stevetheangler

Monday 1st September and at 0630 I leave home heading for the banks of the River Severn at Hampton Loade, specifically the Kinver Freeliner’s day ticket stretch… on the waiting list to join but at the mo still need to purchase a day ticket…

So, I arrive at the car park at around 0715 and head, with tackle, to the area that I intend to fish but thinking that maybe I’m a bit late as there are several cars on the car park already – although possibly non-anglers. Walking down I pass several anglers on the near end of the stretch and my hopes revive as by intended area is quite a way along….

Arriving at the first swim that I’d thought to fish… it looked very nice but, as the rest of the section from there down is good, I decided to wander down the rest of the length – and as the last swim looked gorgeous I decided to set up there…

So, tackled up with an 11’ TFG 2lb TC rod, 10lb line, 33g lead and size 2 hook, I made my first cast at around 0800 with a 1” section of chili infused sausage as bait… and later changed bait to a string of 6 half inch cubes of ‘Liquid Worm’ infused luncheon meat and later still to a ball of pink coloured (and smelly too as the main ball is around 2 years old!) cheesepaste with added cotton wool fibres to help the bait stay on the hook in the current. And so I fished until around 1330 casting around the swim – from far bank to near bank, sliding lead around and across, etc, etc, I tried it all and the only action discernible was slight nudges from small fish nudging and nibbling at the baits.

At 1330 I decide to switch tackle and tactics and target perch in the downstream slack water on the near bank – so I set up my 10’ 1.75lb TC rod, 8lb line, small swimfeeder (later changed to 1.75g lead), and size 12 hook baited variously with worm, maggot, worm&maggot cocktail. When I packed up at 1700 I’d had around 10-12 perch with the largest two probably around 12oz… plus about 3 minnow sized silver fish… plus two gudgeon, one of which was a stonker of about 1.5oz.

And so that was it for the day… the barbel/chub never made a showing for me – and not one eel either :(! … but the perch fishing was a fun end to the day and enjoyable :).

Weather was a bit damp too from around 1000 and I was soaked by the time it decided to finish for the day as I don’t like brollies at all as they hinder you so much – if I use one then (a) its just for the bait and tackle and I sit outside or (b) its raining *HEAVY* (ie visibility probably is 10’ or less). But such is the British weather that once it stopped raining then I air dried within an hour or so :)

Plans ahead:

Friday, planning on a visit to my club’s tench/silvers pool with Liz – 2nd attempt to get there as we were going last week but I did my back in over the previous weekend and wasn’t fit to cart tackle, etc. And I will be using, for the first time, my new Nash Deliverance Groundbait Ball Makers… I’ve got the 60mm and 30mm versions… the 60mm for hand/catapult/thrower delivery and the 30mm with the bait compressed within it on the line to give a sort of ‘method feeder without the metalwork’ sort of effect – could use PVA bags to similar effect but they cost :)

Also looking forward to our Sun £9.50 Holiday break starting the 6th October at the Lakeside Holiday Park in Burnham-on-Sea where there is a resident’s only fishing pool We went there last year but didn’t do too good as I recall… a small perch being the only catch but the pool does have a good head of bream and pike and other species too of reasonable size.

Next week – back to the Severn for a barbel hopefully – only a few weeks left as pike will take over most of my fishing time from 1st October – and I may head over to Lilleshall on a joint perch/carp session ie one rod for perch, the other for carp later in the week.