Nothing to report.....

I haven't been able to get out fishing for a couple of weeks now and to be honest I'm still struggling to find the time for a session. Hopefully I'm going to get out on a local water tomorrow evening for my first eel session of the year, the weather forecast doesn't seem too good (heavy rain) but beggars can't be choosers. 

I'm planning on fishing from around 7pm onwards, the water is not known for its eels but after some research I've had it on good authority that they have been caught in the past. The water is also home to some decent carp and tench, so I'm hoping for a fish or two to report.

Long range piking

With a free day I decided on a pike session and crossed the Pennines to fish one of the large lakes. After a very early start I was at the lake side for around half six and I had baits in the water by 7. The lake is reasonably shallow with very few underwater features so I decided to use the bait boat to find a drop off, after a lot of searching I found an area which went from the usual 6ft to 11/12ft, this area was around 150 + yards from the bank so the day involved a lot of time ferrying baits out.

After 40 minutes I had a take on a lamprey section, I felt the fish kick but then the line went slack, I checked the trebles and there was large scales on each of the trebles. The lamprey was taken out to the drop off again and before I could bring the bait boat ashore I had a take. I leant into the fish and it felt reasonably heavy, the pike put up a very spirited fight and tail walked twice in the last 50 or so yards.

First pike went 11lb 6oz

Thirty minutes later I had a take on another lamprey section, which had been cast around 40 yards
into 6 foot of water, this pike was a jack of around 4 or 5 lb's.

I had a couple more takes on the long distance rod, but these were either lost on the retrieve or missed. I had another fish from the drop off which went to around 8lb, again this was taken on a large section of lamprey.

The 3rd of the day

All 3 fish were caught before midday and by 1230hrs the weather had changed for the worse, the wind had picked up and the lake was becoming extremely choppy. Controlling the bait boat became difficult and locating the drop off became virtually impossible.

Drop off - larger pike were caught in this area

Fighting the waves and wind with the bait boat took its toll on the battery and it eventually gave in. I carried on for another couple of hours, recasting the dead baits when the wind allowed, but I didn't catch any further pike. I had 9 takes in total missed 3, lost 3 and landed 3. The session was hard work but thoroughly enjoyable, I am hoping to return to the water in the coming months and I will definitely be visiting it next winter.

Still Perching

I had another short session on a farm pond today from 1130 to 1530hrs. I opted for a 2 rod approach, 1st rod with a ledgered worm and a pva bag with chopped worm/caster mix and the 2nd rod was to be  a float paternostered live bait.

Ledger rig with home made light ledger stem

As on previous sessions I used a short whip to try and catch some small perch for bait. It took around 30 minutes before I started getting bites on the whip line, after another 20 minutes or so I had 4 or 5 suitably sized baits in the keepnet. I lip hooked a small perch on the paternoster rod and continued fishing for baits in the margins.

Lip hooked bait on the paternoster rig

Bites were hard to come by on the livebait and worm rigs. I kept feeding maggots over the live bait to attract some small bait fish into the area which would hopefully attract the larger perch. Eventually I had a bite on the worm rig, which resulted in strike into thin air, a quick check of the bait showed the small fish were the most likely culprit. The float on the whip slid under and I lifted into to what  appeared to be a slightly better fish, however it turned out to be a foul hooked frog !

I eventually landed a couple of fish on the worm rod but these went no larger than 5 or 6 ounces, I ended the session with 11 perch, not what I was hoping for, these perch are proving to be harder to catch than I thought they would be. 

My homemade ledger stems seem to work well, they slow the fall of the lead through the water so they don't sink into the silt and help keep the line off the bottom. I will be using these whilst targeting eels in the coming months.

I am aiming to get back on the pond next week possibly using the long pole and a running ledger rod both with worms as live baits haven't fared well so far.