Dick Dastardly

Doesn't ring right to me mate as there is never a shortage of food in any TR and the energy expended to get it is minimal. Also ALL of the TR's Ive had the run of the mill on (bait and method wise) have NEVER responded to deadbaits.TR Pike show a very similar feeding MO on all these ressies which is different to most non TR waters. They seem to be very "pre programed" in the way they feed and being simple creatures cant/don't change or modify this. Im more of the opinion that the Chew Pike are more hardier and not dying from being caught.I would love to have some good info on recaptures and some details on their ages (as I suspect the big ones at Chew may be slower growing than their cousains in other ressies) Most Big TR pike are not that old in comparison to the same sized (or to avoid confussion I should say "weight" not size) non TR fish. Think of them as fat overweight teenagers rather than fully grown mature adults. As Chew was never a "contender" in my day I didn't bother cultivating any contacts with the staff there and only knowledge I have is from my own handful of trips there (on official days) and that of mates who have fished there. Its only in relatively recent years that the fishing there has been good enough to really attract attention..............and indeed this in turn raises the question why? Why has it never produced in by gone years and now does?Very likely the reasons why are linked with the original question we ask! As well as food it seems to me that water quality is a great contributor to big TR pike. When the pipe was built to pump water from the Medway into Bewl water it was both noticeable how this affected the water clarity and eventually the piking. Certainly stopped the place (IMO) being the countries No 1 water. In fact this did more damage to the waters ability to keep on throwing up above record pike than all the years of gill netting ever did! Be a very worthwhile study for any fisheries student.

No not my cup of tea either! Im allways interested in what waters are producing/have produced as this certainly shows their potential. However Im not interested at all in trying to catch a particular fish! That said I think its to easy to dismiss the list of caputres from some of these "chasers" as it must take a lot of dedication,drive and hardwork but its simply not for me!

Yes sorry always been under my real name (or what people have always known me as) on here but a couple of seasons ago Si changed it to Dick Dastardly as a reference to a joke on the Wingham Fish In! Should get it changed back really as it has caused some confusion before this! I see what your saying re the TR fishing now and understand. Its not the TR fishing itself but the way it comes about? I see hundreds of people at them who arte not really interested in the piking itself but just the chance of an "easy" big fish. Please note I think there is nothing EASY about actually catching one (all though like all angling there is an undoubted element of luck) but more as you say the fact that the "ground work" to find these monsters is side stepped by just applying to a known water. There have always been a few if us that have been a few lucky enough to have acsess outside of these "circus's" but by the very nature of it it has always been something we have had to be very selfish about as Im sure you can appreciate. Its gone for me now but I tell you I will never forget the feeling of excitement, unbelievable privaledge of turning up out of season (trout) at a TR opening the gate with my own key and having one of the countries premier trout waters all to myself (well with my mate!). And as for pushing a multitude of bank sticks in to "hallowed ground" well that's "sex wee" time!

Oh should also mention then when I mentioned the wrong grapvine etc I was talking generally and not as such directly aiming this at you. Simply because other than here I don't know you so wouldn't know your contacts/situation/experience etc as I certainly wouldn't expect you to know mine unless you are a part of a very small group which obviously your not.

Ive not explained myself very well (or in fact come across properly!) As I first said I don't know why Chew is bucking the normal trend and have offered a few sugestions. Also I have offered qalternative answers to your questions in a hope that people would add more (your self included) To explain my position and indeed what lead me to make the statements I have- I was very heavily involved in the early days of the TR revolution getting acsess to many for many. I am also lucky enough to have fished on all the major initial trials on the major resses. I count all of the acknowledge TR experts (angling wise) of the late 80's to the new century as friends and fishing companions. I was heavily involved with the Pike fishing on both Bewl Water and Bough Beech. Up to now Ive never spoke publicly about my angling at Bewl for fear of jepordising it. However most in the piking world new of it and now the piking is finished there I will no longer be fishing it so have nothing to loose and my partner who worked there full time has also since left..Now my involvement with both gave me far more than the privaledged fishing I enjoyed there but also acsess to the world of trout reservoir management. You can no doubt guess what doors this opens for you and the information you are privy to. I hate to sound big headed but Im afraid this experience has simply made me one of the small group of "experts!" (for lack of a better description) on the subject. Maybe not so current now admittedly but many still remember and I am one of those "privalidged" few you mention who gets invited to fish and doesnt have to worry about getting a ticket for "trial days" Yes it is "unfair" but that's the way of the world. Again Im afraid its pointless trying to debate this with many people as they simply don't have the practical experience of both TR management or TR piking and certainly not the combination of the two. Like I said a handful of people.Sound very arrogant don't I ? but no other way to say it! I tried to edge around it but it seems best to just lay the cards on the table. I can hear people saying now "Never heard of Budgie Burgess" but that Im afraid just proves my point! anyone who does have the knowledge/experience Im on about will have. Yes the days I had the run of Bewl and helped run the trials at both Bough and there are gone but the point is I WAS THERE! and few others can say that! Old experience to base these things on admittedly but EXPERIENCE non the less. The things you say Ive3 contradicted my self on...well I will try and clear them up. Other than the lumps we killed in gill nets I know of only 5 fish in total (Im talking big fish) that were found during the period dead at Bewl and only two at Bough........BUT I took many many dead fish out of our holding cages! fish that anglers had caught and seemingly without any harm.I again refer to all the great TR's of the 90's tell me how many are still producing (in fact ever produced like the initial few trials) where did these fish all go to? That's how I KNOW they die after capture not by the ocaissional body found. In the cold water conditions that these trials are inevitably held in dead fish normally sink (the swim bladder don't pop em up its the gas from decomposition) they then rot on the bottom.I dived Bewl after the great Perch deaths and seen the bottom littered with big perch corpses but never seen one floating! Anyway this isn't about me claiming to be "best placed to comment" I was just tryinfg to justify my comments and point out the simple fact that there are very few who are placed to make educate,knowledgable contributions to such a specialist subject. Did I offend you when I questioned your stance on TR piking? I certainly didn't mean to but by your reply I sense I must have? As you are allways such an interesting contributor on here I was genuinely interested in your views and therefore your stance. Re the braid I wont bother answering that as no doubt some one will take the wrong reaction to me trying to share more "insider" information. People who wouldn't will have already asked my opinion privately and I will have responded.I shouldnt have got drawn in on this one but I did.....................................

You also mention "repeat captures"... other than repeat captures during the same season (often within a few days of each other) its very rare for this to happen in fact Im struggling to think of any well documented examples. Im not sure of your stance on the whole issue of TR piking though as one moment you appear to be championing it and defending it then next branding it as a "circus" ? Im interested in your thoughts on this?

And if they do die what makes you think anyone would be aware of it? Why do so many anglers assume dead fish float and are found? On the Res's Ive been involved with I know of less than a handful of fish found dead over 30 years! But I know for a fact that many have died. However you can only choose to accept or refute what I say as without sounding arrogant I seriously doubt whether there are more than a few handfuls of people who could speak on this subject with any authority born from practical experience..Having been involved heavily in this scene for many years I can assure you that the world of trout reservoir piking is indeed a very specialist one, and one that the angling media or acknowledged "expert pikers" in fact no very little about indeed. What most see (like the publicised fish ins on the likes of Chew is just the !"public face" of it and certainly not one to set any stock by. However your missing the point. I have said quite clearly that Chew seems to be an exception. If you think not then show me ANY other res that has continued to produce fish yet alone actually improve since their initial opening seasons? How many of these have you/do you fish regularly (or your friends)? Best "grapevine" information on these waters comes from the people who work on them every working day not the visiting "guest" anglers who get a few trips in each year. And the "grapevine" to be on then is certainly not the "angling" one but the "fishery management" one. TR's keep stum about what goes on with their pike etc for two good reasons....first they don't want to deter potential customers (both their trout and pike ones) and secondly don't want to incur criticism from non trout anglers re the often unpalatable (to non trout anglers) means of predator management. Its a very political world.

I was lucky enough to meet and talk with a very famous and sucsessfull Salmon angler. He told me that he believed the "secret" of his sucsess was simple. He was wealthy enough to have acsess to some very good beats AND the bailiffs/river keepers on each of these would contact him when there were fish in the river(s). He was in a position to then stop work and fly up and fish! As he told me "It doesn't mater how skilled a salmon fisher you are you cant catch them if they are not there"!

Yes the management are really going to tell potential customers that pike have died! and yes pike anglers would happily admit their own actions are killing them! I THINK NOT! LOL! Im just basing what I say on EVERY other Trout Reservoir Ive pike fished and the now historical facts. Explain to me then why NONE of the big resses that have produced well in their early years have never done so subsequently? However as I openly admitted Chew has bucked this trend (thankfully) and Im at a loss to offer possible reasons why. One thing I can say though that may be relevant is that unlike all the others Chew didn't producev real lumps straight away after it opened its doors. Took several seasons for it to do its first 30. Maybe this is a relevant factor? I don't know. Back in my day (because of my involvement with Bewl Water) I was privy to a lot more information on each of the resses management policies and subsequently information about what they were producing. This is no longer the case (to an extent) so my info these days is much scarcer.

I honestly don't know Steve! Its the only Trout Res EVER that has not only kept producing after the first few seasons of trials BUT actually got better and thrown up bigger fish. For some reason Chews fish seem a lot hardier than other TR's.I (and many other TR Pike specialists have long believed that most of the TR pike we catch don't survive the experience. Now Chew Pike either do or just simply keep on coming up through the ranks! Not been that involved in the scene for many years now but would be interested to know the REAL predator management policy there and info on recaptures.

Big fish and not fresh run either bet it was a good 5lb heavier (if not more) when fresh

Where abouts are you toy town?

Basicly insider knowledge or simply by identifying a braid by looking at/handling it is the only way but not that difficult.

A bit controversial and thats why Ive not said it untill now! There are many many myths about braid! Forget the ones about the actual stuff itself for now as they are not really relevant to this topic however lets look at some of the more relevant ones. Im not entirely sure how many actual manufactrers of brad there are in the world to be honest but I wouldnt mnd its the same as mono in that there are only a few! Work is sub contracted out and often the smaller "companies" are owned by the same parent ones! In the 90's there were only FIVE manafacturers of mono n the world and TWO of those were subsidery companies of one of the "Big Three"! Braid can be made from different quality materials BUT the real cost in manafacture (and therefore the resulting quality and ex factory price) is the actual braiding process. Better quality,lighter,rounder profile braids normally consist of more individual strands being braided together. This takes longer even on the amazing machinery used. So better quality braid costs more to make. BUT this isn't the MAJOR reason for difference in cost! Better quality products are normally sourced and sold by big companies who invest a lot of money in marketing and advertising (forget the cock and bull stories of investing in development this is usually done by manafacturers as very few wholesalers/distributers actually do any development just simply source products) And its in the marketing and advertising that the masive differences in prices acrue. Same as any product the closer to the source of manufacture you can get it from the cheaper it will be. In the "old days" big manufacturers would stay loyal to the big distributors and only supply them with the same exact product. These days the Chinese account for the greater majority of manufacturing and have no such morals! Which does us (the end user) BIG favours. Small enterprising companies now purchase all sorts direct from the manufacturer at the same/similar price (obviously there are better prices per item for larger amounts) and as they dont have the same huge marketing/advertising costs they can sell at a lot lower price. Therefore you can buy exactly the same item that is called "X" by the major company for a lot less as its now called "Y" by the smaller one.Not a cheaper or inferior or different model but EXACTLY the same bar any logos etc.This explains GOOD "cheap" products such as some of the braids. However there are two more factors to be aware of! These are "Fake" or so called "fake" goods. True fakes are just that ie inferior quality products sold as "the real thing" and (of more interest to us!) "so called fakes" These are actually the real item sold as the real item but not from the people whose name apears on the label! Confussed? I will try and explain! The imaginary company we will call "Mega Braid" Mega braid sells top quality braid that it has manafactured in (imaginary)factorey "String is Us" MB pays a lot out in overheads and sells the braid at £20 for 100m after buying it at £2. "Good deals" also buys the exact same product for £3 but as he puts his own label on it and doesnt bother with the same extent of marketing/advertising and can sell it at £15 and still make a good profit."Scummy Dealer" comes along and also buys the same braid at £2 - £3 BUT he cashes in on the advertising/marketing that MB has paid for by putting "fake" MB labels on and selling it as MB braid at the same (or cheaper) price as MB! Thus making more profit or just capitalising on MB's promotion but using the lower price to "steal" sales. So often the "cheap braid" that is as good as the "real stuff" is the real stuff! So forget about labels,advertising blurb and prices just try braids untill you get one that works and source it at the best prices! Poor quality braids are poor regardless of price and can soon be seen as such. Now Ive bored you all to death I will bugger off!

You mention "Action" Ian.Before the turn of the centurey blanks were made with vastly different tapers and indeed combinations of tapers to get them to bend (the "action") in the required way for each job. Since then it seems that many blank manufacturers (especially cheaper massed produced Chinese ones) now use the same mandrel and just increase the number of wraps of cloth (ie make the walls thicker) to increase the test curves relying on this to enable the rod to do different jobs rather than using the old method. No coincidence that this came about the same time as so called "multi range" rods hit the scene! Also why the lower manufacturing costs (as well as the cheaper far east labour of course) has allowed good,usable rods to be now brought so cheaply. For those reletively new to angling may I remind you that the blanks alone for the Tricast rods I mentioned cost over £100 (and that was trade!)

Ive owned hundreds of rods and built probably more than a thousand. Ive got three Tricast 1 3/4lb carp rods (carbon) brought and built in the mid 80's that I used up untill a few years ago. Originally built/brought for carping but in later life (90's onwards) used for big still water bream. Now these had "softened" with age.....or had they? They "felt" softer but was this just because I had by now got used to more pokier carp rods? I honestly dont know. Surely the only way they could become softer is if the materials used to make them had started to deteriorate and effectively mean the blank was actually breaking down? Would/could this be the resin? as I doubt the fibre it self would deteriorate? Maybe some one who works with composite fibres could say. I find this hard to believe as if they were actually breaking down now (some 20 years later on after they "went soft") they would have broken? Another point is that most fellow rod builders I know agree that blanks "dry out" (for lack of better description) with age and this in turn makes they brittle and as such should surely mean "stiffer"! Ive discussed this with very knowledgable rod builders,blank manufacturers and anglers and none have been able to convinvce me either way! Much as this thread has shown!

Golden rule with braid isd to allways select it in a similar size diameter to the diameter of the lbs breaking strain mono you would have used for the same job ie if you use 15lb mono for piking this has a diameter of around 0.35mm so chose a braid with a sim,ilar diameter regardless of the breaking strain.Reason for this is that you then avoid all the common "problems" with handling and abbrasion resistance that people who choose by breaking strain do.

Been a long time braid user and tried several types.With ALL braids (but it seems especially the cheap ones) there is a huge variation in quality.This is basically the quality of the braiding and therefore its resulting profile and diameter. If you can find a cheap braid that you like then great but these days I tend to stick to a couple of time proven favourites.These dont unfortunately fall into the "cheap" range but its really a bit daft as most base "cheap" on the initial purchase price.I base it on how long the braid lasts. Better braids last longer simple as that. You wont go far wrong with Power Pro, Spiderwire Original (hard to source these days) or even (believe it or not !) some of the Fox braids (both their Driftmaster and Trollmaster braids are excellent with Horizon not being to bad either) I have some regularly used braid that has still not been reversed after over 15 years of regular (Winter) use! Now I reckon if you take into acount that you would be changing mono each season the "cost per year" works out well in the favour of braid (good braid).

Thats interesting Phone.Allways thought I was pretty up on US tackle terminology but had allways assumed they reffered to casting weights/rod actions. Live and learn as they say.

01 on ABU reels denotes lefthand wind ie the handle on the left hand side.

I knoiw the EA were checking the electrolyte levels at Ludham Bridge a week ago and they were in the 30's.

Just got back from my customary 2 weeks up on the Broads.Yes there has been another salt flush and yes it did affect the fishing a bit but its not been the disaster many say.Main rivers (Bure and Thurne) were a bit slow (but this is often the case in recent years) but shoot up the Ant and all is fine. Fish a chuck trotting and a few of the better bream showing on the feeder at night. As said above the Broads are "driven" by the tides and you have to accept this sort of thing is going to happen.Even after bad kills the system ALWAYS recovers.

Me to!

Andrew I can do you a good conditioned secondhand outfit of an ABU 6501C and either a Greys rod or other that would suit your needs for around £110 posted.If interested let me know as back in work tommorow and can sort out details/photos. Got some slightly cheaper rods as well.

Yes that's right. Any problems give me a yell Ken