I came home and I slept. No alarms, I had some hours to catch up with first. I managed a couple and then started pottering; there was stuff to do around the house, there was tackle to sort out, an article to re-write and some emails to be done and with the wind blowing I was undecided on what to get up to as far as the kayak was concerned. Then it came to me, I still needed a bream for the competition and where better than that guaranteed, no-fail, dead-cert hotspot at Ellingham? So I tried calling and texting Paul to no avail. Good, no answer! No answer, no Jonah but it’s only polite and besides, despite my bitching I love having Paul along.
So I went to Asda for supplies. I had no maggots in the house but was only after one thing, the common accusation and decided on the best of the best. Yep, the Jolly Green Giant was coming fishing with me. At 84 pence a tin I was really pushing the yak out but Paul tells me big grains are the way forward, small ones just don’t cut the mustard and I knew I’d be getting premium corn here. Then it was time to go home, load up, drink coffee and leave.
Five minutes down the road and on the outskirts of town the first spot hit the windscreen. By Carlton Colville the rain was hammering down and this continued for the rest of the fifteen mile drive to Ellingham. I hate rain. I normally don’t fish in rain but I’d been at home all day and that was that. So there was me, huddled under the rear door of the Astra squeezing myself through the latex neck of my cag. Which is why I was wheezing and red when I got to the water’s edge with the Tetra, one rod and the bare minimum of tackle…
…and my sweetcorn
Now, single grains seem to not work. Double grains are required. A handful of corn chucked into the swim will bring the fish in and hopefully keep them there, a few top ups required now and again, and the two grains are fed over that. A size 6 hook, a hook length of between 6 and 10 inches and a small leger running between two bb shot finished off the end tackle (4lb line straight through, no separate hook length). My tactics? No, partly Paul and partly the internet, learning all the time, using every resource around to get what I’m after…
So there I am, tied up to the big branch in the river by the fork up to the mill race; same place as the two prior failures. Corn in, bait in and I start by holding the rod for bites; there are a few swirls and bubbles and the rain has eased. I’m using the Maxximus DX2000 reel and the Vantage Spinning 10-40g 8ft rod again, a nice set up for the float fishing though a bit on the heavy side for the smaller silver bashing; watch this space! Needed guts today though and so I waited, propping the rod onto the stump to keep it steady enough to indicate the bites as the water was low enough to do so tonight.
Five minutes passed and on the second bite I connected; PB chub at 1.5-2lb, a definite pb and I was happy, though it wasn’t a bream. Paul; called back soon after and he was somewhat envious as well as congratulatory. Very disappointing fight though, perhaps the laziest, most bored and despondent chub I’ve ever hooked; I guess it had been told it had no chance against my super powers by all the other chub from previous nights of bream fishing. In fact I’d assumed it was a bream from the poor fight which apparently they give.
[i]"Now when you've caught your chavender,
(Your chavender or chub)
You hie you to your pavender,
(Your pavender or pub),
And there you lie in lavender,
(Sweet lavender or lub)."[/i]
C.J. Cornish
Well I wasn’t going to the pub after five minutes fishing and I’d be damned if I was going to lie in lavender either. I mean come on, get real, no-one lies in lavender these days, even if it does open the heart and crown chakras as my aromatherapy friend tells me. Whatever they are. Do they have Yakras?
But I wasn’t after chub. Down went the corn again. So I’m sitting there and the rod goes every now and again and I miss it most times and then another, fin perfect, chub comes along, half a pound maybe but I have a good feeling here. Maybe because Paul isn’t about to steal my bream. But then the rod goes, I strike, I hook up and whatever has taken the bait goes absolutely mental! Another chub I think, or perhaps even a tench, this is really a cracking fight…I get it past the weeds and up and as it shoots off away from me I see the deep body and the dark tail fin…hang about, that’s a bream! What the hell? Bream are supposed to be placid things, like cows. It must be a Pamplona bull then! Well, I lock into this fish and it leads me a merry dance, around and around and taking line at times (!) and finally it comes close…looking down I catch some movement a couple of feet below and what do I see languidly moving towards the yak amidst the shedding scales that reflect the moonlight, watchful and patient? A pike, around 6-8lb. Well, not tonight sweetheart; I speak, like some fish-whisperer, to it. It has the power of Obi Wan telling the stormtroopers that they aren’t the droids they’re looking for. Pure poetry:
“An’ you can **** an’ all!”
I lead the bream around the other side and lift it out.
Looks to me like the second pb of the night! Sweet. I’ve had bream of similar size before so it’s not a definite pb but a probable but I can’t be bothered to look through all the photographs.
I let Paul know, and Mark who’s been taking the mick for a few days now. I’ve been less than half an hour on the water. I consider leaving on the up but decide to stick it out for a bit longer in case I can get a definite pb and besides the rain has stopped, the fish are on and I’m enjoying myself. And I have another point.
From Izaak Walton’s description I’d like to see a biggie after all.
[i]The Bream being at a full growth is a large and stately Fish; he will breed both in Rivers and ponds: but loves best to live in ponds, and where, if he likes the water and Air, he will grow not only to be very large, but as fat as a Hog: he is by Gesner taken to be more pleasant or sweet then wholesome; this Fish is long in growing, but breeds exceedingly in a water that pleases him, yea, in many Ponds so fast, as to overstore them, and starve the other Fish.[i/]
But no, along comes a small rudd to the corn.
Try again. Some bubbles and twitches are seen, some fish are about, more corn in the water, I’ve used 1/3 of a can now I guess…I strike too late and miss some bites, it gets darker, I cast again and again moving between two or three spots and then I get a twitch, twitch, twitch, pick up, tip bends, wallop! And we’re off! Line being ripped from the reel, rod arced over somewhat, fish shooting around the swim, I struggle to get it up to the surface and wonder what the hell I have on here! I lead it past the reedbed then it turns and dives in; I pull it free, it shoots to the other side, again tries to make cover but glides over the top; I get a sight of a broad back, big fin and tail, it’s a big fish, a carp maybe? That’d be a good catch, a river carp! It dives straight into the reeds and is stuck. Damn! Pulling doesn’t move it. Slack lining doesn’t move it. I have no choice but to untie and paddle around and over the reedbed to try and lift it from another angle it’s having none of it. My headtorch goes down past the shot but I can’t see the fish in the weeds. I put my paddle down and try to coax it out, try to part the reeds, try to lift the fish clear; careful now boy, that’s a sharp edge on that carbon paddle…it comes free and powers away through the swim towards some lillies; I turn it and it comes up higher in the water and then, after a ten minute battle of wits and wills I have it alongside the kayak and lift it gently in. WOW!!!
This is a definite pb, the second chub pb of the night, perhaps the third pb of the night. Remember last week when I had a pb rudd from here too? What a spot – thanks Paul! This thing is cod sized… broad, muscular,
Oh yeah, that’s a chub and a half…I have no scales, a cod that size would go 3lb plus; friends suggest between 5 and 6lb from the photos and the length of 52cm, measured against the rod butt. I’m thankful I had that rod, the guts it has were vital in getting this fish in. I slide it back into the water and, with lightning in the distance and fog rolling in I decide that’s the fish to leave on after a fantastic hour and a half session.
Marvellous.
No comments:
Post a Comment