in over my small pot of bait, I was very optimistic as there was so much activity in the water and it wasn't long before the float was buried and I was playing another hard fighting carp these carp really are great fun on the pole and as you can see on the picture above  they are quite chunky fish.

  The  swim was bubbling like someone had put an alkaseltzer in the water but in the short time I have fished this venue I have learnt that this is always a sign of small skimmer bream being in the swim.  On this venue you don't really catch carp after carp but more catch one and wait at least 15 minutes while the skimmers knock your bait while you wait for another carp to come in a engulf the bait and it wasn't long before this was the case again.

  My uncle was the next to connect with a carp after wading through a few skimmers and I was also enjoying a hot spell as I hooked into my third carp of the session within the first hour.

  My uncles mate, Curly, could not for the life of him get past the large shoal of skimmers he had in his peg and he was catching one every put in for the majority of the session.  After the carp above my swim went very quiet with all the tell tale knocks on the bait I had experience earlier coming to an end.  My approach when fishing here is big fish or broke so I fully expect their to be lulls in the action while I wait for the bigger fish to move in.  It was not until around 7.30 I got my next bite and it was so violent I didn't even have to see the float go under as the carp literally hooked itself and darted for the deeper water in the middle,  it showed me how easy it is for people to look away for one minute only to find their pole or rod heading towards to water.

Not even the biggest fish of the session, maybe even the smallest but definitely the hardest fighting.

  The swim again went quiet for a while but the next action was a lost fish which felt bigger than anything I had hooked on there before and literally went off like a steam train and there was nothing I could do to turn it and the hook pulled.  

Last fish of the session:

 We left the fishery around 9.30pm with all three of us having different fortunes but as is the way when fishing commercials of an evening you never know who has fished your swim in the day and how much bait was put in, both these factors I am sure have a great effect on your success come the evening time.

Sunday 31st July

  Today saw both me and my uncle back on the banks of the River Dee my uncles plan was to pole fish the slack into a deep hole in the edge while my plan was to wait it out for bigger fish on the feeder.  We arrived under the cover of darkness just as the light blue glow of the new day was appearing in the distance,  as we approached our chosen swim we were surrounded by colony of bats skimming the surface of the water as they greedily hunted for a last gasp meal before the impending daylight forced them back into hiding for another day.

  Since I have purchased my new holdall I can now leave my feeder rod set up ready to go, so it wasn't long before I was using the little light that was in the sky to see the tip of my rod.

  There was a few large knocks on the tip but nothing worth striking at and the only excitement of the morning from my swims point of view came as the group of local swans made their way upstream.  I said a while back that I would follow their progress as much as possible and unfortunately looking at the video it seems like a few of the cygnets have not made it this far with only two surviving.

  The fishing was very poor to be honest and I was facing a big fat blank straight in the face as I still hadn't had a bite at 10.30am while my uncle was just getting a few decent roach on caster but they were few and far between.

  What followed still amazes me as i write this now, my uncle was bringing in a roach approaching a pound when a jack pike shot out from no where a started attacking the roach, chasing it around the swim.  The roach survived with only slight cuts to its back but the pike decided he was still hungry and was lying at the base of the keep net eyeing up another potential meal.

  I quickly set up a pike rig and hooked on a small gudgeon,  no sooner had it hit the water the pike was onto it and making its way back under the raft or debris to the left of the swim, I struck and the fish was on and boy was he an angry little fellow, tail walking and doing his best to throw the hooks.  Not long later and he was on the mat having his picture taken I estimated him to weigh around 3lb,

To enable my uncle to start catching again I put the fish back away from the swim please excuse the music but this song was in my head the whole morning while this was unfolding.

  I walked back to sit with my uncle for a minute and have a brew when my uncle, now in a pike free swim got a bite and as he was bringing the fish in, Bang!! the fish was gone and the line was cut clean, not another pike!!.  Luckily the previous gudgeon we had used was till usable as bait and back in it went and straight away and other jack pike was on.

The two pike where two separate fish with the first being slightly larger than the second but to catch two in such quick succession shows why your swim on the river can go very quiet very quickly.  After all the commotion of these two pike in the swim the fishing never really recovered and we called it a day at noon.

This coming week I hope to spend an evening on the commercial with my new pole and hopefully next weekend try and get onto a new river or new venue.

Till next week 

tight lines

Danny

Blog Update and two short sessions on the dee.....

  This week I would like to start the blog entry by talking about a few changes that I will be making to the blog in the coming weeks, some of you may have noticed the page links now situated towards the top of the blog highlighted in the picture below.

  Recently I have received a few messages from people who follow this blog who also know me from the maggot drowners forum and it was really great to hear from people who read the blog about their impressions of it and also to read about how they are doing on their own angling adventures.  It got me thinking though about the people who don't know me from posting on there and may also want to contact me so I have set up a contact me section for people to contact me on about any aspect of the blog and any questions you may have on waters mentioned.

  I also thought it would be a good idea for the blog to have a section dedicated to the waters I fish both still water and rivers and it is my aim to provide as much information as I can in giving a description of the waters and some pictures to show what will greet you should you want to visit these waters yourself.

  The "contact me" section and "about us" section should both be up and live now and for the next few weeks will be a work in progress and obviously the still water and river sections will take more work so will also be updated as and when I get some free time.  Other sections I have in mind but not yet 100% definite are sections on product reviews and possibly a angling news section, I hope you will like the new developments to the blog and find it very useful once its completed.

 
  Any way onto this weeks fishing and the river Dee again was this weeks destination with two short morning trips both on Saturday and Sunday.  Saturdays fishing trip was to a small secluded feeder stream of the river Dee in pursuit of the lady of the stream and trout. We arrived again nice and early and was treated to of the sight a pair of bats effortlessly hunting in the twilight,  its amazing to see these creatures hunting and I must admit to standing for a good twenty minutes watching them before unloading the gear from the car.

  The river was slightly up due to the overnight rain and there was a good flow pushing through which would improve our chances of connecting with the target species.  In no time we were in the swim,  the darkness was lifting and the birds were in full song signalling the start of another day and there is no better feeling than watching the world around you wake up whilst you are stood in the river trotting.

first fish of the day

 
  I find most of the time when trotting a small stream that the first cast of the day usually brings a decent fish and today was no exception with this greedy trout being the first fish on the bank. Trout and salmon par truly are beautifully marked fish and although not my favourite fish to catch they are definitely along with the grayling the most beautiful on the eye.

  As the bait started to go in I connected and landed a nice grayling but it was the trout that were bossing the swim with four or more decent sized trout coming during the session and it seems the more bait you put in the more you can guarantee a trout in your swim on this little stream.

  As the hemp started to work its magic a few dace started to show up as did a few salmon par.  But the day was unfortunately cut short around 9am when I began to feel really ill to the point where I had to call it a day, very unusual for me as I usually have to be dragged away from the river.  Had we stayed we would have had a really good day as the fish where still darting across the pool as we left, still for a few hours fishing the net below provided some great sport on the centre pin.

  As we were heading back towards the car we were watched the whole way down the country lane by some really young cows who's curiosity got the best of them and they really do make me laugh with the way the look at you almost to say "hey up what's going on here, better make sure we see this rabble off".

  Sunday saw both me and my uncle on the banks of the river Dee trotting for silvers and I must say since fishing with him my trotting technique and baiting has really come along from what it was and although today neither of us emptied the river for a good hour I had the fish where I wanted them and I was getting a bite a cast over my bed of hemp, nothing that would break any records but when trotting maggot the challenge is more a case of quantity and not quality.

Today's swim and I was amazed no chub turned up today with such a lovely trot down to a overhanging tree:

  None of the fish caught really warranted a picture taken but I did manage to get my camera out to capture a very large group of noisy Canada geese (i think lol) moving down river.

very noisy rabble!!

  Today I spent the morning trotting and practising getting my line and feeding right and I was really happy with my net of fish come the end of our session, I had really worked hard for every bite today and I can feel me getting more confident with each session I spend trotting on the Dee and hopefully as time passes the bags will increase but if not, as always when out with my dad and uncle you can guarantee a good laugh and that's what its all about.

Today's bag or roach and dace:

  As with all our fishing on Sundays, with work on Monday in mind we called it a day around noon and a good call it was as no sooner had be got in the car the heavens opened.

Until next week

tight lines

Danny

A few strikes on the dee.........

  As many of you will have noticed today, all public sector workers walked out on strike in protest to changes to their pensions that will see people working longer and paying more contributions for less money when they retire.  I am a civil servant but I wasn't going to be wasting this opportunity walking the streets protesting or on some picket line, my protest would be made on the banks of the River Dee.

  The plan today was to concentrate on trotting and looking to be back home around midday as unfortunately there was still a busy Friday in work to attend.  Today also gave me a chance to test out a piece of equipment I bought last night from stapley water gardens, a FOX bait waiter and I am impressed with it, it made the feeding and fishing much more comfortable.

  Arriving at the bank I quickly set up my 17ft float rod and began trotting a steady glide I had noticed the previous week and instantly the float was going down the swim a dream with no snags to hinder my line and a good even depth. To my amazement the float was going through untouched and it took 4 or 5 trots through to get my first fish which was a nice plump roach followed by another and slowly but surly the swim was getting to the stage where I was getting at least a knock every trot down, with either a nice roach or dace being taken and then I caught a roach of a much better calibre that I knew when I hooked was a better fish and gave a lovely jagged fight as only roach do.

Nice Roach:

    With roach of this calibre around I decided to introduce a few grains of sweetcorn every few casts and continued to catch more roach and dace with the odd rogue salmon par.  On my first trot down with sweetcorn I hooked a proper zoo creature and after a tough fight a Pb trout was on its way to the net and with its last dart and turn for freedom the hooked pulled, gutted!! its bad loosing a big fish when you don't see it but to see the prize there and to loose it was even worse,  lesson learned from this is make sure the fish is on the bank before you have already caught it and photographed it in your head.

 Back in and the roach where still there waiting as was the dace and it was a big dace that was next to have its picture taken and with this being such a large specimen I decided to weigh her, exactly a pound.

Fin perfect silver dart:
                                                 


 At around 10.30 the swim just went dead, I suspected all the commotion of the fish splashing on top had attracted the attention of a hungry pike or had some bigger fish moved in?? in this scenario these two reasons are what all anglers think and usually on the river Dee nine time out of ten its a hungry pike. I still cant explain what made me do this but I decided to just feed corn and stick with it and for the next ten to fifteen minutes the float just went through untouched but just as I was about to reel in at the bottom of my trot the float buried and I struck into something solid that stayed deep and demanded I gave it some line and it made its way into the flow, on four pound line and a stick float rod there was no rushing this fight.
 
  In my head I thought its either a chub or a pike has taken a fish as I have hooked it,  slowly but surly I began making ground only for the fish to angrily make an aggressive dart for the middle of the river,  eventually the fish began to tire and I got a glimpse of the fish and to my amazement it was a barbel after a few more darts for freedom the fish was mine and I was even more chuffed than last week as this had been caught trotting.

another river Dee Bertie:

 
  After this fish it marked the end of the sport and for the next hour and half I just picked up the odd small roach and I called it a day around 12.30 but not before I took a picture of the net of fish, there must have been at least 20 roach over half a pound. The picture below really doesn't do it justice.

net of fish:
   
  

  With the River Dee holding some real specimen barbel and with the way they are breeding hopefully in years to come a barbel in a days trotting will be common place they really do fight at any size and with stocks of roach and dace this high the future for the River Dee is bright.

till next time

tight lines

Danny