stevetheangler

Tuesday 7th April and destination was again our club’s ‘silver’s’ pool (B) aiming to fish the same swim as I did on the previous session and using the same laying-on style – my favourite method on this pool.

So I arrived at the gate to the pool at 0700 on a very misty morning with limited visibility – and the pools are in a very remote area – the sort of place where the champion town crier of the UK, even with the latest in high tech loudhailers, would have a problem getting anyone to hear him… and discovered that not only was the padlocked gate not locked but was wide open with the chain and padlock hanging off it due to the large staples that secured the chain to the gate post having been pulled out and the chain lifted up and off thus allowing unfettered access to the waters… Oh er, missus! Just WHAT am I going to find going on at the pools? Visions of a gang of Puerto Rican Mafia Fish Rustlers wielding WMFDs (Weapons of Mass Fleshy Dissemination) go through my head as I stop and ponder the situation. Anyway, I release the chain, close the gate, and re-wrap the chain around the gate post between strands of barbed wire to prevent it being slid up and off again and secure the gate closed. I then carry on driving down to the pools thinking ‘Was that a good idea??? Cut off my own means of escape now I’ve locked that gate…’. Anyway, get to the pools, and park up – all looks OK so I do a walk around to see what’s up … and all looks good. So I text the club sec to let him know the situation, etc. And to cut the story short – it was all down to the farmer (or his people/contractors) – to get their tractor through the fields for installing new fence stakes.. even though the farmer is informed of the padlock code – so possibly he’d got it wrong or his people didn’t know it and rather than try to find out they took their own steps to get access. But all seemed to get resolved as when I left the waters the chain had been re-stapled to the post and all was again secure…

AND so it came to pass that I could actually start fishing!! :D

So I tackled up, baited the swim per usual with my standard groundbait mix, and started fishing at 0845 with dendro worm as bait. Throughout the day I topped up the swim with occasional golf ball sized groundbait balls and frequent catapulted maggot. And although I did try prawn as bait for a short period, dendro was my bait of the day.

After a few missed bites and float movements the first fish of the day was landed at 0922 – a 3lb 4oz tench…

… and at 0930 another tench of 1lb 9oz came to the net…

Then a long lull came along with just a few indications of fish about until the next fish of the day – a tench of 3lb 9oz was landed at 1250…

… followed immediately – as in, rebaited hook, recast out, float settled down and just kept going down, down, deeper and down (ummm, somebody should write a song about that! :D)…. by the fish of the day … a new personal best perch for me weighing in at 2lb 8oz – almost doubling my previous PB of 1lb 6oz… I’m still buzzing now from it I can tell you!!

 This was followed again by another lengthy quiet spell, until 1445 when a 3lb 11oz tench deigned to take my bait… and following this I expected another fish on the next cast so as to follow the pattern of the ‘wait..catch..catch..wait’ previous captures but it was not to be and that tench was to be the last catch of the day.

And a big chub was spotted just below the surface off the island in front of me and to my right – a good 24″ long I’d say – swimming away from me but when it reached the end of the island it turned and swam towards me – and my baited area – whilst slowly going deeper – thought there might be a chance but it wasn’t to be. And I did try catapulting out some broken biscuit (only thing I had suitable to try as a floating bait) to see if that would get any interest but it failed to.

 I notice the recorded temperatures are a lot lower than the previous visit just a couple of days before. I did use a new thermometer today as the previous one had a problem and the display faded away and I was unable to fix. However, in the house the thermometers did agree temperature-wise to within 1C of each other…

TEMPS:

Time               Air                  Water

0845                9.2                    11.3
0945              12.1                    11.4
1045              15.7                     11.6
1200              18.1                     12.1
1245               25.8                    12.6
1345               29.1                    12.8
1445               21.1                    12.9
1600               26.6                    13.3

WATER TEMP TRENDS: