stevetheangler

Thursday 1st April saw me heading off to a pool again as planned (SAC-DP), leaving the house a little before 0730.

Wednesday had been a scorcher of a day (relatively for the time of year but still T-shirt only friendly and patio door in the living room kept open) but Thursday the temps came back down to earth with a big bump with a cold northerly wind present. On Wednesday I’d commented to Liz that the Damart thermals wouldn’t be needed for my day … WRONG! I got up and dressed without the Damarts initially but whilst having breakfast looking out of the window … and especially after going out to the car to put in the bait and tucker bags, I re-dressed with thermals included … and I was extremely glad I had!

So, I arrived at the pool probably around 0800 and discovered the gate’s padlock had been incorrectly secured. The chain and padlock was attached correctly to the sliding bar’s mountings (often done incorrectly despite several messages posted to members as how to do it) and the padlock’s bolt had been pressed closed BUT the code wheels had not been cleared (ie code still showing) and all that was needed to open the padlock was to press the button that releases the sprung bolt… Committee informed and new message sent out :)

I parked up and looked down over the generally north-south orientated pool from the top-of-hill car park and decided to fish from the west (nearside) bank off to my left as to the right is more the south end of the pool and thus facing into that wind…. As I wasn’t too familiar with the west bank I hadn’t a planned peg in mind so I just walked the tackle down from the car park and along the bank until I located a decent peg – defining ‘decent’ as (a) sheltered by bushes to the left from that wind and (b) a peg with space to ‘swing a cat’ and (c) just looked to have a reasonable chance of catching from based on a few surface (small) fish movements…and the fact (d) the overhanging bush to my left provided a nice sheltered bay/area to floatfish if I wished to change my tactics…. so peg 11 it was.

I catapulted out a few satsuma sized groundbait laced with maggot and particle balls into my intended fishing area before tackling up and placing gear comfortably around me.

Tackle: My standard ledgering setup ie 2 x  1.75lb TC ledger rods, 8 lb line, frame feeders on a rod pod with bite alarms. One rod was baited with 2 worms on a size 6 barbless hook, the other with bread on a size 4 hook…

Frame feeders were loaded with the groundbait mix… and new feeder fills and recasts made half hourly…

First casts were made about 0840 and for the first couple of hours it was quiet with a couple of single ‘beeps’ from the buzzers, most likely just changes in water pressure on the line due to the winds but possibly small fish sucking the bait or liners…

At 1045 came the first proper take on the bread baited rod … and with a slow but strong and steady pull on the line I was hoping it was going to be a decent bream but when landed it was a mirror carp which went 6lb 4oz on the scales – and I was happy with that! :)

Next, and last, bite of the day came an hour later, again on the bread rod… and this time a koi carp of 2lb 8oz came to the net…

I fished on to 1415 – I had intended to fish a bit longer but with no further takes and the cool air getting to me and the prospect of a hot shower ahead I called ‘time’ early.

I had no visible takes on the worm rod although the worms did appear to have suffered some damage and, in fact, I swapped them for a raw king prawn around midday without it seemingly making any difference…

PLANS:

No plans at mo other than I won’t fish again until next Thursday now … and, if the boilies are done then it will probably be the ‘deep’ pool … but a lot depends on what the weather is doing too…

OTHER STUFF:

I left my fishing seat at a pool a few trips ago and put notices on the club’s web site, etc but had no joy seemingly and the camping/director’s chair I’ve had to use was not great so I ordered a new chair which should have arrived a week ago but hasn’t. I’ve been in touch with the company supplying it and they are sending out a new one. And, on Wednesday, I had a phone call – my original chair has been taken in and I’ve now arranged to collect that on Sunday! :)

TEMPS:

WATER:            MIN:    11.0’C    MAX:  13.2’C
AIR:                   MIN:     8.9’C    MAX:  9.9’C

WATER TEMPS:

AIR TEMPS: