stevetheangler

Monday 28th July at 0545 I duly set off on my planned visit to the BAA’s stretch of the Worcs Stour …

Trip went well, roads were very quiet and the trip went without incident and I arrived at the padlocked gate at around 0620, dialed in the padlock code, and opened the gate, drove through, closed and locked the gate behind me and drove down to the car parking area at the bottom end of the stretch and unloaded my bag containing my bait, food and vacuum flask, followed by my tackle rucksack, rod quiver and seat… Hee hee, all good so far!

Right … so I crossed the ‘new bridge’ over the new stream that I think forms part of the fish pass around the weir further downstream although I’m not sure how it all works. On a recce visit I made a couple of weeks ago whilst returning home from a fishing trip I could see a narrow looking pipe outlet into the pool below the weir itself into which it seems that the stream, that is a take off from the main river just after the bridge, disappears presumably into that piped system at the top of the steep bank down … What I don’t undertstand is how it works … seems a fast flow out of the pipe, a 70 degree rise up the bank to where the stream disappears, followed by about 150-200 yards of 6” (max) deep stream up to the main river junction … oh well, perhaps I’m missing something? Wouldn’t be the first time LOL!

Anyway, one the main effects of this new work is the previously you could walk through the gate, turning immediately to the left and meet the river where it crosses the road … and then walk upstream to the weir pool … and then continue onwards to the river above the weir … however the below to above weir access is now blocked by the stream and to get above the weir you now need to travel from the gate straight ahead down field, cross the bridge and then walk back up alongside the main river. Sounds a bit of a palaver BUT actually it is far far better access to the river as a whole than it used to be…

OLD: had to park car in lay-by over the road from a short access road to the gate with the road very busy as <50 yards traffic lights to join a dual carriageway (dicing with life to cross at busy times!), got through gate then walk down edge of field to meet river by the bridge over the road, follow river to weir pool, walk past and around weir and short area fenced off above… but all this used to be through 2’-3’ high grass dragging at your feet, very tiring!

NEW: Can park in the field now! Either close to the gate (ensuring that farmer/owner access isn’t blocked) or down the new track that has been cut to park in a small area right by the bridge over the stream. Also the river access itself and the banks have been sensitively trimmed so that a trolley can be used … and a big thing… big patches of Giant Hogweed that prevented access to several areas of the riverside have now been dealt with and thus more access to fish has become available… :)

So, arrived, only one there … as I was for almost the entire day … one other arrived to walk and check out the water around midday, and another to fish just as I was just finalising my packing up for the day around 1530.

As I’d always fished just above the weir, fishing the closest place to the sill as I could get and this time I had driven up to the bridge and thus to new water to me (seen but never fished) I decided to take my tackle down to the first good looking spot, drop the tackle off and then wander on to the weir swim to see what else turned up. Some very nice swims spotted and I elected to fish this one, a little further down than my original tackle drop…

I intended to light leger and perhaps bouncing bait around down current if that was possible but on this stretch the current is minimal and so I was static legering with a 7g lead … 8lb mainline, size 12 hook originally (stepped down to a 16 later in the day) … and now the first of the minor hiccups … I had intended to start with worm on the hook BUT it appeared that I’d forgotten to pick the worm bag I use (small plastic strand woven bag – good for worm storage as breathable) up from the cool garage floor and so bait for the day ended up being maggot … and I say ‘it appeared’ as when I got home I went get the bag from the garage to drop in the wormery to keep fresh and it wasn’t there I remembered I had actually put them in a pocket on the front of the bag the previous evening when putting in my other (unused on the day) baits…

Second hiccup was that my rod destined to use was a 10’ ‘Grandeslam’ Des Taylor Avon System 3 one – comes with 2 tops, the standard one plus another that takes interchangeable quiver tips … and it was fitted with the standard one and the use of the alternative would have been better in the situation and although I had the section with me I didn’t have the tips rendering useless basically.

Third hiccup was that about about 20 times in the day the tail end of the rig was tangling around the lead – both with lead just freerunning directly on the line and with the lead on a freerunning 3” mono link. Never had that problem before, or last not within the times of my memory…

However, none of the hiccups were not major but could have been improved….

The swim was prefed whilst I tackled up with a few maggots, a few mixed seed particles and some micro pellets – and throughout the day a few (10-12 maggots) were catapulted over the river (7-8 yards?) at intervals.

First cast around 0715….

And almost instant indications with minor nudges of the rod top … and first fish was landed around 0830 … a small roach … followed by a forefinger sized chublet, another hand sized roach and a SMALLER chublet…

And over the day indications continued, some quite good tugs rather than twitches, but nothing else was caught until around 1400 when I struck at a tug and struck into ….

… actually a chunky fellow which had actually taken the bait fair and square having been hooked in its mouth!

After unhooking, as its illegal to return them due to carrying parasites that affect our native white claw ones, he was bagged up and deposited in the dustbin on return home. They do have a positive side though in they can provide a nourishing meal for chub and barbel and others!

After the removal of ‘Mr Claws’ however my swim went completely dead for the next 80 minutes and it was only in the following 10 minutes, just before I packed in for the day that a few minor knocks started. So that made me wonder if he had been responsible for the majority of ‘the days action’??

The Roach

PLANS

Next week … maybe back to The Stour especially if Liz fancies it … I loved it despite the lack of real fish but then again an 8oz roach would be a good fish there anyway I think, with the 4lb bream of a few years back a red letter fish. The peace and tranquillity were superb!. The other option is to return to the Severn at Blackstone. A lot depends on the weather in the interim I think as to the choice that will be made….