How did you get on?

[Neil Maidment]

I had a look at the top end of Throop on the Dorset Stour yesterday, the river looked spot on after a couple of heavy floods so I decided another visit was required.

I arrived early this morning and walked past The Pink Cottage as last nights "Super Moon" was setting.



The river looked just as good again today except for a gusty downstream wind. But the Stour was in a hurry to get to the harbour which forced a bit of a rethink. Some swims were just barrelling through so I looked for the smoothest flow I could find.

The chub did oblige in their own way and in their own time. I managed seven in about seven hours fishing. They appeared one at a time every 45/60 minutes or so which made for a session full of anticipation and knackering trotting!

Only lost one but had I lost any of the ones I landed, I would have sworn blind they were huge chub. Not quite, but very nice fish indeed. They were mostly around 5lbs but I had two crackers just 2oz either side of 6lbs

 

[mikench]

What was it Blakey used to say in "On the buses" ? Seriously cracking fish and photos Neil!

 

[jasonbean1]

;bpI want to know who knits his jumpers...??.....

 

[Graham Elliott 1]

Yes.
He's managed to get Drennan, Korum and Fairisle sponsorship in one hit:wh

 

[Neil Maidment]

Looking good for next week Graham! Forecast says getting steadily colder, light winds and only a little rain. The level is dropping ever so slowly from what is currently a little high for good trotting. Now .69m and has been around this for the last few days. Needs to be .60 to .65 to be almost perfect in my book

 

[fishing4luckies]

After two blanks in a row I managed to turn things around quite spectacularly on a sneaky trip on Tuesday. It was a 'skive' day, which I shouldn't feel as guilty about as I do, since I work for myself.

I decided to go and fish one of the lakes on my Paddock Wood Club ticket which sees very little in the way of other anglers. I met up with a mate (also on a self-employed skive day) who lived just around the corner from the lake and had lightly baited a couple of spots the evening before.

He arrived before me and chose his spot, so on my arrival I dropped into the other swim that had access to the free baited spot. Two rods went out, one with a 20mm Manilla boilie topped with a piece of fake buoyant corn (this was an attempt at 'critically balancing' the hookbait, whatever that means) and the other with a bright yellow manilla wafter. Within less than 10 minutes the Wafter (left hand) rod was off, with a nice 10lb ish common on the end of it. This was followed by 2 more runs in quick succession on the right hand rod, both fish around the 8 or 9lb mark.

Things then went quiet for 45 minutes or so when the LH rod took off again, this time delivering up a 12lb 6oz mirror.

The day carried on like this and by the time I packed up at about 15:00 I'd had 10 bites, 8 of which I'd landed and 2 were lost due to (quite frankly) shockingly bad angling - not getting the net ready in time and losing them practically on the net cord.mg:

My mate had 3 fish on the bank and lost 4 (I think he needs sharper hooks).

So all in all for a late January session with ice on the water in a few spots it was about as good a days fishing as I could've hoped for.

 

[Another Dave]

I caught a pike around 3/4 of a pound yesterday. Went to the dentist which is 5 minutes walk away from the weir where i had that nice perch recently, so naturally i smuggled out my sh1tshop telescopic. Nothing at the weir but got to explore a section i haven't fished before, some huge trees blown over in a couple of spots. Planning a trip in my head where i take a proper rod, some chunky floats and some lobs.

 

[mikench]

Lovely day and not cold. I felt better and my cough wasn't as bad today! Returned to my local mereView attachment 3706

I enjoyed the banter on the bank , the robins, the grebes getting romantic and just being out in the fresh air. I didn't have quite the luck of that Maidment bloke in fact I blanked!:beaten:

Nobody else caught either and 3 blokes had been there for 2 days!!! The club blurb says" it is an excellent winter water provided it is ice free! Today it was fish free!

 

[Graham Elliott 1]

Well a funny day. Joined Monmouth Club as some Wye water and a rarity around here a water with tench over 6lb.

But my challenge today was to have a trot on their bit of the Monnow. I had guested a bit in the town centre last season behind the car park a d managed a grayling and couple of roach from one swim tested as the Missus went to the market.

Well it looked stunning and I expected a bite first cast. After walking to try about 6 cracking looking swims over 3 plus hours the outcome was a 6oz chublet from the single bite!

Of to the Wye back at Ross with only half pint maggots left. First cast nice 10oz dace.
That was it for half hour then a small chub followed by a beautifully conditioned one of 5.13.

Quite again then at 4.30pm a small 6oz roach another couple of chub topped with another a nudge under 5lb.

Happy with that after the struggling morning session

 

[flightliner]

A return to the Trent today hoping for another pike or zander but despite the river looking sock on it was a fruitless exercise . Fish it would seem had either moved on or were laying doggo, maybe it was the snow and rain from Wednesday that had found its way from the Derwent and Dove that are fed from the penines, who knows?
A little disappointing considering the two lovely fish a few days earlier but next time maybe.
One sight was missing as well, the red arrows , maybe they were away somewhere but as some small measure of compensation a barn owl flew back and forth quartering its ground -----

 

[sam vimes]

A nasty northerly and the river still being up meant that option was a not appealing. Opted to go to the roach pond. Due to having a some odds and sods to do this morning, I wasn't likely to get there early. Knowing that a ticket is cheaper after 12, and the fish tend not to wake up until early afternoon, I didn't rush to get there.

I forced myself to fish away from one of my usual two or three pegs. This was partly to get out of the nasty wind and partly to see if the fish were as bothered by being in the deeper water as I thought they might be. After a slow start, I was a bit concerned. Fortunately, without ever being particularly thrilling, things did get better. After a lot of chasing around the swim, and up and down the water column, I ended up with 42 roach before the bites dried up as the sun went down. The shallower peg didn't seem to mean less fish, but I did note that the average size was probably a touch down on what I normally expect.

One sight was missing as well, the red arrows , maybe they were away somewhere.

Probably buggered off to Cyprus. For some bizarre reason, they rather like a bit of winter practice out there. I can't imagine why!
​

 

[jon atkinson]

Lovely day and not cold. I felt better and my cough wasn't as bad today! Returned to my local mereView attachment 3706

I enjoyed the banter on the bank , the robins, the grebes getting romantic and just being out in the fresh air. I didn't have quite the luck of that Maidment bloke in fact I blanked!:beaten:

Nobody else caught either and 3 blokes had been there for 2 days!!! The club blurb says" it is an excellent winter water provided it is ice free! Today it was fish free!

Lovely looking water that Mike - is it on the PA card?

 

[mikench]

Yes Jon and very close to me! It's a beautiful spot but the fishing is difficult , well it is for me ! Blanking doesn't feel so bad there for some reason!

 

[john step]

I went back to a small drain today. The weatherman said cold and the odd flurry of snow. Actually it was very mild and it drizzled ALL day.

I had a pipsqueak about 4lb on lamprey and then on the same lamprey had this one, just a scraping double at 10lb 8ozs.
About time the pike gods smiled on me again.
I think the tail must have been ottered in the past.

View attachment 3719

 

[Graham Elliott 1]

Well knowing that I will be with the 3 Amigos tues to thu argued with myself about whether to go today.

I won. And went.

Mashed bread feeder and large lump flake on a size 6 gave me a nice 4.11 after about an hour but having missed next couple of bites changed to the Hardy 14ft and 4gr olivette with maggots.

Very slow and the 4 or 5 people on the far bank had already packed up by 12.30.
( theres more to life than barbel I said to myself and mentally transformed it to them as they packed up)

Change of swim and slow but six more chub, all under 4lb came to the net, fighting hard in the flow)

Time for home. And HWMBO had cooked a beautiful braised steak on my lap (the steak) in 20 mins of entering.

 

[neil1970]

First fish of the year today, short session before dark.
2lb and 2lb 9oz from the GUC.

After blanking on the pike for a few sessions this year these were very welcome.:w

 

[mikench]

A pair of crackers Neil; I'm envious : no change there then!:wh

 

[The Runner]

Well, finally got out today for the first time in 7 weeks, with the same result as the last time I was out back in mid-December; a biteless blank.
Club match on the Slough Arm at Langley Boats; attendance well down after a grim match here last week which was won with only 2-1, and a forecast of a bitter face wind, so only ten of us lined up.
Drew near end peg about 80 yards before the sheds, water had a very slight bit of colour for once but nothing at all moving while I was setting up but plenty of roach topping further down. Set up usual 4 and 5m whips, three topkits with varying size rigs, and waggler rod.
Started on 4m whip over liquidised, usually an immediate bite if the roach are there but no. Had cupped in a pot of likki across to the boat as well, went over it, same non-result. Tweaked the presentation a bit, still nothing, likewise Paul to my right but all seemed to be getting fish further along. Not too worried at this point as the roach usually spread out/ move as the day goes on here so when after 90 minutes Paul had 4 in 4 drops it looked like it might be on. Nope.
Rather than spread the shoal definitely got tighter. Paul never had another bite, Dave two pegs up who had been getting the odd fish dried up completely around half time as did, as I found out later, the pegs at the far end, leaving only four catching in the middle and two of them gradually slowed right down leaving a good peg to peg between Ian and Kevin, three and four pegs up from me; might as well have been three/ four miles.
Never had a touch on anything, not even the usual Arm blanksaver of a piece of worm dragged around tight in to the tins.
16-1 won it , then 15-1, 9-14 and 5-8.

Ho hum.

 

[ian g]

Managed to get on the Severn below Shrewsbury today , I fished the usual big slack which looked good . I had set up a quiver tip rod with cheese paste as bait in the hope of a hungry chub . I also float fished worm though a missing liner on the butt ring of my 14 ft rod meant a bit of a struggle in the deep margin with a 13 ft rod . I had a bite early on on the float but missed it . Then followed a fairly long quiet period so I decided to try for a few livies. I swapped the cheese paste for lob worms and the float rod for a maggot rig . Plenty of small stuff in the slack and I was soon missing bites like a good un . >After 3 or 4 missed bites I caught a few decent dace I managed a small bleak which went out on the tip rod . A couple more bleak followed then the tip went over and I hooked something reasonable . A jack pike of about 2 lb . The banks are treacherous after the recent floods and after a good slide about looking for my forceps I slipped the pike back .I persisted with the livie on the tip but had no more interest , after a while I switched back to worm on the float using a slider to combat the depth . Pretty slow with just one bite resulting in a perch 2.2 lb , the third 2.2 lb I've cuaght from this peg in 2 trips . This was a nice fat fish and different to the one's I'd caught before. Packed in around 4 as my mate Mike was freezing after forgetting his coat.

 

[sam vimes]

Wasn't planning on getting out today, but a combination of fairly benign weather, a relatively low river and a horrible forecast for the rest of the week saw me grabbing the opportunity. Didn't start fishing until 1500 and only had half a pint of maggots to go at, but still managed five fish before I packed up at 1715. However, I did have to move swims as my usual winter banker let me down with only two tiny little grayling. A move after an hour and a bit showed that I'd persisted too long. The first three runs through the new swim produced two good grayling, both around a pound and a half, and a long range release. That killed it for a while, but a decent trout rounded the day off. Still came home with a quarter of a pint of maggots, enough for another quick session if the weather plays ball.