Well, summers really been a belter so far eh? Bloody awful in truth and I feel like we're already staring down the barrel of autumn already. I was looking forward to long sunny days around work where I could venture out to fish the river after a barbel or two but to be honest I've not felt the urge to do that this season, yet. I'm currently really finding it difficult to get the motivation up to go anywhere other than right on my doorstep. The biggest problem that occurs from this is the serious lack of fishing venues near to my home. Well, one's of any quality that float my boat so to speak..... It seems that since Covid, everybody is now angling and it doesn't matter where you go it's rammed! I really can't bring myself to go to a day ticket venue any more especially near to the weekend! It's crazy how many swims are taken pretty much all day, every day!
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| Early days at Crayfish pool when it finally went well! |
I can remember not so long ago when I had a syndicate ticket on the famous Crayfish Pool and you could literally rock up any day of the week and see no more than 1 or 2 anglers at absolute most on the venue and you had no waiting list in place...now it's a wait of 5-10 years for a ticket on some of these places! What the hell happened to our sport to make it so busy everywhere? I've had a few recent evening sessions at my local urban club water post work and an odd weekend slot. Fortunately it's still a fairly quiet little pool with plenty of water to fish. The fish have responded well to my tactics this summer and I've managed to amass a fairly decent amount of captures so far since late April. I've had a couple of repeat captures and many small commons that have been returned without pictures but there's also been some lovely scaley one's caught too. I'm currently digesting the idea that there's only a few left to catch in there which includes 3 of the A-listers that have so far evaded capture from my side of the fence. It's odd how certain fish can do this and others fall foul to similar tactics and areas of the lake, even to certain anglers.
This last fortnight has seen 3 separate fish get caught between myself and another competent angler just days apart from each other.
Quite amusing to see him with one then 3 days later I've caught it...then a few days later I catch one and he then gets the same one 2 days later.
I know it's a small water but there's definitely something in it I feel that makes certain fish fool foul to certain rigs, bait, tactic, area or in this case certain anglers. It it that our approach is the same? The areas we fish similar or just pure luck? We'll never know.....food for thought though and the age old saying of fish get caught from certain areas is very true in my eyes.
The carp are creatures of habit and generally visit the same old areas day in day out and chose to eat or mill around in these areas. If you can pin point these areas and exploit their potential then that is the key to catching particular fish and becoming successful on your chosen water. Looking back at the Cray in particular, my first season was a bloody hard one! I spent 150 plus nights on there in the first year for just 5 bites and 4 landed! It was tough going to say the least. I questioned my sanity when re-joining the second season as I literally left there empty handed on the majority of visits. I just couldn't get to grips with the place, worrying about my bait, my rigs, bait placement and overall very low confidence in my overall approach to the venue.
The second season came and I spent far less time worrying about all the above and concentrated my efforts on just two spots that had done me a bite or two the previous season. This proved to be key in the grand scheme of things and later ended up with my catching everything I wanted from the venue bar a couple of rogue fish. Well, roll on 10 years and I'm now considering my next move within angling and what, where and how to tackle a new challenge...I love quiet out the way secluded venues but there's nothing remotely near to home that offers this....I'm therefore on the route to considering more urban waters that fly close to my requirements.
I hate the idea but I can't see any other options bar moving house, which is obviously not on the agenda when you have a wife, kids and many ties to your current home. My other option is to just concentrate on Euro trips? I've banged this around in my head a lot and before changing jobs it was on the agenda but with limited holiday time now back in full time employment, that's sorely off the table or for the foreseeable future anyways.
So here we are back at fishing the local pond for upper twenties and high doubles....Ah, it ain't so bad I guess....the lads on there are all a good bunch. The fish are pretty good looking for the best part and sport can at times be frenetic. At least it's a mere 20 minutes from home. So over the last fortnight I've had about 5 or so evenings to pop down and a single full day. They've all fished pretty well with around 30 fish or so coming to the net.
I've spent a bit of time down there coaching a couple of regulars who were struggling too and it's generally just been easy, nice fishing. I'm still after the couple of bigger fish but to be honest if they evade me this year at least it gives me a reason to continue turning up down there and having some fishing on the door step so to speak. I'm currently suffering from a nasty bug and bed ridden which has scuppered any plans I had for after work sessions this week as I'm on the early shift.
That along with the fact that the girls have been away on holiday in Portugal for 10 days has meant that I've had my hands full with household duties as well. In a household of around 100 animals it's been challenging to say the least! I can't wait for them to come home so I can get a bit of respite! Well, there we go, that's about all the news really....not much going on and very little on the calendar at present but hopefully that will change soon. Tight lines all. x
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