Steve Burke

Great to see you back, Dales, and on the mend after what must have been a difficult time.

Wow!

That video compared 20lb braid vs 20lb mono. I suspect the result might be very different if the comparison were between braid and mono of the same diameter. Anyone got time to do a Google search?

Cheers, Dave. Hope to see you both soon.

Thanks to everyone for their good wishes and kind words. Steve and Peggy

Unfortunately the owner has now instructed me to just patch the roof at minimal cost. We'll be getting the roofers amongst the members to advise us how to proceed.

Brilliant,Bob!

Rod Hutchinson. A true pioneer carp angler and excellent writer.

Glad you're OK. Look forward to hearing about your catches soon.

Alan Wilson?

What awful news! Peggy and I met Nick just once when he made a very long journey from the other end of Scotland just to attend the Wingham Fish-In. Although Newt and Jan came from the States, nobody from the UK has come as far. Out thoughts go out to his family and friends on this sad occasion. RIP Nick.

Cheers,guys.

I've been delaying posting this as I'd still be hoping that the Fish-In would go ahead as planned next month. However the roof of the clubhouse has collapsed and, instead of patching it again, we've got to have the whole roof replaced. Unfortunately we won't be able to get this done until after the planned date of the Fish-In. I'm sorry that it's less than a month's notice but we'd be hoping we'd be able to get the work finished in time but this can't be guaranteed. Hopefully we'll be able to go ahead once the roof is replaced and I'll post dates as soon as possible.

This occurs every Spring at Wingham. What seems to happen is the previous year's weed dies off and decomposes on the bottom. In doing so it gives off gases that are trapped underneath the dead weed. As the water temperature rises the gas expands and forces what remains of the weed up to the surface. At Wingham it normally occurs at about 8 to 9C (46 to 48F). It's a sign that Spring is on the way and shortly after the fishing much improves for species like carp and tench. This year "the bottom coming up" as it's generally called started just before last week's snow, which was particularly early as down here we've not had a cold Winter.

The freezing rain I mentioned earlier has now changed to snow. There's no way we're crossing the icy patio to feed the birds. Luckily we'd refilled the feeders before the freezing rain arrived and put out food for the ground feeders. Now we're simply throwing crumbled up fat balls out of the window. Yesterday we watched our top dog male blackbird trying to not only drive off both males and females of his own species but also redwings and fieldfares.