stevetheangler

Thursday 28th July I headed out to a club pool (AA-GH) at 0600, arriving at probably 0630…. but as usual problems saw me not cast in until around 0800!

The day was a bit overcast but warm with a slight breeze travelling from the far end (south) of the pool – so the rhyme ‘When the wind’s in the south its blows the bait into the mouth’ was promising a good day… ummm, well… LOL. … but also a scan with my Deeper Chirp sonar showed a bit of promise to be in the air (errr, water actually? :))…

I had already decided to fish this session with the float on-the-drop (well, as much as one can when the smallest shot you can manage due to clumsy fingers and eyesight is a No4 when back in the day No8’s were manageable but then again 4s are probably the smallest shot one can successfully squeeze onto 6lb line due to line thickness?… I’ve not properly fished on-the-drop for a fair few years really – I usually fish ‘laid-on/lift-method’ when float fishing but thought I’d try out the o-t-d for a change.

So, I set up a 4AAA bodied waggler, sliding, with a stop knot at around 13’ … a bulk of 2SSG+1AAA shot at around mid-depth (which sank the float to the top of the body) then spaced out 3 x No1 shot and 4 No4 shot down the line with the bottom shot about 12” above the size 12 hook… and this was the when the disaster of the day struck as, whilst moving the stop knot up the line, the line snapped and a full re-tackle from scratch was required and hence the late first cast.

So, fishing until 1330, I was catching regularly with maggot baits and  the swim being catapulted with free fed maggots and the odd small ball of groundbait … and about 1030 I switched from the size 12 hook with a bunch of maggots to a size 16 baited with 2-3 maggots. However, the catch was much more quantity than quality with one parrot-nosed common carp of 2lb 13oz being the best fish of the day, the rest being roach of 1oz-2oz size…

I think I was fishing wrong, well not so much think as was, as a guy came just as I was packing up and started to fish the adjoining peg to mine – and I hear he had 13 carp ‘of decent size’ fishing 12 inches deep with Robin Red pellets in the 3 hours he was there… :)

PLANS

Hoping to get out on Monday – probably to the bream/tench pool.

No fishing on Thursday as Wolverhampton is hosting the cycling time trials for Birmingham’s Commonwealth Games on that day … and many roads inc the main roads into the city are closed for that from 0500-1800 – inc the whole ring road and the main roads that lead in from surrounding areas. And it seems that on our estate we cannot get out of it as all the roads directly surrounding are among those closed … and so Liz has had to take a day off work as she won’t be able to commute in.