Des Taylor’s
A nasty fall in the worst week of my year
Diary of a Countryman
IT’S fair to say I’ve just had the worst week of my year so far, but more of that later. Thankfully, I’ve also caught a few fish, and by the time you read this I’ll hopefully be back in fine form and ready for a great start on the river with chub and barbel.
This season I am not going for the two-rods-up-in-the-air jobbie on boilies as I often do. Instead it’ll be a single-rod approach on leger or maybe even float gear. I’ll be taking a few pints of maggots and some meat for rolling over gravel beds and striking at bites instead of grabbing the rod to stop it going into the water, which can happen when you’re hair-rigging boilies.
I am not belittling the selfhooking boilie method at all, and I’ll be doing a lot of it again this season, but it’s nice to have a change. I’m especially looking forward to some floatfishing.
Here’s how my week went…
WEDNESDAY
Tench fishing with my mate Bill Finch, and how we blanked I simply do not know! We had fish bubbling all over the swim but we tried corn and maggots from 5pm until dark and never had a bite.
I’ve had this happen in the past when the tench are preoccupied with natural food, but at least you get a couple – not this time. Just when you think you have it sussed, our sport proves we still have much more to learn.
I know some would say if we’d used a bolt rig and a small boilie instead of a float we’d have caught, but I really want to get my floatfishing skills back to where they were a few years ago.
Having caught a number of big trout lately, several 20lb carp and a 35lb-plus carp I thought I was on a roll, but it was back to reality with a bang there!
THURSDAY
My live Facebook stream, and this week I had to put a few people straight on my thoughts on otters.
Some people verbally abuse me about my stance on otters and yet they know nothing about me nor my love for wildlife, including otters. I have no problems with otters in balanced numbers but right now they are out of control.
Nothing is being done about that and nothing will be done, because everyone in power has too much to lose if they go against our best loved mammal.
I’m getting sick and tired of defending the rights of serious, long-term and knowledgeable anglers and it’s reached a point when the other day I asked the wife if she would be interested in leaving this country as John Wilson and his wife did. When our granddaughter is a little older we may well do that. This country has grown too small for old-school folk like me.
FRIDAY
I knew it would happen! With the humid overnight temperatures I thought the carp would spawn, and so they did.
When I arrived at the lake just after dawn they were jumping and rolling in the marginal weeds and some were even jumping into the branches of the waterside bushes and small trees.
I put the gear back into the car and phoned the pool’s owner, who promptly shut it for the next few days or until the carp had finished their spawning activities.
I headed home, stopping at a mobile café for a breakfast, and spent the rest of the day in my tackle den, tying rigs and messing about in tackle bags ready for a two-day session on the River Wye on June 16.
To be honest I was glad I had come home because the rain came down cats and dogs and it would not have been pleasant out there.
The Wye is low at the moment but this rain should have put some fresh water into it, making it perfect for the start of the season. I can’t wait!
SATURDAY
To a small, clear pool with Andy Taylor and his father Bob in search of tench. Although I say it myself I fished well, with more than 20 tench falling to my waggler and maggots tactics fished over a sloppy mix of Sensas Lake Noire, a dark groundbait which I find is a must in very clear water.
Sadly, the day went pear-shaped as I came down the steep bank from the car with the camera to get the lads to take some photographs. I tripped and fell badly, hurting my head, shoulder and back. It really knocked me about and in the end I went to hospital where they reckon I had damaged a nerve and muscle in the kidney area. I also acquired a lump on my forehead and a badly bruised collar bone. Sorry, folks, I never did get that photo of the tench.
What really got to me was that I had to cancel a two-day boat trip after big tope, which would have been impossible with all that pain. Whoever said fishing was a relaxing sport?
Mind you, the text from Andy, saying they were going to fill the hole I made when I landed with water and make another tench pool was a little out of order…