Martin Bowler’s Adventures Martin goes on the hunt for big tench
THERE had been plenty to celebrate this morning – not only plentiful tench, but the call of a cuckoo echoing down from the vivid green canopy bordering crystal-clear water.
I was at a water park gravel pit, a special place that had been transformed from a scar on the land into an oasis of nature. The tench in front of me were numerous and hungry, so the more I fed, the more I caught.
By lunchtime, bites were still regular as clockwork and I was frustrated that I had to leave – rather churlish of me, given that I’d caught a number of eightpounders and a nine.
All this took place just a 30-minute drive from home, so surely I’d be keen to get back there? Strangely, no, even though tench would be top of the agenda next time I fished!
Cotswold Water Park offers so much but one thing is missing – the chance of a double-figure tench. Plenty are claimed, mainly by carp anglers, and I’m sure there’s the odd one in there, but I doubt that this complex gives me a realistic chance.
After catching hundreds and never bettering 9lb 13oz I would indeed be the world’s unluckiest angler not to have caught at least one double, and unlucky I’m not. So, to scratch the itch of the specimen angler within there was only one sensible option – a trip across the Dartford Bridge and into the Garden of England.
In Kent there’s the chance not only of a 10-pounder but a rarefied tench a couple of pounds heavier than that. Nowhere can compete with the marvellous Medway Valley Fisheries, but I had another reason for travelling so far – to spend a couple of days in the company of Peter Gibbinson.
Peter has a very famous surname in the carp and specimen world, and in all our conversations I can sense he’s immensely proud of his father Jim – quite right too!
Jim Gibbinson caught an amazing array of big fish, and his ability to clinically dissect his successes and explain them in
a way the general angler could understand is what made him stand out from his peers.
His many articles and books helped to make my generation better anglers. My copy of ‘Modern Specimen Hunting’ is particularly well-thumbed!
I was, therefore, delighted that when I arrived in Kent to meet Peter he had brought along another of Jim’s classics. It was lovely to decide on where to fish on the basis of his dad’s words and pictures. Wonderful, enigmatic images of the Larkfield Complex spoke to me now as much as they had years ago, and made me eager to cast for tench in those spots mentioned in the book.
The lakes have matured and
blossomed under the stewardship of Medway Valley Fisheries, but the quality of the fishing remains superbly unchanged. The evocatively named lakes – Railway, Road, Island and Oceans – are synonymous with doublefigure tench. But to give you some idea of the richness of this area we didn’t choose any of these to fish. Larky 2 was our destination.
This gravel pit, split by bars and islands, is as prolific a tench water as anywhere I’ve fished. I love this type of topography, and while the estate lakes of Dorset and Wiltshire, where I now live, hold their own charm I don’t think you can beat fishing to the back of a gravel strip.
The lake bed of the swims we picked resembled an egg box, and we were following in the footsteps of several Drennan Cup winners of recent years. I was so excited to get going I didn’t stop to think about how I should fish, and this mistake was to cloud the result of my trip. At least I learned from it.
Without thinking, I began to bait up as I had done at Cotswold Water Park. We were now well into the tench season, and their appetites were suppressed from a combination of spawning and weeks of angling pressure.
I should have begun feeding cautiously, and you know the rest – once it’s in you can never take it out!
I caught a carp and a few moderate tench but Peter, on the other hand, held back and exercised caution, proving he was a chip off the old block.
A Drennan Bolt feeder filled with maggots supplied his only free feed, so the swim was never overwhelmed. It seems a worm hookbait outscores everything else at the moment in Kent, so Peter threaded a section on to a braided hair and fished a short hooklength.
He visited my swim more than once wearing a big smile, but it was never broader than when he asked me to verify the weight of his personal best tench – 10lb 10oz.
What a wonderful moment, and one I’m sure Jim would have been very proud of, given his close association with the Medway Valley.
On this occasion Kent hadn’t surrendered a huge tench to me, but I was reminded what a special place this is as I celebrated a Gibbinson family success with my friend Peter.
If you want to catch a specimen I don’t know of a richer county, so why not visit the Garden of England and carve out your own slice of tench fishing history?