It’s been so long since I’ve taken a float rod out after the silvers on the river. I’ve finally got around to shortening my 10ft match rod to 7ft and with it in the van and Si asking to borrow a yak to take his cousin up the Waveney for a paddle it seemed like the perfect time to test it out. I do enjoy summer float fishing and stopping off at the tackle shop for a quid’s worth of red maggots I figured I might have a bit of fun…if the bloody downpour seized!
I pitched up at the quay and unloaded, the others already there. It was clearly a bit of an event as not only were Si and J there but also assorted wives and children, ducks and swans and passer’s by.
Sticking my van in the car park around the corner I returned and we set off, a Rapala getting chucked out the back briefly before it hit the bottom and picked up some weed; wait until the main flow then I guess.
I made it all of 500 yards and then decided to stick the float under the bridge supports where I’ve had plenty of success previously on the chub. I had to wait all of twenty seconds before my 4bb float dipped under, a small chub taking the size 16 into its mouth.
A cast or two later and I had a Rudd; nice.
Chub, Rudd, chub, roach…
Next up, an unexpected surprise (as all surprises are) was a skimmer. Sadly this little bream had taken the hook a bit deeply and was bleeding from the gills as I brought it aboard. There seemed little point in returning it to die so I made use of it and popped it on a livebait trace in the hope that a marauding pike might take a fancy to it.
It was easy here, plenty of fish were around and I decided to move to the other bank and fish the uptide support where I’d often done well in the past. In went the float and after numerous casts and a good twenty minutes or so I’d failed to catch a fish. Back to the other bank and the uptide side of the bridge supports. Bingo! After a couple of roach I pulled in the first of a pair of an old favourite. A Gudgeon.
I meandered up river after a while, with fish topping all over the place and passed a dead bream of a few pounds, bloated and stinking. Stopping off here and there I managed a roach and a few small chub but nothing special and didn’t seem to connect with many of the bites as I paddled the mile or so up to Barsham outfall where Si had called to say he’d seen some quality perch.
Amazed I’d not had one by the bridge supports I was hoping they’d still be there. I failed to attract anything on my trolled J13, other than weed, so stowed it as I pulled in to the side and cast my single red maggot to the front.
More roach followed and then, finally, a perch.
It wasn’t of any size but it was another tick in the box and a very pretty tick at that. I carried on catching, chub and bream from the same spot too and then Si and J reappeared, fortified by chips and beer and pulled up alongside. J had brought a bottle of Gone Fishing ale for me as a thank you and, thirsty, I had a couple of swigs before handing him the rod and getting him to try his hand.
There were numerous tiddlers sucking the bottom half of the maggot and no end of strikes were missed before he finally landed his monster!
Honour was restored. We headed back to the quay then, still nothing doing on the troll, and met back up with the families with my having 1 Rudd, 9 chub, 2 bream, 15 roach, 2 Gudgeon and 1 perch to add to my list. I could have had way more had I stayed in that first spot but I fancied a bit of travel too! Back at the slip, Si’s son had a go on Whippersnapper’s kayak for a bit after J had landed, beaming and overjoyed at how his day had been and as we left to fetch the vehicles I spotted a bunch of fish under our noses. I turned and asked the kids if they wanted to catch a fish…of course they did! One by one they managed a roach, all delighted and intrigued with these little silver creatures. And that was the perfect ending to a very pleasant day.
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