The water was very high and the wind was pretty strong still, creating a fair chop on the Broad. Conditions, therefore, were not ideal – I have heard from a guy who pike-fishes there very regularly that when the water is high the pike aren’t interested - and this fits with my own experience here, wind also being a problem as usual hotspots seem to be empty. Still, the route takes them in anyway. So off I went up the margins and around the reedy bays
Nope, nothing was playing ball. I’d got a Shakespeare Big S blue mackerel on the one rod, perhaps my most productive piker, and a Rapala in a shiny blue mackerel pattern on the other. I decided to change them, and on went a Big S and a Rapala Super Shad Rap, both Redheads, and off I went again, this time downwind and further from the margins
Still nothing. I headed back up again, into the wind and about a third of the way up I heard the clutch on the Shimano TR-100G screaming – something was on the end (probably weed or a mussel bed). I stowed the paddle, grabbed the rod and was in
Whatever it was, it was big.
Big, and not wanting to come up to the surface in any great hurry.
It didn’t seem in a hurry to go anywhere quite frankly. But it wasn’t the bottom – there was movement…
Up it came
Further, until
A shape broke the surface and slid down again…
It appeared once again
It took a while to land, but was definitely a new personal best as far as chairs went.
So I continued on my second circuit, and on reaching a bay that is often fished by pikers in winter and which usually sees some action on float fished maggots I tied off to a tree and chucked in a telescopic for some small silvers – expecting nothing as all I had was some old casters from the previous lot of maggots and a few crumbs from the sausage rolls I’d got from the bakers on the way back from the school run. I was not disappointed in this as I caught the expected nothing.
I changed tactics and chucked some Storm Naturistic lures for a while, a small pike one and a large perch one, along with the redhead Super Shad Rap. Nope, nothing doing at all. I untied and continued the troll, using the Storm’s.
Nothing doing, I tied off near another hotspot where I had hooked large pike and close to where Simon had got one on the fly last year. I tried the Storms, the Super Shad Raps, still nothing. 2.5 hours I’d been on the broad by now and I hadn’t had anything bar a chair. Except for the bit of tree stump covered in mussels that I finally hauled in from here. I untied and went off, lures changed to a Rapala CD11, silver with a black back, and a Super Shad Rap in gold shiner -basically a goldfish made of plastic with two trebles. Simon had his biggie on one of these but I’d yet to tempt a fish with it.
I paddled off. Spoke with a guy on the bank who’d also had nothing when
zzzzz
I was in. I stowed the paddle and grabbed the rod.
Yes, I was in. It wasn’t doing a lot though. No head shaking, no powerful runs. Maybe it was off or I’d got some weed after all?
20 yards off and up came Jack
and down went Jack
and in came Jack
It made one dash for freedom, a solid run, when near the boat and then it came alongside: it wasn’t a bad size, 3-4lb and the reason for its relative inactivity became clear. It was a damaged fish. There was a chunk of flesh missing from the right gill-cover and the raker was visible, this was the first thing (I have seen this a few times but am none the wiser as to the cause) and the second was that the hook was at the top of the eye socket rather than in the mouth.
I lifted it out and unhooked the lure from the fish
A quick pic at arms length – just fitting with it zoomed back as wide as possible and me leaning back as far as I could
and one laid across my legs for a flank shot to show better its markings
and back it went, the first fish to be taken from my Trident. Presumably the first UK freshwater fish taken from a Trident. In fact, the British record Trident-caught pike and the largest fish ever landed in the UK in freshwater from a Trident. Which still doesn’t make it any bigger but a fisherman has to have a tale, right? The best bit was that I hadn’t blanked on the maiden fishing trip.
I carried on down to the bottom and began going up the side again, deciding that I would complete one last circuit or catch one more pike and then come in as I had to get home fairly soon. I passed the chair and was just into deeper water when I felt the rod going
And off went fish two.
A lively one this, only a pound and a half or so, and when it wasn’t dashing off it was leaping out of the water
It’d also fell to the gold shiner, caught on the belly hook fully in the mouth – having come presumably from below and grabbed it from the underside. Judging by its belly (bear in mind it’s shallow here, 6 feet or so, so it wasn’t gassed up) it had already eaten breakfast. I do like a fish with an appetite.
A couple more jumps and I managed to get my fingers in behind the gill covers and up it came.
Unhooked, snapped, and back it went.
I was happy with that. Either the fish had come back on the feed or orange was the colour of the day but it was about time to leave and so I turned around and paddled back to the launch point in what was now a proper fishing kayak.
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