Lovely chub at 5lb 9oz, and the cap ain't bad either!
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One of my targets for this winter is a 7lb-plus chub, so with that in mind I have decided to target the Dorset Stour.
My first trip found me on Beat 2 of the famous Throop fishery and sat in Boulder Weir.
The water was up a little with a good bit of colour, a welcome change from the very low conditions we've had since the start of the season.
I started fishing at the tail of the run off, with a Kamasan Black Cap feeder filled with hemp and caster, with a size 12 hook baited initially with three casters.
This was tied to a hi-tech thin 5lb mono hooklength, with the feeder fished as a standard running rig.
What I didn't expect was the silver fish stripping the hook bare on the drop.
Ok, so time for a quick re-think…
On went two fake Enterprise casters, topped off with a real one.
Constant rattling on the rod tip…..
Three fake ones……
Still constant rattling on the rod tip….
Bugger…
So still filling and re-casting the feeder, I changed the hook to a size 10 Raptor T6 and baited it with The Source paste.
Bit of a cock-up with the self-take shots, but there's no mistaking that this is one big chub at 6lb 10oz
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After about half an hour I had a couple of slight taps, 30 seconds later another tap and then the tip slowly moved round and struck into a good fish.
First blood to me, a lovely fat chub of 5-09, a quick mat shot and back it goes.
No more bites for a few hours, but I'm still casting and feeding constantly when the tip suddenly nods once and then just wraps around and keeps going.
This is a good fish and it takes a fair bit of line and some hard work to get it in.
In the net in the dark and it looks massive. Up on the scales and at 6-10 it's a new PB and well on the way to that target of 7lb.
A couple of very poor self takes (apologies) and back she goes.
Chuffed to bits to be off the mark so successfully and I can't wait to get back to it.
Graham Whatmore
