ITS SUMMER!

 It would see we have skipped spring and jumped right from winter into summer in a little over a week, I bet the fish don't know what the hells happening. I know one thing though, it killed my tench and bream sport dead.

 Yesterday saw me heading to a local carp puddle, hole in the ground type thing. Now don't go thinking I'm loosing the plot as we all know how much I hate those kind of places but I actually enjoyed it, only because I had both kids in tow and took them for a few hours fishing. Kyle can pretty much look after himself now apart from removing the odd deep hooked fish so once I had him set up and fishing I sat on the floor with 4 meters of pole and entertained Lilly for a while. For a 3 year old she did well, or rather I did managing to keep her amused for near on 3 hours.

 Plenty of small perch and skimmers were landed between us, me and Lil managed a nice looking carp hybrid/brown goldfish type thing around a pound plus a couple of nice 10oz rudd. Kyle added a nice bream around 2lb as we were ready to pack up. It was warm, we caught fish and the kids enjoyed it and that's what it all about.

 My latest session started last night when I headed to my tench water armed with a bucket of spod mix and the rod. One chap was down for the evening and once he had me sussed out the info started to flow back and forth. He revealed something to me that I never imagined possible on that water and gives me something to definitely look at in the future should my current plan start to fall apart.

 With the bank holiday I expected it to be busy today so made sure I was first there to get the pick of the swims, my swim in fact I baited last night! It was 4.10am when I pulled through the gate this morning and as the light grew the lake looked truly stunning, one of those classic fully misted mornings it looked just like ghosts drifting over the glassy looking surface. Out when the rods and I sat back ready for the action to kick in.

 I waited, and waited, and waited. I knew early on it was never going to happen, there was not a cloud in the sky or a breath of wind. The water stayed like glass for most of the morning and temperature was rising as high as the sun. Around 9am and totally out of the blue one of the rods rattled off and I landed a bream around 4lb, afterwards much the same. Nothing. I have noticed before on here, hot, sunny windless days are the kiss of death. However, on a plus note my next trip is Wednesday when it looks like a nice low pressure front will be moving in.

Start as you mean to go on.

 What a difference a week makes eh? I even had my coat off today. I was up and out of the house at not much after 4am this morning and was pleased not to be met by a freezing blast for once. Arriving at the lake it was clear the fish felt the same today, for the first time this year(from what I have seen anyway) there were signs that the fish were around and feeding.

 As is quite common on here during the week I had the place to my self and headed straight to my first choice swim and with the rods clipped up ready to go it was just a matter of setting the alarms up, putting some bait on and away we go. Well that is exactly what happened too! With fish showing well out I cast my long range rig first. This was baited with 2 rubber casters and a real one glued to a short hair and arranged so as to look like a small pile of free offerings. Before I had even finished spodding bait out the alarm sounded into life and a nice 4lb bream hit the net.

 I finished the baiting up which consisted of 6 spods full of dead maggots, casters, hemp and corn over each line plugged with my new CSK ground bait I was testing. The feeders were filled with the same with a good sprinkle of the spod mix mixed in too. Once that was sorted I got both rods out and soon had another bream of around the same size. It then went a little quiet until around 7am when out of the blue one of the rods roared of and I knew this was no bream. I was correct and my first tench of the year graced my net.

 By now the wind had dropped, the lake was flat calm and the morning sun felt much warmer than it had all year, this did do as I expected though and no more bites were forth coming for well over an hour. At around 8.30am I had to put my coat back on as the wind had picked up and scattered clouds kept blocking the sun, this had an almost immediate effect on the fish as they suddenly went on the rampage. First up was another bream before the tench moved in, 2 landed over the next hour all between 4 and 5lb plus two unfortunate breaks and another bream.

 It was soon 10am and I had to start thinking about heading home as the other half was working and I had to take the little one to nursery. Out went both rods for the lucky last cast. First away was the far rod, the way it screamed off I was expecting another tench but the slow plodding nature gave the game away. It did give a good account of its self though and a solid 5lb bream wallowed into the net.

 Unbelievably I was still holding the fish in the water to recover when the other rod screamed off, this though was no bream and the fish took line on more than one occasion, once close in it made a couple of determined attempts at getting into the reeds but i was more than ready for it and it was soon laid on the mat. As with the bream, this one turned out to be the biggest tench of the day at a shade over 5lb. O how I wish I didn't have to head home. Luckily I have all next week off work and will be spending 3 days on here with some baiting up in between.

Spring is erm................ starting to spring

 Well, that's been a long old drawn out winter. Since the rivers shut I have briefly wet a line on just one occasion and for just a few hours, although I have been busy with other fishy things and I am now pleased to announce that as of last week I am now trading as DAB Angling.

 This is only intended to be a small operation which I hope will bring in a bit of extra pocket money. As a lot of you know I make heavy duty feeders up to 6 ounce and I'm currently working on a small selection of species specific baits(barbel and tench for now) which should be on general sale by early next year once they have undergone lots more testing. We will have to see how things go but so long as I keep covering my costs there's plenty of scope to extend both the feeder and bait range.

 So, back to the fishing.
I arrived at my local tench water before 5am this morning, the reason for the early start is that it has all of a sudden become popular with the carp lads despite it been well known as a rock hard water and holding less that 20 original carp in 26 acres of water. Luckily I was first there and so dropped into one of my favoured swims.

 Even though it was a southerly wind it was blooming cold and the temp gauge on the car had been reading just 3 degree, with this in mind I held back on the bait and stuck to only feeding what my swim feeders could carry. I didn't even bother to have a few quick chucks at the start. The fish on this lake do like to give them self's away with the bream rolling and tench fizzing but all I saw all day was one smallish bream roll well out in the middle.

 At around 10.30am one of the alarms sounded and I picked up what was a rather subdued stop start take, the welcome culprit was a nice bream around 4lb. I had another take later when the bobbin juddered upwards before dropping to the floor like a brick and I connected with thin air although it's quite possible it could have been a liner and the fish had picked up the line with its fins. That was it for the day and I left a couple of other tench/bream anglers blanking around 1pm.

Ready to spring into action

 There was a definite warmth in the sun today that's not been felt for quite some time, and although I didn't expect much, if any action it was a glorious morning to be by the water at dawn even after I scraped the ice and over night sprinkling of snow off the car.

 I arrived at my target tench water for the coming months as the sun started to poke it's head up this morning with the intention of getting everything ready for the forth coming warm weather. Dawn is the best time to find the fish on here as they duly give them self's away with streams of bubbles, even with the cold there were a few, not many but the very odd small scattered patch of bubbles right where I expected the fish to be. However fishing was to come second today as I wanted to make good use of the quiet time by putting the marker float to good use.

 I had a quick walk around the lake a couple of weeks back and found the deeper areas in what is a rather shallow, very silty water. Now I knew where they were I wanted to make the most of them. I dropped into the first swim and thrashed the water until I was happy I had found a spot that I hoped the fish would like. I then got the rods out and cast my rigs to the marked spots and made notes of what to aim at on the far bank. They were then clipped up and marker knots tied on with light pole elastic. Numerous casts were made to the marker until I was 100% happy that the rigs would be bang on the money.

 Next up was the job of clipping up the spod rod, again I made plenty of casts Until I was happy that this was also spot on. The only draw back with this was that the small light weight spod falls a bit short of my furthest target when empty and the only thing to do was to put some bait in as it has holes top to bottom and with not having any kind of tape with me I couldn't fill it with water. Once happy that everything was spot on I moved onto the next swim that I fancy.

 To make things easier for me should I not be able to get in my first choice swim I intend to fish the same distance from which ever one I fish meaning I can leave all the rods clipped up and ready to on every trip. As look would have it one spot I have picked (that I fished a lot last season) falls half way between two swims meaning, subject to a friendly word and an OK from who ever jumps in my swim before me I should be able to fish the same spot from two swims. Another stroke of look is that the feature I'm fishing to is a long deeper channel that runs along 3 or 4 swims and once I had a good chuck about with the marker again I found that my clipped up rods could be fished on good areas in all of them.

 It was well after 9am by the time I got a bait in the water and as I wasn't expecting a great deal even before I had spent 2 hours chucking leads and rigs about I set about doing a bit of testing. Last year I fished the water with one standard heavy feeder rod outfit and a sleeper rod on an alarm. Looking back I don't think this was the best approach and with the size and power of the tench in there I have decided this year to fish both rods on alarms. I tried a couple of new rigs out to see how they cast and also to make sure they didn't tangle and I must say the Korum Helli rig kits work a treat.

 I have a lot of faith in imitation, fake, rubber call them what you like baits but really only used them along side naturals. This year I will be going a step further and using them exclusively on one rod at all times so, I tested a few of these out in the margins too. Corn stacks, mag aligners and my personal favourite so far, D-rigged fake casters. 3 of these tied to 8lb fluro carbon and a size 10 hook just look awesome fluttering down on to the lake bed ready to be hoovered up. And as some of you know, last year I started working on my own baits. Firstly came the ground bait that was responsible for double figure PB carp and barbel, now I have started to play around with one for the tench and today gave me the first opportunity to try it out.

 As expected I didn't catch but it was a rewarding day all the same, the sun felt great for once when the wind dropped. The water fowl were busy collecting material to build nests with and I just got a feeling that any time soon everything will just wake up and go mental trying to make up for lost time and I can't wait.

Fish at last

 It's been quite a slog this winter and although not exactly a red letter one I had a half decent day on the calder today with my mate JD and we both put a few fish on the bank.

I arrived this morning to find JD walking to the bottom of the length so I dropped into a swim about half way, dumped the gear and wandered down to see him. He told me he had just spent half an hour in said swim with nothing to show. We chatted for a while and it wasn't long before his first chub of the day was in the net, I quickly hurried back to my gear and chose another swim a little further down. With the rods already made up I was fishing in no time and sat back to see JD landing another.

 Now expecting good things I was left feeling rather cold and puzzled after a couple of hours or so with nothing to show for my efforts. JD had had another and was getting a few bites and Rich had come down to see how we were getting on so I upped sticks and moved down near them. First chuck with a piece of steak on the hook and the tip twitched a couple of times before slamming down and a nice 4lb chub soon lay in my net. Next chuck and away it went again, this time we were all surprised to see a nice looking brown trout of around a pound, also falling to the steak.

 Rich left us soon after and it seems he had taken the fish with him as it went very quiet with just the odd tentative twitch so JD decided to move up stream to one of his favourite banker swims while I stuck it out a little longer. His moved paid off as he was soon into another good chub. I quickly followed suit and dropped into the swim above where I had started. I didn't have to wait long before the tip flew round again and another 4lb chub graced my net.

(must remember to remove the polaroids next time)

 I had another cast in this swim before working my way down stream. I dropped into a couple of swims with nothing to show before reaching the bottom end and the swim we had fished this morning, however I only managed two missed chances on cheese paste. I could see JD into another fish so I headed back up there but that one turned out to be another trout, oddly taken on cheese paste! These calder trout have obviously not read the rule book. I settled into my swim but all seemed quiet until JD shouted he was into a good fish. It was putting up a good battle and as it had taken the paste again we were expecting a good chub only for it to turn out to be another trout, this time around 2lb although it was a stunning looking fish with very large, dark distinctive spots and a pale, almost rainbow trout like body.

 All stayed quiet after this and with a drop in air temperature we called it a day. As we walked back to the car I commented on how much of the river bed we could see with it been so low and clear. We left the gear in the cars and went for an explore. This turned out to be a good idea as it painted a very different picture to the river bed than we had imagined, we also discovered a couple of very nice looking spots that just must hold barbel in the warmer months. Roll on those I say.

Is it spring yet?

 The way this winters form has been going I'll be glad when it starts to warm up as there has been a distinct lack of fish recently and today was no different, although on a lighter note it was rather enjoyable. Since having a first proper go at lure fishing last year I had kept telling my self I should buy the necessary gear and do some more. A couple of weeks back I was offered a suitable rod along with a box of bits and bobs plus some lures, the money exchanged hands and today saw me on the bank with it for the first time accompanied by JD.

  We decided to work our way along a local canal that runs almost parallel to the river Calder, then work our way back down the river. We covered a good couple of miles stopping off at likely looking spots along the way, swapping and changing between lures. Diving plugs, rubber shad types, micro rubber lures, we tried the lot but despite our best efforts we failed to even entice so much as a touch between us.

 It wasn't a bad day to be out and about though, especially when out of the wind. It was enjoyable doing something new for once too and its certainly not put me off but perhaps I might be best waiting till it warms up and the fish are more willing to chase bits of odd looking rubber. We did however discover a few new cracking looking spots on the river as we were wandering along a stretch neither of us had been on before.

First PB of the year

 With a light dusting of snow this morning and the Colne at normal level for once the day was set for some nice grayling sport. Things soon took a downer though when I realised I had left home without my waders. With JD on the map and me driving we set off in search of some new spots to fish only to find I was stuffed without my boots. We drove around for a while before settling on a stretch of the lower river we tried to fish last time and got caught out by rising snow melt.

 I made a slight miss judgement when tackling up and soon found the water in the pool too deep for my grayling bobber float, and a little too slow for the pin and the faster water just too far out of easy casting range. Off it all came and on went a 3 gram Avon float coupled with a closed face reel, third or fourth trot and the float sailed away. Not the intended grayling but a nice brown trout well over a pound, I slipped it back before realising what I had done. Having not fished many upland rivers that fish would have been almost double my PB and I was slightly gutted that, even though not huge I had popped it back without so much as a trophy shot.

 We made our way upstream dropping into a few pools on the way and soon realised the fish were playing hard to get. JD was well ahead of me by now and by the time I caught up with him he was fishing a large, slow deep bend in the river. I remembered from our last trip here that just above this there is a nice deep but not too slow run along the far bank so I headed for there. I got the depth sorted and decided on a spot of tea whilst I fed some maggots. Just as I started to fish JD arrived still fish less and decided to watch me trot along the far bank. Whilst I don't see my self as some kind of expert I gave JD a few pointers on trotting as he admits him self that he is a complete novice at it. I think he was impressed with my skills as I worked the float along the far bank anyway.

 Right on cue mid sentence the float dipped under and I struck into something solid, I though it was the bottom at first as it just held solid before starting to move slowly upstream. It was clearly a good fish and went on a few slow powerful runs, I got it close in and was still no wiser to what I was attached to. It wasn't until it finally rolled in the net that I realised it was the biggest wild trout I had ever seen. Out of season I know but I was well happy with this beast, on the scales it went 3lb 2oz.

 I hooked another, smaller fish soon after that shed the hook whilst doing airborne acrobatics. This must have spooked any remaining fish in the swim as it went stone dead, with JD still fish less we decided on a move to the Calder for the afternoon just a short distance away where another friend of ours was already fishing.

 We arrived to find Rich sat feeder fishing bread for the chub only for him to tell us he had not landed a fish but missed loads of bites, at least they were feeding. JD got into one of his known chub swims a little upstream and I decided to trot between them. I had no choice anyway as I had only brought float gear with me. After JD's cracking session yesterday when he landed 9 good chub in just a few hours on a different stretch he drew a big fat blank today, I didn't fair much better and just couldn't get it together this afternoon. Snagged hooks, tangled rigs and an awkward flow saw me packing up after not too long, Rich on the other hand showed us how to do it finally landing 5 good chub to just over 4lb.