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The Flying Tench

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Blog Entries posted by The Flying Tench

  1. The Flying Tench
    All 4 inches of him!
     
    Oxford canal 3 to 6pm. My past visits to canals in April have all been blanks, so almost anything was going to count as a success. I started float fishing maggot under the rod tip in a very narrow stretch. I guess I had too light a float, and it was a bit strange to see the wind blowing the float against the flow. So I switched to an area where a passer by told me Zeds roamed, and soon switched to maggot feeder. Almost at once two decent roach of 6-7 oz, and a perch of about 1lb 8oz. Then it went dead, and I missed the few bites - must use my shaved-down quiver-tip next time. Then, just before I packed up, a tiny zander. The first I've ever caught, so that definitely counts as my best April canal day so far.
     
    Next time I'll take the ultra-lite gear.
  2. The Flying Tench
    3-6pm
    My hope was to catch some of the quality roach which tend to reside in commercial fisheries, though it was a bit of a 'punt' as I have never been to this fishery before and had no reports on the roach fishing. The advice I was given by the guy in the shop there was to try Ben's Match Lake where they grow to 2.5lbs. Hmm, for some reason 'Ben's Match Lake' didn't ring the right bells, and the trouble with being told they grow to 2.5lbs - well, you could say that about a lot of lakes, and it's different from saying there is good roach fishing. It said on the web site that the specimen lake had good roach and perch but they were never fished for, so I suggested this. Unfortunately the minimum line strength allowed on this lake is 12lb. No wonder they are never fished for!
     
    But I took his advice, and went to Ben's Match Lake, a small lake where there were a couple of anglers fishing, neither of them for roach. The guy on my right was catching 2-3lb carp constantly, so to avoid the carp I decided not to use ground bait, but loose-fed maggot and caster, of course using those baits on the hook. I was soon catching roach and skimmers, the best roach being about 9oz. Not bad, though I had hoped for a little more. Then after a quiet spell I switched to caster & maggot cocktail, and surprisingly the bites increased, and I caught 4 beautiful crucians, 3 of them about 10oz and one 1lb 5oz. As well as these I had about 15 roach, 6 skimmers to 3lb, a perch and a rudd.
     
    Not quite what I hoped with the roach, but I was delighted with the crucians as I have caught very few of these to date.
     
    Oh, in case anyone thinks of trying these lakes, the gates close at 7pm, so you have to leave by then if you are not staying overnight. I hadn't picked this up from the website.
  3. The Flying Tench
    I went to the Oxford Canal again with ultra-lite gear hoping for a proper Zander to add to the 4" one caught on maggot last time. Alas, there was nothing doing, not even a mini perch. I assume this was because of the very cloudy water, with visibility only 2 or 3 inches, doubtless due to the 17mm of rain we've had in the last couple of days. It was certainly clearer on Friday. I'd welcome any comments on this from those with more experience of canals than me.
     
    I should have taken worms!
  5. The Flying Tench
    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 first went to the main river, where I was with Kappa on Monday. Plenty of small perch under the rod tip by the boats, but my few casts to the middle didn't register any bites, possibly because the feeder rod wasn't flexible enough.
     
    Then I moved on to Benson Weir. Surprisingly I had almost no small fish, but I had two nice perch of around a pound, one in the weir pool and one in the lock cut. Once again, despite trying a bit harder in the lock cut, no success casting and working the lure.
     
    Two very brief sessions, but I was pleased that the method worked on my own tackle, at least under the rod tip. I look forward to doing it with a proper U/L rod in the new year.
  6. The Flying Tench
    1.30 - 4.30pm The Thames
     
    Kappa kindly took me out for an afternoon introduction to U/L, borrowing his rods. The fish were in good form, and the extra flow meant they were a bit nearer, in which aided contact. Nevertheless, there was a dramatic improvement on my previous attempts at lure fishing on the Thames, where I have caught one or two pike but found the perch hard to find compared with my previous experience on the Kennet. Let me rephrase that - in 18 months I have only caught one perch on lure till today!
     
    Altogether had 10-15 perch up to 1.5lbs, and one pike of a bit over 5lbs. The question for me is 'What made the difference?' Smaller lures? Not a big factor on this occasion, as I was catching some of the time on the same size plastics as I had used previously. Keeping in touch with the lure? Maybe, but I was only just getting the hang of that after the cast, and on the retrieve I don't think I had been too bad with my other rod. Using a fluorocarbon trace? Very possibly. But a big factor I'm fairly sure was registering more bites with the softer tip.
     
    When Santa brings me my U/L rod, methinks I'll take my traditional lure rod along as well to do some experiments. I've already thanked Kappa for a really eye-opening session!
  7. The Flying Tench
    Took a 2/3 day fishing break on the free stretch of the River Frome with 3 objectives:
     
    a) catch a really big roach, though I realised this was a long shot
    b)catch some middle-ranking roach
    c) get a pb dace
     
    Well the biggies weren't around, and it turns out there are very few middle-ranking roach there. I was mislead on that score by a local angler when I dropped in in September. So that left the dace.
     
    Unfortunately they were a bit AWOL also. Some exceptional dace had been coming out till a week or two ago, but then after some heavy rain they'd gone somewhere! Apparently you can normally get many more bites than when I was there. I did catch about 10 dace, and they were mostly chunky fish of about 6 oz. In fact, I've never seen such fat dace. I met one angler who assured me he'd had a 1lb 7oz dace 2 weeks before! I said that I thought the record was 1lb 5oz, and this didn't seem to faze him at all! He showed me a pic on his phone, and it certainly looked a huge dace, broad and torpedo shaped.
     
    Other than that I caught some brownies. It's possible one or two could have been small sea trout, but they were mostly brownies. And I met some very helpful local anglers - but no roach!
  8. The Flying Tench
    5.30-6.30am
    I'd never caught a sea fish on a lure from the bank, and didn't really know where to start. I have memories of casting out into the ocean in vague hope, but nothing coming of it, and not really expecting anything to come of it! But on this occasion a highly skilled local angler offered to take me out.
     
    The first thing was that we met in the dark at 5am in the morning! After a short walk we clambered down rocks, also in the dark, with him giving me guidance all the way. Quite an adventure!
     
    As light came we cast our lures, and for a while it was bite a chuck, with mainly scad and a few mackerel. My tally was 4 scad up to about 12oz. Then the bites stopped, and my host advised me there was no real point in continuing. A great introduction to rock fishing for which I am most grateful.
  9. The Flying Tench
    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. I wondered if it was a pred. Sure enough, for my last 3 casts, about 3 seconds after the feeder landed, there was an explosion in the water where my feeder landed and 20-30 bleak leaped from the water, outwards from a central point. I can only assume the bleak congregated on the feeder as it went down, and the preds had learned to wait and spring on them at this point. Mean!
  10. The Flying Tench
    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 after 20 minutes was 'no', so I had a choice. Do I make up groundbait and switch to bread, or try maggot to see what was around? I opted for the latter. One or two small ones, mostly dace, though not enough to be a nuisance as in the summer. Then two chub of about 1.5lbs each.
     
    I then decided to switch to feeder. My first thought was bread, but on the basis I didn't have long, and I wasn't convinced the roach were around, I fished maggot feeder. One more chub of about 2lbs, and a couple of perch, best about 12 oz. No small ones at all.
     
    Nothing amazing, but I was pleased by the general quality of fish for a brief session with maggot.
  11. The Flying Tench
    5.30-8pm R Thames
    The object of today's fish was to learn a new technique rather than to catch fish. Phew, fortunate that! I'd never fished waggler before and gathered it might be useful on the Thames, so...
    I remembered my depth gauge this time, and was surprised to discover how uniform the depth was -10' deep from a rod length out to three quarters of the way across. A bit deep for float fishing, but not impossible. I put the 2' extension in my rod to make it 15', and used a 10BB waggler float with most of the shot bunched round the float and just one number 1 shot a foot from the hook. The idea, of course, was that the hefty float would tow the bait along, tripping the bottom.
    To my surprise, this aspect worked OK. It wobbled along like I saw in a dvd some years ago, jerking a bit with the float rising and falling in the water. I started on maggot, on the basis I didn't mind smallish fish to help me get used to the technique. Alas, this is where it went wrong. I had forgotten how many micro fish there are in this stretch, and the maggot came back chewed each time, even though there were no discernible bites. What worried me was this - if the float was too hefty to register bites from micro fish, would it register a bite from a shy monster roach? I'll start a thread on this.
    I then switched to hemp 'n tares, but got no clear bites, so decided to switch to stick float. With the more sensitive float I was getting bites all the time, but it was obvious that it was the small fish having a go at the tares. Hmm, at this point I couldn't see how to avoid the micros, so decided to call it a day.
  12. The Flying Tench
    5.30-8pm. Went to the 'easy Thames' where dog-walkers go, where the banks are clear of nettles, and where there was a decent flow and 7 feet of water one and a half rod lengths out. Ideal for trotting. The aim of the session was to try hemp and tares.
     
    My experience of fishing with hemp is mainly limited to the 'good old days' when I was a teenager. My twin and I got on the Green Line bus from north London to Walton-on-Thames one day, and fished for roach. It was a killer bait in those days to the extent that it was sometimes banned. We didn't catch anything big, but it was bite-a-chuck at times and a great day's fishing.
     
    In recent years I have tried hemp a couple of times, but hardly got any bites at all. But I've heard hemp and tares recommended for the middle Thames to winkle out the bigger roach, so thought I'd give it a try.
     
    I started feeding hemp, with a few maggots, and maggot on the hook. Quickly had a chub of about 1lb and a roach, but then the micro fish moved in. So after half an hour switched to tares on the hook and started getting the occasional bite. It was never bite-a-chuck, but it was pleasing to catch about 10 roach on a new bait, with the best a respectable 8oz (approx).
     
    But it felt a bit of a 'cop out' fishing this particular stretch. I'll probably try the wide river next time
  13. The Flying Tench
    5.30-7.30pm Kennet
    Spent the first 90 minutes alternately sheltering from the showers and ledgering for a monster chub that got into a snag and broke me up last time. Alas, he wasn't at home - or maybe he objected to the broomhandle and rope approach I used to try and avoid a repeat this time!
    Spent the last half hour jigging with my gold lame worm with the wiggly tail. It seems fish are appreciative of glamour, and I was pleased to net a 3lb 13oz chub and a 2lb 1 oz perch.
  14. The Flying Tench
    7.30-9pm
    A short exploratory session. My aim was to see whether fishing with maggot would tempt any of the better roach, or just get loads of small ones. I baited with 3mm halibut pellets, with maggot on the hook. First bite was a lovely 9 inch roach, and I was optimistic, but I didn't get any bigger ones - though it was 'bite a chuck', and there were several reasonable roach as well as some skimmers. For the last half hour I switched to sweetcorn, and immediately got a better stamp of skimmer, up to 2lb, but only one roach.
     
    Overall I had nearly 30 roach, 10 skimmers and one perch.
     
    Hmm, not sure how to get round the skimmers and small roach. I think I'll wait till the colder weather, which should reduce the enthusiasm of both relative to the decent roach which I understand are there.
  15. The Flying Tench
    6-9pm
    I first went to a hotspot on the K&A Canal. Water very clouded. I tossed out my trusty Mepps Aglia and started getting 'knocks'. Now according to the books that is what you expect, but it has never been my experience. Up till now, when I got a 'knock' it meant I had encountered a bit of weed - at least, I think so. But these were too high in the water, and I was fairly sure it was fish. Could this have been linked to the murky conditions? I'd be interested in any views.
     
    Then, after a few casts I had a nice perch of about 2lbs. A truly beautiful fish which I put straight back at risk of scaring the shoal. I went back to the car to get the scales and keep net, but after that it all went dead.
     
    I then went to a small private Kennet weirpool. The water was low and very clear, and the perch didn't show any interest in my lures - and I had forgotten to bring lobworms. I messed around for a bit maggot fishing to find where the prey fish were, but even there the perch (and pike also) weren't interested. I made some mental notes for next time.
  16. The Flying Tench
    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 your car right up to!
     
    Earlier in the day I had checked out another syndicate which was the opposite, with access not for the faint-hearted - with hazards ranging from herds of obstreperous cows (bolshy teenagers) to a very rickety bridge that my car wasn't too keen on - so it was good to arrive at the more civilised setting of Carmel.
     
    I chose a 'perfect' swim, 10' deep just a rod length out, with a gentle but steady flow. With regular rowing crews tanking down the centre of the river (the women outnumbered the men) I reckoned the fish would be close to the bank. I started to trot maggot. Problem number 1 was micro-dace. The surface boiled each time I chucked in some maggots. So I switched to sweetcorn, but the fish weren't interested apart from one chublet. Then I tried maggot again, casting out of range of the micro-dace, and drawing the float back in when the bait had had a chance to sink, but no luck again. My aim had been to catch trotting, but for the last few minutes I switched to maggot feeder, and had a better chublet and a small roach.
     
    Conclusion: part of the problem had been my trotting skills. Maybe I hadn't got deep enough, the problem being false bites through weed. I'm a Thames novice, so it will be interesting to learn how to fish this lovely river, so different from the Kennet! All advice welcome.
  17. The Flying Tench
    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 interested. Just before this the owner came out for a chat and mentioned that it had been fishing very well for decent sized pike, so I knew how to fish the final hour.
     
    Fished wobbled smelt and roach. Had one take from a fish of about 5 lbs when it was quite dark, but I didn't hook him properly. That was it. A small point of note was that both pike took the bait very close to the bottom, unlike some trips wobbling when they follow the bait and take high in the water.
  18. The Flying Tench
    4-6pm
    I went to the same swim as the last 2 weeks,where I reckoned a lot of fish would be concentrated to get out of the fast flow, but after getting a pb dace last time I decided to leave the perch and see what other silver fish might be around.
     
    My first approach was with bread over specialist roach ground bait. Immediately I was getting little touches, but they were hard to hook. Then I caught a nice roach of about half a pound, but after that it was very slow so I decided to try maggot over the ground bait. Still slow, so I started feeding maggot, which inevitably meant attracting the perch, and things picked up to the extent of becoming bite-a-chuck by the end. As time went on I discovered that the dace were concentrated in slightly faster water then the perch - shouldn't have been a surprise, doh!
     
    Total tally was about 15 perch, best about 12oz; 8 dace, best about 6 oz; 2 roach, best about 10oz. Nothing monstrous, but an enjoyable session on the float.
  19. The Flying Tench
    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 most of the weirpool, even the back-flows, a torrent there will probably be one small calm place and that is where ALL the fish will be. And they've been putting up with these conditions now for a while, so they must be getting hungry!
     
    There was indeed one very limited calm place, but the fish MOST STUPIDLY hadn't applied the same logic as me. Where on earth were they?
  20. The Flying Tench
    2.45 - 4.20pm
     
    I had a couple of hours on the CSAS stretch of the Kennet 2 days ago. It was good to meet up with Viney, but we both blanked and I am sure part of the reason was water temperature of 6.5degC. In addition it was rather coloured, about 12" visibility.
     
    Today I went to the private weirpool I visited a couple of weeks ago. Water temp was unchanged from 2 days ago, but the colour had dropped out just a little. My plan was to do some more jigging for perch, but a guy in the tackle shop where I bought some heavier jigs mentioned that drop-shotting (at least partly in the flow) was effective in weir pools, and I thought I would try this out for the first half hour. It didn't work at all in the flow, but I caught my first ever fish drop-shotting! 3 perch, best 1lb 11oz. The first two were caught raising and lowering the bait right under the rod top, standing just to the side of where the water poured in. I had a 0.5oz weight, which I found much easier to feel with my slightly stiff spinning rod than the lighter ones I had used previously. The same gold lame plastic worm as last time.
     
    I then tried jigging for half an hour to no avail. A bit like last time, maybe I made a mistake putting the fish back in - scaring the shoal and all that? Then a couple of casts with a Mepps, yielding a small jack. By then my back was aching a bit so I finished ledgering with lobworm which produced another jack, about 2lbs.
     
    A pleasing day. First ever fish drop-shotting, and first ever fish on lures in such cold temperature.
  21. The Flying Tench
    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 cold day.
     
    I also had a few casts without the s-p, but no luck. Next time I get out the lure rod in such cold weather I think I'll try bouncing a plastic worm or real worm along the bottom. Not that I've ever caught this way so far!
  22. The Flying Tench
    I had some realistic plans for carp or perch for today, and then I heard a rumour about some good roach in one of the harder gravel pits. Typically, I gave up on the carp and perch and had a crack at the roach. Not a touch! Always the same - me and roach! I won't bore you with the details.
  23. The Flying Tench
    6.30-9.30pm
     
    Went to an easier water than last week in search of a carp. My plan was to decide when I got there whether to fish on the surface or the bottom, depending how many fish were active up top. There was loads of surface activity, but I realised I had forgotten my fluorocarbon leader and felt that 6lb mono might be a bit light, so fished with a float 12 feet out on the bottom using 8lb soft braid.
     
    I chucked in some dog biscuits and immediately a carp came and snaffled them up, so I was fairly sure I could have had some success on top - but OTOH it was good to continue with what I tried last week.
     
    By the time I had wandered round the lake and held inane conversations with the robin that came and sat on my landing net, but who refused to eat the groundbait I offered him on my shoe, I realised an hour had gone. I can't believe anyone else wastes time like I do, but I enjoy it!
     
    I started with luncheon meat (unflavoured) over propriety carp groundbait, but the carp weren't interested. After an hour I switched to bread and immediately there were little touches and then a good bite and a heavy carp went off like a train, only to smash my 8lb braid. Drat! I must have set the drag on my reel on too high a tension, and not used to fishing in the dark with a different reel from usual I was too slow to adjust. Bad fishing, really, but I consoled myself that I am a novice for this type of fishing and hopefully the mistake won't be repeated.
     
    After that one missed bite, and then the swim went dead. I'll do better next time!
  24. The Flying Tench
    7.45 - 8.45pm
    The aim of the session was simply to catch a carp on a zig rig - something I've never done. My interest in this came from a time when I was trying to catch a carp on the top from what is now really a specimen lake, and they felt all round the dog biscuit to see if there was any suspicious line there. It occurred to me that if I had the bait a foot or two down with the line coming up from a running lead below the carp might come at it from above and not encounter the line. The lake in question was deep which made using a zig rig tricky, and it never worked, so my plan tonight was to try on an easy (and shallow) lake to give me a bit of faith in the approach.
     
    I arrived at 6.30pm, but by the time I had decided between 2 possible lakes and messed about with the new rig it was 7.45pm before there was a bait in the water. I chose the lake with less birds! One thing I discovered was that, even with a bit of rig foam added, the bait wasn't buoyant enough to pull line through the lead, so I had to set a fixed line length from the lead to the bait. I was baiting up with chum mixer on the surface, so didn't want the hook bait to be too low. I should add that by now the carp were chomping hungrily on my dog biscuits, so I started full of confidence.
     
    Then things went quiet for a bit, and just as I was starting to think it wasn't going to work the tip went round and I had a nice common of about 6lbs on bread crust. But I suspect I had the wrong type of bread as the crust came off very easily, and this caused lack of confidence as I couldn't see the bait. So I switched to dog biscuit. I lost two on this. The first one went off like a train and somehow broke my 6lb trace. I don't know how that happened - perhaps he found a snag. The second one got off the hook. All three fish seemed to hook themselves, though I had not set up the lead as a bolt rig - perhaps I should have done?
     
    Then as dusk came on things quietened again, I suspect because they couldn't see the dog biscuits so well. But as I packed up I broke up a couple of slices of bread and chucked them in, and the result was wondrous to behold! Th carp were onto them in seconds, and their chomping was even less ladylike than it had been earlier in the evening. I made a mental note to use some bread next time as well as chum mixer as an attractant.
     
    Mission accomplished, I caught a fish on zig rig! Though I'm still not confident with this rig, and I think I need another go on the easy lake. The most important thing will be setting the depth a bit more precisely than I did this time.
     
    Edit 20.8.13 Water Boatmen
    An item I forgot to mention is that the lake had many 'water boatmen' making significant ripples as they swam.. Actually I my have got the wrong name for them. They have 6 legs and swim a very effective breast stroke. I wondered why the carp weren't eating them, after all they must contain protein. But then I noticed that when I threw in some dog biscuits which got the carp in feeding mood, swimming around on the surface, they started to hoover up the water boatmen as well!
  25. The Flying Tench
    A family holiday in the Vendee region of the west of France. I managed three short sessions on local lakes which had all been created by damming little rivers: Apremont, Jaunee and Gue Gorand.
     
    My aim was to try and make contact with some of the local roach. For some reason I reckon some reasonable sized ones will be found in these lakes - though my reason for thinking so is limited to one not very specific comment on a French angling website. In the first two cases I suspected from my experience last year that the problem would be getting past the Bullhead Catfish, and so it proved to be. These aggressive little blighters were onto the bait straight away, and my French was not good enough to find out from local anglers how they solve the problem - if, indeed, they do.
     
    So it was down to Lac Gue Gorand. I tried this last as it was the only lake the man in the angling shop didn't recommend for roach when I quizzed him last year, though a visit to a new angling shop half way through my stay this year yielded the welcome, if surprising, news that Lac Gue Gorand doesn't have any catfish! My trip there was limited to two hours. In the first hour I float-fished and caught very small roach. In the second hour I fished the maggot feeder a bit further out, and caught a couple of better roach, the larger being about 10oz. No big deal, but that roach looked enormous, and was a joy to behold after all the little catfish, hard fighting little critters that they are!
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