My last couple of weeks of Feb were blown off-track by the storm winds of Eunice and her pals, and by a trip to Wales that usurped a booked trip to the famed river Itchen. (hope it went well for you, fellers).

Pre-storm, I'd had a weekday afternoon where threatened rain had me at Willows, where a brolly is better suited than my planned trip back to Speen. The weather kept others away, apart from a very friendly fully-kitted out chap just along from me who with bait boat assistance, already had 4 carp to his name by the time I plonked down. With my puny rod and scattergun casting technique, I felt rather rag-and-bone man in approach as I sat staring at my bobbins made of bottle corks and hair grips swaying in the wind, quite untroubled by fish while his bionic bite alarms screamed time after time. As we both packed up at dusk, I'd missed a couple of bites but did have a mirror of around six and a half just before close of play which I was too embarrassed to formally weigh for you as my new friend hadn't bothered with any of his l3 fish.

I had a couple of hours a few days later, the first windless day after the storms blew through, so I took some lures to the canal/river stretch either side of Bulls Lock. Don't ask why, but I'd not appreciated that the NAA's stretch of river to Widmead Lock is not only pretty long, but looks quite powerful, comparatively deep and full of fish-holding features. Whilst the only thing to trouble any of my lures were submerged branches and snags, I was enthused by the prospect of future visits quivertipping to trailing branches, or trotting the straight sections and wondered why I'd heard so little about the section. Was it because members were keeping it a secret? Or the nuisance of large numbers of pedestrians and dogs sharing the towpath, or simply the distance from any carpark? Then there was a crashing in the water as a huge, oily cormorant made it's take off run from midstream and I knew that perhaps I'd found my answer.

Next day, more winds planned (and it was a cold one too) so again lashed my brolly down at Willows. A 4lb-er first cast with a brand-new bite alarm/bobbin combo promised a bag-up, but that was it, until last cast, where a particularly pretty 8lb10 Common brought the end to my fishing month with a needed surge of spirit.