First things first, have caught perch up to a pound and a quarter either on caster or worm but have never targeted them to catch specimen size fish, its always been a case of getting something in the net. Also never tried prawns along this stretch of canal although i have caught carp and chub also. Maybe a couple of afternoons with a small spinner from the Aqueduct towards earlswood might indicate a good area to target the larger perch. But as i've said before the fish seem to be constantly changing their habitat to new pastures.
Re Trittiford Park, i'll start with Swanshurst Park as i used to live in Swanshurst Lane for 25 years and fished it hundreds of times. Years ago it was a great tench and rudd water with a great weed cover extending out maybe 6 to 8ft. All that was needed was a cast beyond the weed and to draw the float back to the edge to get the bites. The tench used to congregate in the corner at night as it was where the silt/leaves used to gather and it was possible to get a dozen fish when doing an all nighter (back over the fence in the morning before the park-keeper came as it had a fence and locked gate in those days). The tench, rudd and weed cover have long gone but it had always been a good water for roach then about twelve years ago the carp fishermen started catching bream on boilies. These fish had not been targeted by myself and others and i was never aware of just how many were in there. Over the next five years we used pellets and caught bags of between 50lb and 100lb quite phenomical for the size of water. Then someone pulled the plug, yes i mean just that. In the middle of one of the paths is a drain cover and underneath is a sluice tap to let water out into what was a small golf course. This was left open one friday and by sunday there was no water in the lake and resulted in a massive fish kill (it was the week i had chosen to go on holiday else i would have noticed it and tried to do something as soon as possible). Think this happened in the spring as the resulting months were a good summer? and i remember seeing thousands of swan mussels dead, dried up although we had collected quite a few and threw them into the canal, the pool was left empty for months.
Meanwhile Trittiford Park itself was re-establishing it self. There was an influx of skimmers, carp and surprisingly gudgeon a few years ago. I dont really know who is responsible for re-stocking whether its the council or the environmental agency but it was the start of some great fishing. It was the time when poles first appeared and i remember honing my skills by catching over a hundred gudgeon in a morning, absolutely fabulous for a pole beginner. These disappeared altogether in about four years but the carp (of which there were many) and skimmers grew on and again resulted in five or six years of great fishing. Then came the bombshell, Trittiford was netted and a certain amount of fish went into restocking Swanshurst. I dont honestlly know but i think some of the carp went missing because they do not appear to be in significant numbers in either park at the moment. The result is that on some days you cannot buy a bite in either park but i do have happy memories.
I dont think that the council is too bothered about fishing, part of Trittiford has been designated as a wild fowl sanctury (ankle deep canadian goose **** to you an me) and as explained in a previous post half of one side has been landscaped (if you can call it that) with a sort of flint chippings right down to the waters edge. What it will look like when the weeds come through who knows. Both parks used to be picturesque having boathouses with rowing boats, a motorboat house (for the motorboats), putting geens, miniature golf course, toilets and cafeterias and parkkeepers all surrounded by a fence and access by gate but such is progress alas all gone.