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About this blog

the downs and ups of a pleasure angler

Entries in this blog

The story so far

Well here goes with a new blog. I fish the same waters around Newbury to a degee as Chris Plumb and Rusty, so it'll be interesting if it reads like that to anyone else! For various reasons I often only manage to fish short sessions. I'm really a 'pleasure angler' who still likes to catch the occasional pb, even if they are not specimens as such. I fish once a week, normally, on Mondays, and aim to post each week for a while to see how it goes.   After a couple of years with no pbs (beyond a g
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Moderate difficulty carp lake 26.8.13

6-10pm I've always liked the idea of float fishing for carp in the margins, but have never done it other than by accident on easy waters when my roach swim has been invaded. So when an angler who has been having some success with this style of fishing on one of our moderate difficulty waters invited me to come along I keenly took up the offer.   I fished 4 feet from the bank in 4-5 feet of water with luncheon meat over a mixture of shop bought groundbait and various extras. I baited and fishe
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

2

Thames trotting failed 16.6.14

7.30 - 10pm I've only lived near Wallingford since 19th March, so this was my first chance to fish the river. I've joined a club that can fish the Thames at Carmel College at Wallingford. This used to be a Jewish boarding school (it was known as the 'Jewish Eton') till the nineties when it had to close for financial reasons. I don't understand what it is used for now apart from being used as a film set for various TV programmes - and for angling, with beautifully prepared swims you can drive yo
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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general

Boddington Reservoir 1.6.22

I've done a couple of entries on this and they've been lost, so will keep it very brief. I spent an afternoon at Bod Res trying for the roach. Midwater. Plenty of bites on maggot and also 6mm pellet, but I kept bumping them and only landed about 10 fish. The problem may have been that the rod, a trotting rod, wasn't soft enough. I've got another rod more like a match rod, and will try again with that.
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench in general

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The Sergeants win this time 21.7.14

6 - 9.30pm I started in a private Kennet weirpool. Too bright, really, but I had a good (chub?) on who snagged me and threw the hook. Then, towards dusk, I moved to a perch hot-spot on the canal. A beautiful still summer evening, and I felt in my bones I was certain to catch, but the perch seemd oblivious to my spinners and worms. As the evening wore on the fish activity increased. The canal wasn't as murky as I had expected, and I saw first of all a small shoal of 2-3lb chub cruising around j
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Prawn cocktail? Mon 10th May

6.40-9.10pm local pit WT 13.5degC   The aim of the outing was to find out a bit more about the perch in a pit I've spent a few sessions on now - and also to try prawn as a new bait. I've never been keen on the messy business of chopped worm, and I hoped that Tesco's economy prawns would prove an alternative.   Started with maggot feeder tight to an overhanging tree, but zilch for the first half hour. With the water temp having dropped it didn't seem too promising, but then I noticed some f
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Jigging for perch 20.11.15

3pm to 4.45pm Thames   Plan A was to go roach fishing, but all the clouds disappeared and I though lure fishing might be a better bet. My new ultralite rod will have to wait for Christmas, but I thought it would be an interesting experiment to try jigging with a 12' feeder rod, with the most flexible tip. This would build on my tuition by Kappa a few days ago, and I would use two methods: casting to the middle of the river, and slowly working the lure in; and jigging below the rod tip.   I f
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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general

Grove pond 20.8.21

2.30 - 5.15pm I started off 'up in the water' with hemp and tares and casters hoping for some of the quality roach and rudd I've had in the last couple of months here. I had 6 roach in the first hour, but none were over about 5 ounces, so I switched to fishing on the deck practising the lift method. One nice bream about 3lbs, and 3 crucians all about 8 oz. Enjoyable fishing. 
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench in general

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14.11.16 Thames Trotting

3 - 4.30pm. Tackle shop owners and anglers on the bank are saying the same thing. For some reason the Thames is full of roach this year, up to just under a pound. Chokka. Wall to wall. Brim full. It's so full of roach that I have found myself asking if there is even room for any water! And what is more they are unbelievably easy to catch. 'Bite a chuck mate, you can't go wrong.' The only problem is that not many of them have been finding their way into my landing net.   So in sceptical mood I
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Thames chub and perch 24.10.14

3.45-5.45pm Brief session on a lovely peg where the water flows somewhat faster than normal for the Thames - 6 feet of water just beyond the rod tip. The water had plenty of colour, a lovely green-grey, and the skies were grey too - ideal conditions! My target was roach. I had plenty on hemp and tares here early in September, and they took the tares immediately - no long wait as per many venues. My first task was to see whether they were still into this bait in late October.   The answer aft
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Thames lock cut roach 25.1.16

3-5pm, WT 7DegC I chose this lock cut to avoid the wind, but found it was in the opposite direction to the forecast, so did prove a slight problem. Plan A was to fish fine for roach (float, single maggot), as in my last blog entry on the lake, though I had a plan B (lobworms for perch.). But this proved unnecessary as first cast I had a nice roach of about 6oz. Then for the first half hour it was almost bite a chuck with quality roach between 6 and 11oz, ten in all averaging 8oz, so that was 5l
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

1

Contrast of 2 lakes 22.7.13

8-9.45pm   We've had 3 weeks of very hot weather by UK standards. It was a choice between surface fishing for carp or trying a weirpool on the theory that the fish would have congregated there because of the higher oxygen level. The carp won.   I was passing by and had a look at Willows, the slightly harder of the 2 lakes from last week, where I couldn't see any surface carp at that time, though I didn't check out all the lake. This week it was very different with loads of dark shapes swimmi
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Weirpool fish - where are they? 1.1.14

I couldn't resist going out in the howly wowly wind to wet a line, even if it wasn't a very serious attempt to catch fish. Following getting my first 3 fish drop-shotting two days ago I went to a free weirpool to see if I could repeat the trick. I had already seen from the other side of the canal a few days ago that the EA had opened the weir gate wide and there was a mass of water rushing through, with almost no-where that a self respecting perch would want to go. Aha! My logic was this: with m
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Angling in a corset 19 September 2011

My slipped disk has been a pain over the summer and I haven't done any fishing, but I got a support belt thing recently that helps a lot. So I am OK now for short trips, I think.   Last Monday I tried maggot on the hook with groundbait feeder on a swim on the canalised river which is known for roach, but just got very small fish - gudgeon, roach, perch. But I saw a couple of reasonable fish just under the surface that could have been roach. So this week at the same swim I tried float and magi
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Brief Thames roach session 31.8.15

7.20- 8.30pm   A brief dusk session so I could feel I'd been out. Fishing feeder 30yds out with sweetcorn on the hook and open feeder with bread crumb, sweetcorn and 3mm pellets. A type of fishing I'm pretty hopeless at, but was pleased to catch 5 chunky roach, mainly 5-6oz, in the first half hour. One poor little fella hadn't actually been hooked, but had somehow got himself jammed in the feeder!   I was just starting to think I might get a nice roach as dark fell, when the swim went dead.
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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The Angst of Angling

Another three blanks!   24th May (WT 23 deg! about 2 metres out, 2 metres deep) Attempt to capture the big rudd in a local syndicate lake - the evening of a very hot day, where I think I had seen a few rudd earlier in the day, but couldn't see them -or interest them - in the lower light levels of eve.   31st May (WT 18.5deg) spent an hour or so chucking lures round a local gravel pit, to no effect. Hmm, I'd located the perch a few weeks ago, so thought I was onto a good bet. Saw a strange
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Blanko ergo sum

.....as the great French mind-angler Rene Dust-carts once said.   I wondered whether to report on my latest blank, and decided that, if I didn't, you might think I no longer exist.   Well I haven't caught much this winter - a mixture of other commitments, minor back trouble, and of course downright (and totally undeserved) bad luck! I've chucked a few spinners, impaled a few lobworms, caught one or two roach and perch, but nothing really worthy of comment. Yesterday was a typical example. Th
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Mon 11th Jan

3.30- 4.30pm Thick snow. Decided to take a trip to the Lambourn, armed with sweetcorn and cryogenically frozen maggots. Maybe they weren't quite frozen in my garage, but their still state for some reason made me think of those who git themselves frozen in the hope of waking up feeling better in 2,000 years time!   Delayed, typically, so time very limited, though not too worried in this cold. The aim I guess was to catch anything at all, but particularly to try out the advice Chris P gave t
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

1
Update

Grove Pond 30.4.21

3.30 - 5.15pm  This lake belongs to Wantage Angling Club, of which I am a member.  After a series of cold nights, and bright sun all afternoon, I had few expectations of catching fish, but I was pleasantly surprised. I float-fished maggot and had about 15 small roach, about 5 rudd (best a chunky 7oz) and 3 nice crucians, all about 6oz. As far as I know this lake doesn't hold any mega-specimens, but it's a very pleasant lake to fish.
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench in Update

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Coveted Angler of the Season Award

Sorry folks, I'm afraid you haven't won it. I have! IT'S MINE! Yes, the really coveted one, the one awarded by THE FISH to the angler who gives them the LEAST AGGRO. The BIGGEST BLANKER OF THEM ALL! The number of blanks I have had since May is truly astonishing. Leaving aside tiddlers and my trip to the Wye, in 12 trips I have had 12 blanks! And that's a pleasure angler in summer!   And how do I feel about this? Well, sad to say, a kind of benign idiocy has descended upon me, and I have quite
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Side-Planer 22.11.13

3-4pm. Cold bright day. Not really a proper session. I fancied giving the side-planer a walk along the flowing canal with a Mepps attached. I've caught jacks on the s-p with wobbled smelt, but never had anything on a lure and I decided to have a go. But I lacked confidence as to what was happening to the lure. There was a fair flow, and not being able to see the lure, and not having direct contact with it, I had little idea how deep it was - and I felt it needed to be near the bottom on such a c
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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10.5.19 Orchid Lakes pb bream

4-6.30pm at the Club Lake, Orchid Lakes, Dorchester   I left myself too little time, mainly because the forecast had been showers, and I decided to wait till the weather was better. But then the forecast changed, so I had a quick session.   Fished 8mm halibut pellet, with 3mm pellets in the feeder. Had carp of approx. 11lb plus bream of 6lb 6oz and 4lb 7oz. The bigger bream was a pb. I realise many anglers, specially carpers, have had much bigger bream than this, but I was still very pleased
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Private weirpool

3-6.30pm Grey sky, moderately high air pressure   I went armed with worms, maggots and deadbaits, and wasn't sure when the magic hour came whether I would try for perch or pike. Started off with float/maggot to see where the fish were concentrated, and it wasn't where they usually are! Had 3 roach, best about 8oz, and 4 mini-dace.   Then tried worm on the float with no success, so switched to jigged plastic worm. Had a 2lb jack, interestingly where the roach were. The perch weren't intereste
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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River Thames, Cholsey Marsh 21.6.19

7.30 - 9.30pm During the last 2 years I did some fishing with 8mm pellet. It worked well in the lake, but was pretty dead in the river. So I decided to try 6mm pellet to see if that would be more to the taste of the quality roach which are my main target. I used 3mm pellet in the feeder.   Just one skimmer bream, plus a number of bites including a couple which got off. I would say mostly skimmers. Maybe the roach were up in the water?
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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Mon 22 Feb 2010

3.30-5pm Had 1.4cm of ice cold rain and snow overnight, so I knew it would be hard. Tried maggot feeder and 2 dedrobaenas with maggot feed at a chub swim on the flowing canal for an hour, but no luck. So went to a private weirpool I'm allowed to fish where I've never known it to take longer than 5 mins to get a first bite from a chub, but was surprised to see a torrent running through the pool in a way I've never seen before. Mrs Chevin seemed to have moved on, so went home for tea!
The Flying Tench

The Flying Tench

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