Short afternoon session

I have struggled for an opportunity to fish over the last couple of weeks and on the occasions I have had the chance to go the rivers have been in flood and the still waters I want to fish are a bit of a drive for a short session. Fortunately I had a few spare hours this afternoon and EA website indicated that the river level should be ok. I decided to fish further upstream than I have before and I arrived at the river for around 1130hrs. I traveled light so I could remain mobile, tactics for the day was 1 bait rod and 1 medium lure rod.

River condition - getting better 

I found a deep section on the near bank and cast a ledgered smelt there which also gave me the chance to test my new 'line gate' arms for the backbiters.

New line gate heads for backbiter arms

I had a quiet first 45 minutes, backbiters remained silent and no knocks on the lures so I moved further upstream. The smelt was cast slightly downstream of a snag, which looked like it would hold a fish or two and I continued to explore the stretch with the lure rod. After around 5 minutes I noticed the arm on the backbiter starting to move, then the alarm sounded. I removed the rod from its rests,closed the bail arm, wound down and lifted into a fish. A small jack was the result, to be honest I was a little disappointed as the swim looked really promising. This jack took my pike tally to 4 for the season.

Better than a blank !

Other than the jack I had no other takes on the bait or the lures, I did get to have a bit of a play with the line gates and they seem pretty good, hopefully I will be able to give them a more thorough testing soon.