I’ll take whatever I can get, whenever I can get it…

Just a quick entry tonight to log a short stint on the canal.

My daughter had a ballet class at 5:30pm so, as we were walking past the shed to the car I grabbed my drop-shotting rod and reel and my pre-prepared lure holdall. I wanted to hit a shoal of perch I’d seen lurking under a road bridge a few times whilst passing over the previous weeks.

Sadly the perch were absent in numbers tonight, but I did pick up one in the 20 minutes or so I had to fish, plus a bonus jack pike that I really wasn’t expecting.

Both were taken on a 2.5″ silvery and olive natural shad twitched across the weed flanks close in, though I did have a few taps on the far bank. The bridge, which I specifically wanted to target, was dead.

Lots of ducks and gulls around tonight as the canal was covered in bread. Other than that it was surprisingly clean!

Take care all.

Wet nets.

 

A roach, a perch and half a pike

No time for all the gear, no idea today. One birthday party to taxi for and another one going away for the weekend tonight. I decided to try and winkle out a few perch from the abandoned locks at the local canal instead, for an hour.

Now they say you should never revisit places you fished as a kid as you’ll come away disappointed… and they’re not wrong. The locks were choked with rubbish and weed and the surrounding stretches of canal were silted almost to the roof.

There were fish about though. I’d caught them before, last year in fact, but the canal at least in this area seems to have taken a header. It’s pretty shameful that you’re charged to fish here and doubly so considering the area is supposed to have been ‘regenerated’.

I made one pass down the locks, bombing through the duckweed with a relax Kopyto shad. Just a small 2″ silver one. No takes.

There’s a jig in there somewhere…

I saw some roach rising in one of the turning ponds and, conscious that I only had an hour I decided to pop the only float I’d brought on and try and get a maggot in a weedless spot. Sadly the roach were super wary and small but I did pick up this one on the drop.

By now time was getting on so I popped the little knobbly shad on that I found a week or so ago and tried bombing through the duckweed again with better results.

Just a small one but a perch all the same!

Before I left I thought I’d topwater a shad across the turning pool above the weed. First cast I spotted a pike of around 5lb following, so I threw it again and after 2 misses he picked it up. Sadly when I got him to the bank he bit me off.

Bye lure. Bye pike. Had fun though.

Wet nets.

Oh, hello lure!

This morning the wife and I set off on a grand adventure, namely to buy a new electric stove. We probably did around 80 miles all told, and ended up buying it in our home town.

With most of the day wasted I was in two minds whether to pop down to the lake or not. It was getting on for 2:00pm, rather chilly and quite overcast, but with tomorrow already fully booked I thought I’d better grab the carp by the barbules, as it were.

I pulled up around 2:30pm to find my happy place full of kids, so I opted for the hawthorn peg as it usually produces close in. I had lob and red & white maggot, and again throughout the session the lob did absolutely nothing. The fish are either getting wise to it, or it’s my presentation. As nothing has changed with the latter, I can only assume the former coupled with the copious amounts of 1 – 2″ fry that are present.

First cast with the float rod (all I took) with triple red maggot, I picked up this 2lb 7oz bruiser of a perch, replete with battle scars.

Ok, I could now go home happy.

The action was pretty steady all afternoon, with everything landed on maggot. Several F1’s and a nice 4lb common, plus a string of small perch and roach. Bream have been noticably absent of late, as have eels, though I did pick up a bootlace on my previous trip.

Throught the session I had what I thought was a jack crashing the party, right next to the reeds. I’ve seen jack pike caught there before. In fact just a few weeks ago I was chatting to a lure angler about the perch he’d been picking up when he caught a small jack from the very same peg. After he left I noticed he’d dropped one of his knobbly shads so I popped it in the bag in case I ever bumped into him again.

As I was packing up I thought I’d pop the shad on to see if I could pick up the jack. Out went the jig and within a few minutes I’d landed not a jack, but a rather handsome 1lb 10oz perch.

I’m not a lure angler, but this has certainly inspired me to take the drop shot rod with me next time I go.

Wet nets.